Henry Wansey (10 August 1751 – 19 July 1827) was an English antiquary, who was by trade a clothier, but retired from business in middle life and devoted his leisure to travel, to literature, and to antiquarian research.
[1] He was a member of the Bath and West of England Agricultural Society, in which he served the office of vice-president, and in connection with which he published in 1780 A Letter to the Marquis of Lansdowne on the Subject of the Late Tax on Wool, in which he pointed out the policy mistakes in the tax, and maintained that commercial restrictions of such a nature were generally injurious.
[2] In 1789, Wansey was elected a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, in 1794 he visited the United States, and in 1796 he published his observations under the title An Excursion to the United States of America, Salisbury; 2nd edit.
Wansey, however, principally occupied himself with the study of local antiquities, and for some years he laboured in conjunction with Sir Richard Colt Hoare in preparing the account of the hundred of Warminster for Hoare's History of Wiltshire.
[2] Besides the works referred to, Wansey was the author of: He also contributed papers to the Archæologia of the Society of Antiquaries.