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Episodes from the early history of British Admiralty charting
- By Campbell, Tony
- Published 1 December 1983
- Maps
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Campbell, Tony
Tony Campbell was a map dealer (Francis Edwards, later Weinreb & Douwma/Robert Douwma Ltd - 1964-84), then in the British Library Map Library (Map Librarian 1987-2001). He is Chairman of Imago Mundi Ltd, in which role he coordinates the International Conferences on the History of Cartography.
Since 1997 he has maintained the 'Map History' gateway site. Author of Early Maps (1981), The Earliest Printed Maps, 1472-1500 (1987), the chapter on Portolan Charts in Volume 1 of The History of Cartography (1987), and numerous articles.
www.maphistory.info
by Tony Campbell
IN ONE YEAR, 1860, the Hydrographic Department of the Admiralty sold 140,000 charts, an average of over fifty copies of each of the 2,500 separate sheets then in print. By the end of the nineteenth century that number would have quadrupled; yet Admiralty charts are hard to find today. The reason is simple, and probably obvious: loose sheet navigational charts have always been treated as functional objects and no more — to be annotated, rolled up or folded as convenience dictated, and eventually thrown away. For the modern collector. Admiralty charts have at least three advantages. Their inclusive coverage of the world's coastlines gives them relevance to anyone who lives by the coast or who goes down to the sea in ships. Then, their contemporary scarcity makes for a difficult and hence satisfying hunt. Finally, when a relevant sheet is located it may well prove to he inexpensive, because the unsurpassed merits of British Admiralty charting are not widely appreciated outside hydrographical circles!
For those who find dates hard to remember, it was thoughtful of the Admiralty to issue the first chart in 1800. This meant, however, that they were narrowly pipped to the post by the equivalent department in Spain, which published its first sheet two years previously. Both these efforts, though, pale beside those of the French, whose DepOt General de la Marine had been established as far hack as 1720. Their leading light and his major production — Jacques Nicholas Bellin's Hydrographie Francoise — are well known. It was, indeed, the enforced reliance on the charts of their French enemy which persuaded the British Admiralty in 1795 to appoint their first Hydrographer, Alexander Dalrymple. History's uncomplimentary verdict on Dalrymple is now being rethought and the 'father of the Admiralty Chart' must he given due credit for having published more than half of those sheets which were listed in the earliest extant Admiralty chart catalogue, that of 1825.
Dalrymple was also Hydrographer to the East India Company. The bibliographical confusions resulting from this dual role are highly involved. It is planned to include in a future issue of The Map Collector explanatory notes on the dating of Admiralty charts. The unravelling of the Dalrymple charts is best held over until then. Under his successor, Thomas Hurd, Admiralty charts ceased to be restricted to the Royal Navy, and in 1821 the first priced sheets were released for general sale. The tenure of the third Hydrographer, W.E. Parry, was interrupted by his two voyages to the Arctic and it was left to his successors, Francis Beaufort and John Washington, to win for the Admiralty chart the pre-eminent position it has held ever since. It was under Beaufort's direction that the decision was taken to extend the British surveying effort to much of the rest of the world — a policy that had been largely carried out by the time of Washington's death in 1863, and so efficiently that many of today's charts are merely up dated versions of those original surveys. Entire volumes have, quite rightly, been devoted to early Admiralty surveying. It is only possible here to sample the riches and mention a few of the highlights from the first sixty years of the production of these charts.
The early surveyors were faced with a wide range of difficulties and dangers. The hydrographic work was carried out in sailing vessels or in oared longboats — the first limited in manoeuvrability and liable to strike the underwater perils they were specifically there to discover, the second easily swamped in a squall. Not unnaturally, some of the existing inhabitants, in Africa and the Pacific for example, took violent exception to activities whose obscure purpose they could not fathom. In Africa the deadly malaria, the cause of which remained a mystery, decimated the surveying parties as soon as they entered any river estuary. Given the inadequacy of the instruments in use at the time, and the parsimony of the Admiralt y paymasters (the main reason for Parry's resignation) one might expect the quality of earlier work to have suffered. Yet it is precisely this period which produced most of the greatest names in the field.
