Item 154, detail
"First Separately Engraved Map of Galveston Bay"&emdash;Streeter
151. [MAP: TEXAS]. SPAIN. DIRECCIÓN DE HIDROGRAFÍA. Bahía de Galvez-towm [sic]. [Madrid, 1809]. Engraved chart of Galveston Bay. 18.6 x 26.8 cm. (7-5/16 x 10-1/2 inches). Black and white. Scale: 1 inch = approximately 1 league. Very fine.
First state. From the Portulano de la América
Setentrional (Madrid, 1809; reissued without change in 1818, and with
slight change in 1825). Phillips, Atlases 1223. Streeter 1043: "The
first separately engraved maps of Galveston Bay...show all of Galveston Bay and
the east end of Galveston Island, and give soundings in 'Pies castellanos.'
There are legends for 'Ro de la Trinidad' 'pd de
Culebras,' and 'Ptd Orcoquisas.'" Taliaferro 200 (with illustration): "This is
the first printed map devoted specifically to Galveston Bay. It is derived from
the 1783-86 survey of the Spanish navigator José de Evía....
Charles W. Hayes (1:15) calls Evía's survey the 'only historically
notable event relating to Galveston Island of the eighteenth century....' It
was upon the occasion of this survey that the bay received its present name, in
honor of Bernardo de Gálvez, viceroy of New Spain."
($1,500-3,000)
$1,725.00
First Engraved Chart of Matagorda Bay
152. [MAP: TEXAS]. SPAIN. DIRECCIÓN DE HIDROGRAFÍA. Bahia de S. Bernardo. [Madrid, 1809]. Engraved chart of present-day Matagorda Bay. 18.4 x 26.0 cm. (7-1/4 x 10-1/4 inches). Black and white. Scale: 1 inch = approximately 2-1/2 nautical miles. Uniform light age-toning, otherwise very fine.
First issue. From the Portulano de la América
Setentrional (Madrid, 1809; reissued without change in 1818, and with
slight change in 1825). Phillips, Atlases 1223. Streeter 1044: "The
first separately engraved maps of St. Bernardo Bay [with] a large 'Bahia de S.
Bernardo' and a small 'Lago de S. Bernardo' adjoining, into which flows
'Ro. Colorado ó de Cañas.' There are also legends for
'Ila de S. Francisco,' and 'Barra de S. Bernardo.' On modern maps this is Pass
Cavallo between Matagorda Island and Matagorda Peninsula."
($1,500-3,000)
$1,725.00
Arrowsmith’s Grand Wall Map of Mexico & the Southwest
153. [MAP: NORTH AMERICA]. ARROWSMITH, Aaron. A New Map of Mexico and Adjacent Provinces Compiled from Original Documents.... London: Published 5th. October 1810, by A. Arrowsmith, 10 Soho Sque. Hydrographer to His Majesty, 1810. Wall map, neatly mounted on cartographic linen, wooden rollers at top and bottom. Engraved map. Four sheets, together measuring 128.0 x 161.3 cm. (50-1/2 x 63-1/2 inches). Original outline color. Insets of the Valley of Mexico, Veracruz, and Acapulco. Edges and seams of the four sheets slightly frayed, occasional browning and staining, but generally in very good condition for this very rare and important foundation map for Texas and the Southwest (the only copy we note offered in recent years was Paul Burns' copy in our Catalogue 6).
First state (with Hydrographer to the King) of a cornerstone map of Texas, Mexico, and the Southwestern U.S. The two 1810 editions of this map vary considerably in their depiction of the Texas-Louisiana border. The present edition shows the Sabine and Red Rivers as the boundary, approximately the frontier then accepted in practice by both sides. The subsequent state (with Prince of Wales, same year) follows Humboldt and the official Spanish stance in pushing Texas territory deep into Louisiana, to the Mermento River. This was the first large-scale map to depict the important discoveries of Pike and Humboldt in the Southwest, and it became the most influential and widely copied map of the region in the era. As an early nineteenth-century publication based on information gathered by Spanish exploring parties in the eighteenth century, Arrowsmith's map belongs to the beginning of a new cartographic sequence. "Perhaps the most respected mapmaker of the early nineteenth century, Aaron Arrowsmith produced maps which were the result of a careful synthesis of all of the information he could obtain. His map of Mexico which first appeared in 1810 was bitterly criticized by Humboldt as a blatant plagiarism of his own map. While there is no doubt that Arrowsmith did use Humboldt’s data to best advantage, his map was no mere copy. For his improved rendering of the Brazos River, if for no other reason, Arrowsmith’s depiction of the Texas area merits inclusion as a landmark in the cartography of the region" (Crossroads of Empire - Amon Carter Museum exhibit June 12-July 26, 1981).
