Born in Birmingham, William Lewis moved to London where he worked for a merchant. He became a student of chess player Jacob Sarratt. In later years he showed himself to be very unkind to his old teacher. He said Sarratt's "Treatise on the Game of Chess" (1808) was a "poorly written book". But in 1822 three years after Sarrat died, Lewis published a second edition of it. This was in competition with a much better revision by Sarrat published in 1821 by Sarratt's poverty-stricken widow. In 1843, many players gave money to help the old widow, but Lewis' name is not on the list.