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Fair example of the first state of this extremely rare map covering the Western United States and British Columbia, from the Rocky Mountains and Upper Plains to the Pacific Coast.
Influential map of the far west, with large inset at upper right, "Map of the Atlantic Ocean Showing parts of the Eastern & Western Continents," which shows virtually all of North and South America as well as large swathes of Europe and Africa. The map offers a credible depiction of the various overland routes and proposed railroad routes to the West Coast as contemplated during the first year of the American Civil War, as well as the US Mail Route through the Southwest to California. Prior to the war, the US Government had actively surveyed and explored the West, both as a means of locating prospective railroad routes to the West Coast and to improve the existing overland routes.
The map depicts many of these routes, including:
- Major Long's route in 1819
- John C. Fremont's Routes in 1842, 1843, 1844 and 1845
- Lieutenant Albert & Peck's Route in 1845
- The Route surveyed by Major W.H. Emory in 1846
- Captain H. Stansbury's Route in 1849
- Lieutenant Bryan and W.E. Smith's Route to El Paso in 1849
- Simpson's Route in 1849
- Fredonyer's Trail in 1850
- Captain Sitgreaves Route in 1852
- Lieutenant Mullen's Route in 1853 and 1854
- Lieutenant Whipple's Route in 1853 for the Topographical Engineers
- Lieutenant R. Arnold's Route in 1853
- General Stevens' Route in 1853
- Lieutenant Donelson's Route in 1853
- Lander's Route in 1853
- Captain G.B. McClellan's Route in 1853
- The route surveyed by Lieutenant Parke for the Topographical Engineers in 1854
- GK Warren's Route in 1855
- The area surveyed by the Mexican Boundary Commission
- Undated route of Lieutenant Garrard
- The Santa Fe Trail
- The Emigrant Route (Oregon Trail)
- The Pony Express Route
- Proposed Route of the Pacific RR
- Proposed Route of the Atlantic & Pacific RR
The map also includes a number of important western forts, at a moment in time when the Civil War was impacting the region. The gold regions in Colorado are shown, including Auraria and Denver City.
Warren Heckrotte notes: "The representation of the Nez Perce and Salmon River mines is almost identical to Lowell's map of this area, also published in 1862 - one of them copied from the other. The map also includes Arizona and parts of Dakota and Nebraska.
Rarity
The map is very rare on the market. The last example we note was offered in the Warren Heckrotte Sale at PBA Galleries in 2015 and before that in the Streeter Sale in 1969.
We note examples in the British Library, Yale, and Harvard.
Provenance: PBA Galleries, 2024.
G. W. & C. B. Colton was a prominent family firm of mapmakers who were leaders in the American map trade in the nineteenth century. Its founder, Joseph Hutchins Colton (1800-1893), was a Massachusetts native. Colton did not start in the map trade; rather, he worked in a general store from 1816 to 1829 and then as a night clerk at the United States Post Office in Hartford, Connecticut. By 1830, he was in New York City, where he set up his publishing business a year later.
The first printed item with his imprint is dated 1833, a reprint of S. Stiles & Company’s edition of David Burr’s map of the state of New York. He also printed John Disturnell’s map of New York City in 1833. Colton’s next cartographic venture was in 1835, when he acquired the rights to John Farmer’s seminal maps of Michigan and Wisconsin. Another early and important Colton work is his Topographical Map of the City and County of New York and the Adjacent Country (1836). In 1839, Colton began issuing the Western Tourist and Emigrant’s Guide, which was originally issued by J. Calvin Smith.
During this first decade, Colton did not have a resident map engraver; he relied upon copyrights purchased from other map makers, most often S. Stiles & Company, and later Stiles, Sherman & Smith. Smith was a charter member of the American Geographical and Statistical Society, as was John Disturnell. This connection would bear fruit for Colton during the early period in his career, helping him to acquire the rights to several important maps. By 1850, the Colton firm was one of the primary publishers of guidebooks and immigrant and railroad maps, known for the high-quality steel plate engravings with decorative borders and hand watercolors.
In 1846, Colton published Colton’s Map of the United States of America, British Possessions . . . his first venture into the wall map business. This work would be issued until 1884 and was the first of several successful wall maps issued by the firm, including collaborative works with D.G. Johnson. From the 1840s to 1855, the firm focused on the production of railroad maps. Later, it published a number of Civil War maps.
In 1855, Colton finally issued his first atlas, Colton’s Atlas of the World, issued in two volumes in 1855 and 1856. In 1857 the work was reduced to a single volume under the title of Colton’s General Atlas, which was published in largely the same format until 1888. It is in this work that George Woolworth (G. W.) Colton’s name appears for the first time.
Born in 1827 and lacking formal training as a mapmaker, G. W. joined his father’s business and would later help it to thrive. His brother Charles B. (C. B.) Colton would also join the firm. Beginning in 1859, the General Atlas gives credit to Johnson & Browning, a credit which disappears after 1860, when Johnson & Browning launched their own atlas venture, Johnson’s New Illustrated (Steel Plate) Family Atlas, which bears Colton’s name as the publisher in the 1860 and 1861 editions.
J.H. Colton also published a number of smaller atlases and school geographies, including his Atlas of America (1854-56), his Illustrated Cabinet Atlas (1859), Colton’s Condensed Cabinet Atlas of Descriptive Geography (1864) and Colton’s Quarto Atlas of the World (1865). From 1850 to the early 1890s, the firm also published several school atlases and pocket maps. The firm continued until the late 1890s, when it merged with a competitor and then ceased to trade under the name Colton.
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