1817 Robertson Map of the United States

This is a scarce 1817 map of the United States. The map covers the United States east of the Mississippi, with an ephemeral early state configuration limited to the original 13 colonies, as well as Kentucky and Tennessee. Further west, the map is dominated by an expansive Western Territory extending from the Florida boundary to Lake Superior. It is most significant for its early illustration of Kentucky and Tennessee, including its unique inclusion of Daniel Boone's (1734 - 1820) ephemeral settlement Boonesborough. The map was engraved for inclusion in the 1817 edition of William Robertson uncompleted History of America.

Boonesborough

Boonesborough was one of the first English-speaking settlements west of the Appalachian Mountains. Located in eastern Kentucky, Boonesborough was founded as Boone's Station by frontiersman Daniel Boone (1734 - 1820). At the time, Boone was employed by Richard Henderson (1735 - 1785) and Nathanial Hart (1734 - 1782) of the Transylvania Company, a joint stock venture incorporated to settle the area around the Kentucky, Ohio, and Cumberland Rivers, roughly today's Henderson County. Boone lived there from 1775 to 1779, and the town was officially chartered as Boonesborough in October 1779. Although Boonesborough survived the September 1778 American Revolutionary War 'Siege of Boonsborough' by British-aligned Shawnee Chief Blackfish, Boone himself left in 1779 and it subsequently failed to at long-term population, thus slowly declined and vanished.

Publication History and Census

This map was engraved and published for inclusion in the 1817 edition of the Scottish historian William Robertson's (1721 - 1793) History of America (London: Richard Evans). The works was never finished as Robertson died in 1793, so the map has little to do with the original title and appeared only in the 1817 Richard Evans edition. Nor is there any indication who engraved or printed the map. There is only one listing of the separate map in the OCLC. Scarce to the market.