"United States of America Corrected & Improved from the Best Authorities", Anderson, Hugh

This very rare map is a derivative of Benjamin Warner's 1820 map of the United States, one of the first separately issued maps of the United States to stretch from sea to shining sea. In its depiction of the West, the map pulls from Lewis and Clark, Humboldt, Pike, and Melish. According to Wheat, Warner's map was part of a wave of maps that propagated the mythical rivers of the Great Basin that "would plague everybody, even more than did the older tale of the Island of California." The R. Bonaventura flows into a partial lake in the Valle Salado. To its west is a conjectural river that supposedly links the Buenaventura to San Francisco Bay. The map borrows from Melish a notation that marks where "Clarks Canoes stop 3000 miles from the Mississippi." Spanish Territory is separated from the United States by the "boundary of the United States according to the Florida Treaty." In Texas there are a few place names including San Antonio and Ft. Matagorda, but Galveston is incorrectly place west of Sabine Lake. The Missouri Territory takes in the entire northern plains region from the Mississippi to the Pacific Northwest. Arkansaw Territory is shown at its largest extent. Today's Minnesota and Wisconsin are here a part of North West Territory. As with many editions of the Melish map of the United States, there is a vignette of an eagle carrying a shield emblazoned with the stars and stripes above the script title. Published by Philadelphia-based McCarty & Davis. Engraved by Hugh Anderson. On banknote paper. We have only located one other example of the McCarty & Davis issue for sale on the market in the last 25 years.

References: Wheat (TMW) #360.

Condition: B+

Issued folding on thin banknote-style paper, now flat, with light soiling. A 5" tear at left and a few splits along the folds have been professionally repaired on verso.