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Above
left: A Map of the Southern Section of the United States including the
Floridas and Bahama Islands, Shewing the Seat of War in that Department,
1813 by John Melish.
Above
right: Southern Section of the United States including Florida &c. by
John Melish 1816 [1824] (image courtesy of Old
World Auctions)
Click
the following links for other digitized examples of the 1813
map and the 1824
map (or here).
The
map above left appeared in Melish's Military & Topographical Atlas of the
United States
, first published in 1813
with 8 maps. Examples of different states found via Google
include:
Louisiana
State Museum Map Database includes an 1815 dated copy of the Military
Atlas with the Southern Section map reportedly dated 1814
(image not available) and with map title the same as in 1813.
There
are at least 2 different states with the imprint below the neat line stating
"Improved to 11th June 1816." On each, the title has been changed to
remove reference to the "Seat of War" and an inset showing Bermuda
is included adjacent to the right border. The University
of Illinois has a copy
that shows a "double-wide" Mississippi Territory, while the David
Rumsey Collection contains a copy
which shows Alabama Territory (established March 3, 1817), suggesting a
publication date for the latter of no earlier than 1817. Rumsey's copy is in a
Military Atlas which has an 1815 [out]dated title page.
There
are refernces to this map being included in an 1819 Melish publication, but no
images could be located on line, so at this time it is uncertain if there were
later updates to the plate.
Finally,
the map shown above right is not from the original Melish plate, but is a very
slightly smaller map presumably engraved by C. F. Himberg (his imprint is on the
Northern Section map, but not the above map). This map is found in the atlas to
accompany Axel Klinckowström's Bref om de Forenta Staterna, published in
1824 in Stockholm . "A Swedish aristocrat, Klinckowström spent three years
in the United States (1818-1820) as an official emissary of his country,
traveling widely and taking a lively interest in all he saw" (NYPL/Deak).
This map is curious in its mixture of English and Swedish text. For example,
"The alligators go no further north"
just above Louisiana's border, as well as a few other annotations from the
original Melish map, are engraved in Swedish on this map. Yet other annotations,
such as "Great Beds of Marble" in Missouri Territory are retained in
English.
John
Melish (1771-1822) was born in
Scotland
and traveled extensively to
the
West Indies
and the
United States
during his early career in
the textile industry. He kept detailed journals about his travels and, upon
moving permanently to
America
in ~1811,
he embarked on a publishing career. Melish was the first purely
cartographic/geographic American publisher. Despite a relatively short
publishing career, which ended with
his sudden death in 1822, John Melish is credited with bringing the American
cartographic enterprise up to world standards, as is evident by the quality of
his work.
Additional
Reference: Ristow, American Maps and Mapmakers, pages 180-183.
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