Ephraim Seehl

Ephraim Seehl

Ephraim Reinhold Seehl, in England, Ephraim Rinhold Seehl was an apothecary or chemist of German origin born in Sweden. He settled in England and was naturalised as a British Subject by Act of Parliament in 1783 (23 Geo c. 8). He was the son of Captain Reinhold Seehl (d. 1721), a German volunteer who worked his way through the ranks in the Swedish army.

He is one of only three people with addresses in Poplar and Blackwall to be found in Mortimer's Universal Director of 1763, where his entry reads, 'Seehl, Ephraim Rinhold, Copperas Merchant, Blackwall; or at the Bank Coffee-house, Threadneedlestreet.' At this time he was leasing the Copperas Works (Bromley) from his brother-in-law, the shipwright John Perry of Blackwall Yard.

Seehl traveled widely in Europe and wrote, in English, A new improvement in the art of making the true volatile spirit of sulphur (1744) and A short treatise upon the art and mystery of making of copperas.(1768)

He was a subscriber to Mineralogia Cornubiensis (1778) by William Pryce.

His autograph book shows that he was almost certainly a Rosicrucian.