Title: A Map of the most Inhabited part of Virginia containing the whole Province of  Maryland with Part of Pennsylvania, New Jersey And North Carolina 

Drawn by: Joshua Fry & Peter Jefferson in 1775. Second edition, fifth state.

Scale: Bar scale indicates 30 miles.

Publisher: London, Robert Sayer and Thomas Jefferys. Map in 2 sheets.

Dimensions: Sheet 1: 57.2 x 129.2 cm.; plate 1: 69.9 x 123.3 cm.; image 1: 38.8 x 122.4 cm.; sheet 2: 56.3 x 129.7 cm.; plate 2: 39.9 x 123.1 cm.; image 2: 38.9 x 122.4 cm. Engraving. Hand colored.

In: Thomas Jefferys. The American Atlas, London, 1776.

A Map of the most Inhabited part of Virginia, 1776

The idea for a new map of Virginia, including its western part, had been advanced in 1737 by Joshua Fry, Major Robert Brooks and Major William Mayo in the Assembly in Williamsburg. Financial problems delayed action on these plans until 1750. In that year the acting governor Lewis Burnell com-missioned Joshua Fry, surveyor of Albemarle County and Peter Jefferson, who worked in his office, to conduct the survey. Both Fry and Jefferson already had considerable previous experience in surveying, including the western part of Virginia. In view of its sponsorship, it is not surprising that the Virginia part of the map is the most accurate and complete, showing roads and names of rivers, mountains and settlements.

Maryland got much less attention from Fry and Jefferson and, aside from the roads to Philadelphia, only a number of important settlements are shown. Nevertheless, the map was important for Maryland in that it did add consid-erably to the geographical knowledge of Western Maryland, at a time when the settlement of this region was beginning.

This is the first map to show the parallel location of the mountain ridges in the western parts of Virginia and Maryland. However, the actual depiction of the ridges is done rather crudely. The "mole hill" symbol for mountains (see nos. 4 & 7) had, by the mid 18th century, been replaced by hachures, short lines running in the direction of maximum slope to indicate the relief of the land. This improvement, an innovation of the French school of mapmaking, worked well on the large scale topographic maps for which the French used it. It is much less satisfactory on a small scale map such as this.

The map is carefully executed and the cartouche of a wharf scene is very attractive. It was first published in 1753 or 1754; the table of distances by J. Dalrymple was added in 1755, In 1776 a second edition, dated 1775, was included in Thomas Jefferys' American Atlas. Two French editions followed in 1757 and 1777.

References:
W. Cumming, 1958, no. 281; The Fry & Jefferson Map of Virginia and Maryland, 1966; E. Mathews, 1898, pp. 391-394; C. Verner, 1967, pp. 70-94; The World Encompassed, 1952, no. 249.

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