Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Leney, William S.
LENEY, WILLIAM S. (fl. 1790–1810), engraver, was born in London, and articled to Peltro William Tomkins [q. v.] He practised both in line and stipple, and was employed upon Boydell's great edition of Shakespeare, for which he executed five plates after Fuseli, Downman, W. Miller, J. Graham, and J. Boydell. He also engraved Rubens's ‘Descent from the Cross’ and R. Westall's ‘Going to the Mill.’ About 1806 Leney emigrated to America and settled at New York, where he engraved some small portraits of George Washington, John Adams, Captain Lawrence of the Chesapeake, Robert Fulton, and other Americans of note. In 1812 he entered into partnership with William Rollinson, a bank-note engraver, and having in a few years earned a competency, retired from business and took a farm on the St. Lawrence, near Montreal. There he resided until his death, the date of which is not recorded.
[Redgrave's Dict. of Artists; Baker's American Engravers and their Works, 1875; Baker's Engraved Portraits of Washington, 1881.]