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A Chart of South Carolina and Georgia.
[Boston: William Norman, 1798]. Engraving, 20.5” x 17.65”, on laid paper tinted blue. CONDITION: Good, light soiling and wear to margins, small ink stain in lower right corner, light foxing, some fading to blue tint. A rare 18th-century chart of the coast of South Carolina and Georgia, and just the second larger scale chart of the region published in America. This chart appeared in the first edition of John Norman’s American Pilot in 1791, the second nautical atlas published in America, as well as various editions through 1816 published successively by John Norman, William Norman (John’s son), John Norman again (following the death of William) and Andrew Allen. The example offered here is the second state of three described by Wheat & Brun, with “Shules Folly” in the inset corrected to “Shutes Folly,” but without full shading to the islands in “Altamaha In." The swath of coastline depicted extends from St. Johns River (in present-day Jacksonville, Florida) in the south to St. John Island in South Carolina in the north. An inset chart in the lower-right quadrant, entitled “A Chart of the Bar and Harbour of Charles Town,” depicts Charleston Harbor in detail (which is not featured on the map proper) and shows a range of channels that were used for navigating the shoals at the harbor’s entrance. The broader chart and the inset include many soundings and dotted lines indicating shoals. Other details include inlets, rivers, entrances to ports, the city of Savannah, forts (St. Andrews and Prince William—both in Georgia), an anchorage (represented by two anchors at the mouth of the St. Johns River), and lighthouses on various islands. Settlement at Savannah and Charleston is indicated in each case by a single building. Following the Revolutionary War and the cessation in the publication of American maps by British publishers, American mapmakers began to fill the void. The first to address the pressing need for more charts of the U.S. coastline was mathematician and lecturer Bartholomew Burges of Boston, who began work in 1789 on a maritime atlas meant to consist of twelve charts, at least some of them engraved by John Norman. However, Burges was unable to obtain the endorsement of the Boston Marine Society and appears to have run into financial difficulties as well. Burges then turned for aid to Matthew Clark, who eventually terminated his business relationship with Burges and published his own Complete Set of Charts of the Coast of America in 1790, which contained eighteen charts, six more than originally proposed by Burges, most of them engraved by John Norman. Clark’s charts were essentially derivative of the charts of Des Barres and other British chart-makers and were printed on a relatively small scale. John Norman evidently sensed an opportunity in the inadequacy of Clark’s charts, as he soon began engraving charts of his own, which he would publish in The American Pilot. While most of Norman’s charts were, like Clark’s, based on British prototypes, many were on a larger scale, and more importantly, two were largely original works by American surveyors: Daniel Dunbibin’s Chart of the Coast of America From Cape Hateras to Cape Roman and Paul Pinkham’s A Chart of Nantucket Shoals. John Norman and subsequently William Norman (thought to be John’s son) published eleven editions of The American Pilot from 1791 to 1816. Engraver John Norman (1748–1817) immigrated from London to Philadelphia circa 1774, working there until about 1780, then moved to Boston. In addition to engraving maps, portraits, buildings and landscapes, he was one of the publishers of the Boston Magazine (1783–84) and also published Boston’s first directory in 1789. His output of maps and charts included small format maps for the American edition of the Reverend Murray’s Impartial History of the War in America, the Clark charts, the American Pilot charts, and Osgood Carleton’s Accurate Map of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts of 1798. An important early chart of the coast of South Carolina and Georgia by a Federal-era mapmaker. REFERENCES: Phillips, Maps of America, p. 821; Wheat & Brun 600 & 607 (state II of III).
Item #7454
Price: $22,500.00
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