Lewis Cozens

{{Infobox person

| name = Henry Lewis Cozens

| image =

| alt =

| caption =

| birth_date = 1909{{cite book |title=England & Wales deaths 1837–2007 |page=301 |volume=8C |location=Newtown}}

| birth_place = Edmonton, London, England{{cite book |title=England & Wales deaths 1837–2007 |page=494 |volume=3A |location=Edmonton}}

| death_date = 24 April 1968{{cite journal |title=Lewis Cozens |last=Boyd |first=James |authorlink=James I. C. Boyd |publisher=Talyllyn Railway Preservation Society |journal=Talyllyn News |date=September 1968 |volume=59 |pages=34, 35}}

| death_place = Newtown, Powys, Wales

| occupation = Author, historian

| years_active =

| known_for =

| notable_works =

}}

File:Talybont and Victoria locomotives.jpg locomotives Talybont and Victoria, this photograph first appeared in Cozens' book on the Tramway]]

Lewis Cozens (full name Henry Lewis Cozens) was a British railway author and historian, notable as one of the earliest writers on Welsh narrow gauge and light railways.

Biography

Cozens was born in Edmonton, Middlesex in 1909, the son of James Henry Theodore Charles Cozens and Mary Margarite Cozens (née Jones).{{cite book

|title=Will of Mary Cozens |year=1935

}} He was a bank clerk by profession and his family came from the Welsh county of Montgomeryshire. He married Elizabeth Kindlberger in London in 1939.{{cite book

|title=England & Wales deaths 1837–2007 |location=London |page=33 |volume=1C

}}

In 1935, Cozens' mother Mary died, leaving £145 to Lewis and his brother David. In 1939, his father a civil servant{{London Gazette |city=Edinburgh |title=Civil Service Commission |issue=11139 |date=24 October 1899 |page=998}} also died, leaving Lewis £150 in his will. The unusual declaration in the will was reported in the Birmingham Daily Post, it said the bequest was "in view of the fact that I paid no premium for his career and he was no charge to me from the age of eighteen".{{cite news |title=Son no charge to me |work=Birmingham Daily Post |date=23 January 1940}}

During his holidays in Wales before and after World War II, he explored the many minor railways of mid Wales. As early as 1944, Cozens was actively researching the history of the Plynlimon and Hafan Tramway. In that year he began a correspondence with Selwyn Pearce Higgins about the discovery of historical records of the Tramway.{{cite archive

|institution=National Railway Museum |item-id=PSH/5/58/ |collection=Selwyn Pearce Higgins Archive

}} This led to the publication of Cozens' 1955 book on the Plynlimon and Hafan.

In 1949, he published the first of his histories on Welsh railways, about the Talyllyn Railway. These early books were self-published and were slim volumes, as printing paper was still rationed in the immediate post-war years. He soon followed with books on the Corris Railway, the Mawddwy Railway and other local lines. His books were the first serious attempt to publish histories of these railways and they introduced many early railway enthusiasts to them. Cozens was a friend of other notable early railway historians, including James Boyd, and R. W. Kidner. Cozens and Boyd have been described as the "eminent authors on the minor railways of North- and Mid-Wales".{{cite book

}}

Several of Cozen's early books were later expanded and republished. While many of his books have been superseded by more detailed histories, his work was influential on later authors{{cite book

}} and provided important early coverage of the subject.{{cite news

|title=Publications Received |work=The Railway Gazette |volume=88 |year=1948

}}

Works

{{cite book |title=The Tal-y-llyn Railway

|last=Cozens |first=Lewis

|authorlink=Lewis Cozens

|year=1949 |publisher=self-published

|ref={{harvid|Cozens, Tal-y-llyn|1949}}

}}

{{cite book |title=The Corris Railway