David Melville was the son of David and Elizabeth (Thurston) Melville. He was born on March 21, 1773 in Newport, Rhode Island. He was descended from David Melville who came to Boston, Massachusetts, from Scotland during the last decade of the seventeenth century and later married Elizabeth, daughter of Rev. Samuel Willard, 1640-1707, pastor of South Church and vice-president of Harvard College.
While little is known of Melville's environment, it is believed that he was of a family of metal craftsmen and that after securing a common-school education he learned this trade.
By the time Melville was thirty years old he was established in Newport as a pewterer, maker of household utensils, and the proprietor of a hardware store, as indicated by his advertisement in the Rhode Island Republican of June 4, 1803. About this time there was considerable interest in France and England in public demonstrations of illuminating gas. It is probable that Melville took note of these but was not aware of the processes involved. He was an ingenious individual, however, and having his curiosity aroused, he began experimenting and in 1806 succeeded in lighting his house on Pelham Street in Newport with coal gas. Encouraged by the public interest, he continued experimenting for upwards of seven years, constantly improving the process, and on March 18, 1813, obtained the first United States patent for apparatus for making coal gas. He then formed a partnership with Winslow Lewis of Boston and advertised in the newspapers for business in the lighting of "manufactories, mines, mills, streets, theatres, lighthouses and other buildings" by gas. During the year he succeeded in lighting a cotton factory at Watertown, Massachusetts, and a factory of the Wenscott Manufacturing Company near Providence, Rhode Island. The cost of installation and operation was almost prohibitive, however, and he soon realized that the opportunities for general gas lighting were extremely limited. With the help of his partner, therefore, he concentrated his attention on interesting the government in using gas for lighthouses and in 1817 obtained a contract to install his gas light in the Beaver Tail Lighthouse at Newport and demonstrate it for a year. Melville fulfilled the terms of his contract, but the government declined to adopt gas lights, owing chiefly to opposition by persons who had contracted to furnish oil, including his own partner, and by those engaged in whale fisheries. Wholly discouraged, he abandoned his project and for the balance of his life gave his attention to his trade and to the hardware business. The defection of his partner and the latter's attempt to deprive him of his patent rights were a bitter disappointment to him. To clarify his position he published in 1819 the whole story of his relationship with Lewis under the title An Expose of Facts Respectfully Submitted to the Government of the U. S. Relating to the Conduct of Winslow Lewis. He was buried in Newport.
Melville married Patience S. Sherman of Newport on March 4, 1812, and was the father of seven children.
