Samuel Hollyer was born on February 24, 1826 in London, England, the son of Samuel Hollyer, of an old Warwickshire family. His grandfather, John Hollyer, who married a relative of Dr. Samuel Johnson, went to London about the middle of the eighteenth century and there lost a considerable fortune in dock building. The elder Samuel Hollyer was a line-engraver and publisher and later became an expert collector of watercolors of the early English school.
Hollyer was apprenticed at fourteen to the Findens, engravers, for a fee of five hundred pounds, but after serving five of his seven years he was transferred to Ryall's studio.
Hollyer worked for Ryall and other engravers. The first plates which bear his signature are dated 1842. In 1850 he married Amy Smith and the following year they emigrated to New York. Hollyer did well, executing plates for book publishers, but in 1853 his wife died and he returned to England for a few months. On returning to England again in 1860 he found his stipple in great demand and remained for six years, marrying meanwhile, in 1863, Madeline C. Chevalier. After his permanent settlement in America in 1866, he lived for many years at Hudson Heights, near Guttenberg, New Jersey, commuting to New York.
According to Stauffer he engaged at times in lithography, photography, and the publishing business. In 1904 he published a series of etchings of historic buildings under the title Prints of Old New York, of antiquarian interest. During his later years he was a picturesque and familiar figure on the streets of New York, known and liked everywhere in the print world.
Hollyer was known as the last of the old school of American line-engravers. During his more than seventy years of active work he engraved in line and stipple excellent portraits of most of the literary celebrities of his time, as well as landscapes, bookplates, and vignettes for book-illustration. He also made excursions into mezzotint and etching. His self-portrait, etched at the age of forty, is a fine piece of work.
Hollyer was married, but his wife's name is unknown. She died in 1853.
