Very little is known regarding Samuel S. Carr. He was born in England on 15 October 1837 and studied at the Royal Academy of Design at Chester. In 1863 he emigrated to the United States where in 1865 he attended a class in mechanical drawing at Cooper Union. From 1870 to 1907 he lived with his sister and brother-in-law at 461 Twelfth Street in Brooklyn, New York, and shared a studio with the painter, Clinton Loveridge.

He exhibited at the National Academy of Design, New York, the Brooklyn Art Association, and the Brooklyn Art Club, of which he had been president. Most of his canvases, with the exception of a number of his Coney Island scenes which were painted between 1877 and 1881, are undated. Beach scenes were also exhibited at the Brooklyn Art Club from 1882 to 1896. In the 1880s Carr frequently painted rural genre subjects, reminiscent of Eastman Johnson and Winslow Homer, that often feature children on their way home from school. Sheep grazing in the meadow of Prospect Park, Brooklyn, near where his studio was located, was also a favorite subject of the artist. Carr died in Brooklyn on 25 February 1908. Only a brief obituary in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle appears to have noticed his passing, mentioning that Carr was a member of several Masonic lodges.