1845 Brué and Picquet Map of the West Indies and Central America

This is a beautiful and wonderfully detailed Adrien-Hubert Brué and Charles Picquet 1845 map of the West Indies. Published 4 years after the Federal Republic of Central America ceased to exist, the map still illustrates that short-lived Central American republic.

A Closer Look

Depicting the region from the Gulf Coast of the United States south to northern South America, islands throughout the Caribbean are illustrated and labeled from Cuba south to Trinidad and Tobago. The Bahamas appear in detail, with individual islands, straits, banks, and other locations all labeled. Cuba, Haiti, and Jamaica are all illustrated with the same level of detail, with coastal locations, cities, towns, lakes, and even road networks all noted. A table below Haiti lists the six administrative divisions of the island republic. Cities, towns, and coastal features are also identified throughout the rest of the Antilles. All the islands are shaded in different colors to indicate which colonial power claimed which island. A key to the color scheme appears just below the inset maps in the upper right corner. These focus on the Virgin Islands and the two French colonies, Martinique and Guadeloupe.

Central America benefits from the same attention to detail. Cities, towns, villages, rivers, mountains, and coastal locations are all labeled. Countries are identified using outline color, with the largest, the Federal Republic of Central America, outlined in pink. However, Picquet's information must have been outdated because the Federal Republic of Central America ceased to exist in 1841.

The United Provinces of Central America

The United Provinces of Central America (1823 - 1839/1841) was a country in Central America that also went by the name Federal Republic of Central America. In September 1821, the Captaincy General of Guatemala declared independence from Spain. In January 1822, the First Mexican Empire annexed this territory, which would not regain its independence until 1823. Five states combined to create the Federal Republic: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. The Federal Republic based its government on that of the United States and adopted a constitution in November 1824. The first presidential election was held in April 1825, but the elected president, Manuel José Arce, had to make compromises to get elected. This led to a civil war from 1827 until 1829. A new president was elected in 1830, but the country again descended into civil war in 1838. By 1840, the states within the Federal Republic declared their independence, and the Federal Republic ceased to exist.

Publication History and Census

This map was 'reviewed, corrected, and augmented' by Charles Piquet (or rather his son, Pierre-Jacques Picquet, since Charles died in 1827) and published by Piquet in 1845. The first edition appeared in 1832 and was created by Adrien-Hubert Brué. We note 4 examples of the present 1845 edition in OCLC, which are part of the collections at Florida State University, the University of Texas at Arlington, the Bibliothèque nationale de France, and the Biblioteca Nacional de España. Pierre-Jacques Picquet continued publishing editions of this map through at least the late 1850s. The Picquet firm's embossed seal and stamp appear just above the title.