Martin & Martin 25: "Relying on information provided to him by the
Hudson's Bay Company, [Arrowsmith] added significant details in the Northwest,
and his depiction of the California coast was probably taken from the British
explorer Vancouver's own charts. In the Texas area he undoubtedly used Pike's
rendition of the rivers, particularly of the Brazos and the Guadalupe, while he
followed Humboldt in tracing the coast from the Spanish Hydrographic Office
chart.... By combining the best parts of Humboldt's and Pike's maps and
avoiding their errors, and by adding his own new information, Arrowsmith
contributed a significantly improved depiction of the region." Phillips,
America, p. 408. Streeter 1046. Taliaferro 202: "In interior
detail...the Arrowsmith maps are quite distinct, with Mexico being far
superior. Most noticeably, Arrowsmith added the Brazos River, which he had
omitted entirely on the 1803 map, and he correctly named the Trinity River,
which he had previously called the 'Rio Arrokisos.'" Wheat, Transmississippi
West 295 & pp. 27-28.
($5,000-7,000) $8,625.00
Item 154,
detail
154. [MAP: UNITED STATES]. MELISH, John. United States of America Compiled from the latest & best Authorities. Philadelphia: M. D. Fairman, 1818. Engraved map of North America west to the Rio Grande. 41.3 x 50.2 cm. (16-1/4 x 19-3/4 inches). Original outline coloring. Scale: 1 inch = 120 miles. Engraving of a flying eagle with shield above title. Repair to blank margin where removed from book, two short splits at folds of lower margin, else fine.
A smaller version of Melish's Map of the United States....
(Philadelphia, 1816), with Melish's new prototype configuration for Texas that
remained influential until Austin's 1830 map of Texas. An improvement on
Humboldt, it shows the relationship between the Texas rivers more correctly,
and Galveston Bay is located. Of Melish and his maps, Martin & Martin write
(p. 115): "Recognizing the demand for geographical information on the American
West was limitless for the foreseeable future, Melish undertook to accumulate a
vast amount of descriptions, statistics, and maps, and in 1816 produced in six
sheets his famous map. It proved so popular it was reprinted at least
twenty-two times by the end of 1822. For the Texas area, Melish relied heavily
on the surveys conducted by William Darby, who had personally surveyed much of
the Sabine River area.... Melish's map significantly improved the descriptions
and depictions of the Texas interior, but perhaps its most lasting value to
history was its official association with the Adams-Onís Treaty."
Phillips, America, p. 880. Taliaferro, p. 14n. Wheat,
Transmississippi West 327.
($600-800) $920.00
155. [MAP: WORLD]. WEILAND, C. F. Oestliche und Westliche Halbkugel der Erde nach den neuesten Entdeckungen Entworfen. Weimar: Geographisches Institut, 1819. Engraved double hemisphere map of the world. Border measures 50.2 x 66.5 cm. (19-3/4 x 26-3/16 inches); each hemisphere 30.5 cm. (12 inches) in diameter. Original outline coloring. Very fine.
Carl Ferdinand Weiland (1782-1847) published two atlases, Atlas von
Amerika (1824-28) and Algemeiner Hand-Atlas (1828-48). A typical
Germanic production, clean and neat, with understated but handsome ornamental
border. Louisiana stretches from the Pacific Northwest Coast to the
Mississippi.
($250-450) $287.50
156. [MAP: NORTH AMERICA]. ARROWSMITH, John. Mexico. London, 1832. Engraved map. 47.8 x 59.9 cm. (19 x 23-5/8 inches). Original outline coloring. Scale: 1 inch = approximately 110 miles. Inset: Mexico, showing its connection with the ports of Acapulco, Vera Cruz & Tampico. Plate number 44 at lower right. Three short tears at blank margins, otherwise a fine, crisp copy on heavy paper.
This map by the nephew of Aaron Arrowsmith was reissued several times,
but this is the earliest issue. The large attractive map extends from the 42nd
parallel to Guatemala and shows Texas on the eve of the Revolution. Texas
appears in a truncated form, with an area smaller than that claimed by the
Republic&emdash;the Nueces River is the southern boundary, and West Texas
and the Panhandle are part of Mexican Territory. The American Fur Depot appears
on the eastern shore of Youta, or the Great Salt Lake. Phillips,
America, p. 409 (with date altered to 1834); Atlases 764.
