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Virginia Title: A Map of the most Inhabited part of Virginia containing the whole Province of Maryland with Part of Pensilvania, New Jersey and North Carolina Drawn by Josua Fry & Peter Jefferson in 1751. To the Right Honourable, George Dunk Earl of Halifax First Lord Commissioner; and to the Rest of Right Honourable and Honourable Commissioners, for Trade and Plantations. This map is mostly humbly Inscribed to Their Lordships. By their Lordships. Most Obedient & most devoted humble Serv. Thos. Jefferys. Artist: Fry, Josua & Jefferson, Peter Published: London, Thomas Jefferys Geographer to His Royal Highness Date: 1755 Size: [ca. 65 x 103 cm] Technic: Copper engraving / Original color. Description: Copper engraving. Black and white line engraving with period outline hand color. Mounted on modern linen, ca. 25 1/2 x 40 1/4 inch. The request of George Montagu Dunk, Earl of Halifax, who became president of the Board of Trade and Plantations in 1748, was to obtain detailed information regarding the frontiers of English settlements in Virginia and the Ohio River Valley. Therefor the acting governor of Virginia Colonel Lewis Burwell commissioned Colonel Josua Fry and Peter Jefferson to prepare a detailed map of the Virginia colony. The first drafts for this map were delivered in 1751 to governor Burwell. Already in March 1752 the material was given to the London publisher Thomas Jefferys to engrave and print the map. Jefferys acted himself as an engraver for the map and commissioned the artist Francis Hayman and the engraver Charles Grignion to design the decorative cartouche. Hayman's cartouche illustrates the tobacco trade, on which the economy of Virginia was based. This amazing scene of the tobacco warehouse in the foreground with English nobleman and the wharf with working slaves and English ships in the background are probably one of the earliest scenes illustrating the Virginia tobacco trade. The highly detailed map extends from the Atlantic Coast across the Blue Ridge Mountains towards the Ohio Valley. In the North it reaches towards Philadelphia and the neighboring New Jersey, in the South it extends towards North Carolina with the Brushy mountains, Anson county and Granville county. The detailed map shows as well trails or roads in Virginia, many plantations were engraved, including the family names of the plantation owners in this period. Of this map eight editions or states were published until 1794. The first four states of this map are very rare and nearly unobtainable. States five to eight were published in various editions of the American Atlas. Our example of the map is the rare fourth state of 1755 published separately-issued. An early and strong impression. Notes: A strong impression. In excellent condition. Condition: Excellent Reference: Pritchard & Taliaferro, Degrees of Latitude, #30; Price: /
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