JEFFERYS, Thomas (1719-1771)
The Coast Of West Florida and Louisiana
London: Printed for Robert Sayer, 20 February, 1775. Copper-engraved map on laid paper, uncoloured, large compass rose with radiating rhumb lines, coastal soundings, navigational annotations, and scales of latitude and longitude. Sheet size: 21 1/8 x 28 1/2 inches.
An important eighteenth-century navigational chart of the northern Gulf of Mexico, published shortly before the American Revolution, depicting the coasts of Louisiana and British West Florida with detailed hydrographic information.
The chart extends along the northern coast of the Gulf of Mexico, encompassing the Mississippi Delta, the Louisiana coastline, Mobile Bay, Pensacola, and the western coast of Florida. Rivers, bays, islands, coastal settlements, and navigational hazards are carefully delineated, while numerous soundings and annotations provide practical information for vessels navigating the Gulf. A prominent compass rose dominates the open water, its extensive network of rhumb lines extending across the chart. The chart also records navigational routes and observations concerning the prevailing winds and currents, reflecting the importance of the Gulf to maritime commerce between the Caribbean, the Mississippi Valley, and the Atlantic world. The map documents a period of considerable territorial change following the Seven Years' War. Under the Treaty of Paris of 1763, Britain acquired Florida from Spain and established the colonies of East and West Florida. The western colony initially extended from the Apalachicola River to the Mississippi River, encompassing the important ports of Pensacola and Mobile. Meanwhile, France had ceded Louisiana west of the Mississippi, together with New Orleans, to Spain. The chart thus represents a strategically important coastline divided between British and Spanish possessions, where maritime navigation, colonial trade, and imperial administration were closely connected. The present chart appeared in 1775 in The West-India Atlas, an important collection of nautical charts intended to provide accurate geographical and hydrographic information for navigation throughout the Caribbean and adjoining American coasts. It forms the western portion of a larger two-sheet representation of the Gulf Coast and Florida, accompanied by The Peninsula and Gulf of Florida or Channel of Bahama with the Bahama Islands. Together, the sheets provided an extensive navigational survey of the Gulf of Mexico and the approaches to the Florida Straits, a maritime corridor of considerable commercial and military importance during the late colonial period. Thomas Jefferys was one of the leading English cartographers of the 18th century. From about 1750, he published a series of maps of the Americas, that were among the most significant produced in the period. As Geographer to the Prince of Wales, and after 1761, Geographer to the King, Jefferys was well-placed to have access to the best surveys conducted, and many of his maps held the status of "official work." Jefferys died on 20th November 1771, but Robert Sayer (in partnership with John Bennett) 'having acquired the sole property of the Plates' and other material relating to the work, 'minutely followed' Jefferys' plans for The West India Atlas although Sayer does note that additional work was done using various sources to ensure that the information was up to date.
Item #43183
Price: $3,500.00