Taliaferro 238: "This is one of the first European maps to use Austin's Map
of Texas, 1830, as a source.... The first edition of the atlas appeared in
1834; as subsequent editions were published, the maps were frequently
revised."
($750-1,500) $1,495.00
"One of the Landmarks of Texas Cartography" — Streeter
Item 157 - detail
157. [MAP: TEXAS]. BURR, David H. Texas. New York: J. H. Colton, 1833. Pocket map. Engraved map. 44.0 x 53.4 cm. (17-5/16 x 21 inches), original brown diced cloth folder, upper cover gilt-lettered TEXAS. Original full coloring. Scale: 1 inch = approximately 50 miles. Inset: Plan of the Port of Galveston. Slight offsetting, short tear at blank left margin (not affecting image or text), overall fine. Original covers detached (but preserved, separated at spine, back cover damaged, upper cover quite presentable except for a bit of marginal wear). Provenance: John Howell Books. Exceedingly rare, even more so than the various issues of Stephen F. Austin's map of Texas.
First state. Bryan & Hanak 22. Contours of Discovery, p. 53: "[Burr's] early map of Texas remains a standard view of the area on the eve of the Revolution." Crossroads of Empire - Amon Carter Museum exhibit June 12-July 26, 1981, p. 32 (this copy): "The map also contributes an outstanding inset map of Galveston Bay drawn by Alexander Thompson, an American who was a captain in the Texas Navy." Martin & Martin 30, color plate (p. 55): "Anglo-Americans in the early decades of the nineteenth century reacted quickly to the opportunities to settle in the rich lands made available to them through empresario contracts in the Mexican state of Coahuila y Tejas. Stephen F. Austin's 1830 map of Texas, showing his two grants and one to Green DeWitt, aroused great interest in Texas, both on the part of potential settlers as well as in the American government itself. In 1833, the Geographer to the United States House of Representatives, David H. Burr, updated Austin's earlier effort with a new map of Texas showing seventeen land grants.... With the inclusion of the new land grants, his map documented the explosion of immigration into Texas."
Streeter, p. 329 (designating the Burr map as one of the six most
important maps especially desirable for a Texas collection) & 1134
(locating only the Yale copy): "The Burr map of 1833 is the first large scale
map of Texas, as distinguished from a general map, to show all of Texas to the
Arkansas River and also includes all of the Texas Panhandle. The pioneer Austin
map of 1830 goes only to a little north of the Red River. The Burr map, like
the Austin map, is one of the landmarks of Texas cartography, showing as it
does the parceling out of the country, with a few gaps, into seventeen land
grants, all graphically shown in colors at the fairly large scale of fifty
miles to an inch. The Austin map of 1830 gives only the boundaries of three
grants, which it shows in color, and the Hooker maps of 1833 though they, like
the Burr map, show Texas to the Arkansas River, do so on the small scale of
about ninety miles to an inch and without color.... The Burr map incorporates
for the first time on a printed map the Staples manuscript map of the Wilson
and Exeter Grant.... The Burr map instead of following the Treaty of 1819, in
drawing the boundary line north to the Red River from the Sabine River's
intersection of the 32nd parallel, incorrectly starts the line about twenty
miles west of the intersection, thereby showing part of Texas as belonging to
Arkansas and Louisiana. This led later to a boundary dispute between Arkansas
and Texas." Taliaferro 247 (citing the 1835 issue) and p. 15n (designating
Burr's map as important for its contribution to Texas geography as a whole and
providing a "valuable record of the social and political evolution of the state
during the crucial years when much of its territory was first settled by a
population of European origin."
($60,000-90,000) $86,250.00
Foundation of Modern U.S. Road maps
158. [MAP: UNITED STATES]. MITCHELL, S. Augustus & J. H. Young. Mitchell's Travellers Guide through the United States. A Map of the Roads, Distances, Steam Boat & Canal Routes &c. by J. H. Young. Philadelphia: Mitchell, 1833. Pocket map. Engraved map on onionskin paper of the United States west to eastern Mexico [i.e. Texas] and Missouri Territory, folded into original 16mo gilt-lettered straight-grain red morocco, with folded "../../index" sheet. 43.4 x 54.0 cm. (17-1/16 x 21-1/4 inches). Original bright outline coloring. Scale not stated. Nine inset maps of major U.S. cities and their environs (including New Orleans, Vicinity of the Falls of Niagara, Vicinity of Baltimore and Washington, etc.). Upper cover printed with contemporary owner's name: "Wm. W. Forsaith." Clean split at lower joint of cover, overall fine; the map exceptionally fine. These little pocket road maps are difficult to find in collector's condition because they were subject to hard use by their purchasers, who took them along on their travels.