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COPYRIGHT December 1983 The Map Collector, All rights reserved.
No portion of this article nor the accompanying illustrations can or may be reproduced without the express written permission from the copyright holder.
IN ONE YEAR, 1860, the Hydrographic Department of the Admiralty sold 140,000 charts, an average of over fifty copies of each of the 2,500 separate sheets then in print. By the end of the nineteenth century that number would have quadrupled; yet Admiralty charts are hard to find today. The reason is simple, and probably obvious: loose sheet navigational charts have always been treated as functional objects and no more — to be annotated, rolled up or folded as convenience dictated, and eventually thrown away. For the modern collector. Admiralty charts have at least three advantages. Their inclusive coverage of the world's coastlines gives them relevance to anyone who lives by the coast or who goes down to the sea in ships. Then, their contemporary scarcity makes for a difficult and hence satisfying hunt. Finally, when a relevant sheet is located it may well prove to he inexpensive, because the unsurpassed merits of British Admiralty charting are not widely appreciated outside hydrographical circles!
For those who find dates hard to remember, it was thoughtful of the Admiralty to issue the first chart in 1800. This meant, however, that they were narrowly pipped to the post by the equivalent department in Spain, which published its first sheet two years previously. Both these efforts, though, pale beside those of the French, whose DepOt General de la Marine had been established as far hack as 1720. Their leading light and his major production — Jacques Nicholas Bellin's Hydrographie Francoise — are well known. It was, indeed, the enforced reliance on the charts of their French enemy which persuaded the British Admiralty in 1795 to appoint their first Hydrographer, Alexander Dalrymple. History's uncomplimentary verdict on Dalrymple is now being rethought and the 'father of the Admiralty Chart' must he given due credit for having published more than half of those sheets which were listed in the earliest extant Admiralty chart catalogue, that of 1825.
Dalrymple was also Hydrographer to the East India Company. The bibliographical confusions resulting from this dual role are highly involved. It is planned to include in a future issue of The Map Collector explanatory notes on the dating of Admiralty charts. The unravelling of the Dalrymple charts is best held over until then. Under his successor, Thomas Hurd, Admiralty charts ceased to be restricted to the Royal Navy, and in 1821 the first priced sheets were released for general sale. The tenure of the third Hydrographer, W.E. Parry, was interrupted by his two voyages to the Arctic and it was left to his successors, Francis Beaufort and John Washington, to win for the Admiralty chart the pre-eminent position it has held ever since. It was under Beaufort's direction that the decision was taken to extend the British surveying effort to much of the rest of the world — a policy that had been largely carried out by the time of Washington's death in 1863, and so efficiently that many of today's charts are merely up dated versions of those original surveys. Entire volumes have, quite rightly, been devoted to early Admiralty surveying. It is only possible here to sample the riches and mention a few of the highlights from the first sixty years of the production of these charts.
The early surveyors were faced with a wide range of difficulties and dangers. The hydrographic work was carried out in sailing vessels or in oared longboats — the first limited in manoeuvrability and liable to strike the underwater perils they were specifically there to discover, the second easily swamped in a squall. Not unnaturally, some of the existing inhabitants, in Africa and the Pacific for example, took violent exception to activities whose obscure purpose they could not fathom. In Africa the deadly malaria, the cause of which remained a mystery, decimated the surveying parties as soon as they entered any river estuary. Given the inadequacy of the instruments in use at the time, and the parsimony of the Admiralt y paymasters (the main reason for Parry's resignation) one might expect the quality of earlier work to have suffered. Yet it is precisely this period which produced most of the greatest names in the field.
Read Full Article >>
[Acrobat Reader required]
COPYRIGHT December 1983 The Map Collector, All rights reserved.
No portion of this article nor the accompanying illustrations can or may be reproduced without the express written permission from the copyright holder.
