Samuel Lewis (barrister)

Sir Samuel Lewis KCMG (13 November 1843 – 9 July 1903) was a Sierra Leonean Krio mayor of Freetown and lawyer.

Lewis was the first West African ever knighted and was the third Sierra Leonean to qualify as a barrister.

In 1896, he was made a knight, the first West African to achieve such an honour,[1] a year after he had been appointed mayor.

Lewis was one of nine children (eight sons and a daughter) of a Yoruba Recaptive merchant (in real estate and agricultural products) Elderman William Lewis of Oxford Street in the Freetown Municipal Council, and his wife Fanny.

His siblings - Ebenezer Albert, Christopher Bright Lewis, William Jr, John, Josiah William, Emmanuel, Jacob and Caroline Matilda Lumpkin - were all political leaders and heads of the colonial government of Freetown.