Second edition (first edition, 1832). Clark, Travels in the Old
South (III:74n) lists eight editions of the map between 1836 and 1864,
noting that he was unable to locate the earlier editions. Howes M690n.
Phillips, America, p. 886 (1832 issue). Schwartz & Ehrenberg, p.
255: "Internal improvements coupled with the great Irish and German migrations
beginning in 1827 led to the production of traveler's guides that depicted
roads and their distances, steamboat and canal routes, and lengths of principal
railroads.... In 1832 Samuel Augustus Mitchell first issued his 'Traveller's
Guide through the United States' and complimented it two years later with
'Tourist Pocket Maps' of the different states. These early works and their
multitudinous progeny over the next fifty years laid the foundation for the
road maps of today."
($400-800) $805.00
Grandiose & Dramatic Map of the Young Republic
159. [MAP: UNITED STATES]. MITCHELL, S. Augustus & J. H. Young. Mitchell's Reference & Distance Map of the United States by J. H. Young. Philadelphia: Mitchell & Winman, 1834. Engraved map, 36 sections mounted on cartographic linen, reinforced with green cloth selvage, outer two sections backed with original marbled paper. 136.5 x 173.2 cm. (53-3/4 x 68-3/16 inches). Original full coloring. Scale: 1 inch = 25 miles. Insets of ten U.S. cities and their environs, North Part of Maine, South Part of Florida, and General Map of the United States with the contiguous British & Mexican Possessions. Large engraving of an eagle below title, ornate vine and shell border. Cloth selvage loose in places, marbled paper rubbed, the map itself fine.
First edition (with printed date of 1834 and without counties
individually colored; see item 161 herein for the 1835 edition with colored
counties). This grand map is extremely detailed and large in scale (one inch =
25 miles), showing every county, township, parish, and hundreds of U.S. towns
based on the 1830 census, along with steamboats, railroads, canal routes, etc.
The inset General Map of the United States with the Contiguous British &
Mexican Possessions is quite large (42.4 x 54.3 cm.), in the Arrowsmith
conformation, with good detail in Texas (which is shown as part of Mexico) and
the Transmississippi West (not in Wheat). Clark, Travels in the Old
South III:72n (referring to the Accompaniment text). Howes M684n
(referring to the separately issued text). Nebenzahl, Compass 39:35
(describing the 1835 edition): "Very decorative map of the United States that
demonstrated the rapid national expansion and regional conflicts of the
Jacksonian era. The nascent railroad system is shown challenging the highly
developed canal network.... A large inset shows the nation in relation to the
lands lying west to the Pacific." Please note that when Nebenzahl offered the
1835 edition of this great map almost twenty years ago in 1978, his price was
$750. Reviewing recent price records of the various editions of Mitchell's
superb map, we strongly feel that these maps are routinely undervalued, given
their beauty, grandeur, drama, accuracy, immense decorative value, and historic
importance. A reserve of $1,000 seems about a third of what the map should
fetch, but we feel compelled nonetheless to pay heed to recent market
comparables.
($1,000-3,000) $1,150.00
160. [MAP: TEXAS]. [BRADFORD, Thomas Gamaliel]. Texas. [New York, 1835]. Engraved map. 19.8 x 26.4 cm. (7-13/16 x 10-3/8 inches). Original outline coloring. 1 inch = approximately 72 miles. Paper slightly age-toned, otherwise fine.
First edition, issue uncertain, but with early issue points
("Mustang Wild Horse Desert" shown in south Texas, Nueces River shown as
southwestern boundary, land grants instead of counties, Austin not shown,
etc.). Map 64A from Bradford's Comprehensive Atlas, Geographical, Historical
and Commercial (New York, 1835). Martin & Martin 31: "The map itself
appeared to be copied directly from Austin's, the only readily available
authority.... The map differed from Austin's primarily in its prominent display
of numerous colonization grants and a plethora of new settlements and towns,
indicative of the massive influx of colonists occurring after the publication
of Austin's work. Another significant departure from Austin was the map's
depiction of the Arkansas boundary controversy.... Aside from showing Texas as
a separate state, the map [is] historically important for clearly demonstrating
the demand in the U.S. for information about Texas during the Revolution and
the early years of the Republic." Phillips, America, p. 841;
Atlases 770.
($800-1,200) $1,495.00
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