§ 7 Maps and Charts
Though the need of a good history of the most important maps and charts of America, enriched by copies of the most interesting, cannot but have been felt by every one who has spent much time in the study of its first settlement and growth, such a work still remains a desideratum in our literature. As a trifling aid to any who may hereafter engage in an undertaking of this kind, and as an assistance to the future historian of that portion of our country, I add a brief notice of those that best illustrate the progress of geographical knowledge respecting Florida.
On the earliest extant sketch of the New World—, that made by Juan de Cosa in 1500—, a continuous coast line running east and northeast connects the southern continent to the shores of the Mar descubierta por Ingleses in the extreme north. No signs of a peninsula are visible.
Eight years later, on the Universalior cogniti Orbis Tabula, of Johannes Ruysch found in the geography of Ptolemy printed at Rome under the supervision of Marcus Beneventanus and Johannes Gotta, the whole of North America is included in a small body of land marked Terra Nova or Baccalauras,120 joined to the countries of Gog and Magog and the desertum Lob in Asia. A cape stretching out towards Cuba is called Cabo de Portugesi.121
This brings us to the enigmatical map in the magnificent folio edition of Ptolemy, printed at Venice in 1513. On this, North America is an oblong parallelogram of land with an irregularly shaped portion projecting from its south-eastern extremity, maintaining with general correctness the outlines and direction of the peninsula of Florida. A number of capes and rivers are marked along its shores, some of the names evidently Portugese, others Spanish. Now as Leon first saw Florida in 1512, and the report of his discovery did not reach Europe for years, whence came this knowledge of the northern continent? Santarem and Ghillany both confess that there were voyages to the New World undertaken by Portuguese in the first decade of the century, about which all else but the mere fact of their existence have escaped the most laborious investigations; hence, probably to one of these unknown navigators we are to ascribe the honor of being the first discoverer of Florida, and the source of the information displayed by the editors of this copy of Ptolemy.122
The first outline of the coast drawn from known observation is the Traza de las Costas de Tierra Firme y de las Tierras Nuevas, accompanying the royal grant of those parts to Francisco de Garay in the year 1521. It has been published by Navarrete, and by Buckingham Smith. Contrary to the usual opinion of the day, which was not proved incorrect till the voyages of Francesco Fernandez de Cordova (1517), and more conclusively by that of Estevan Gomez (1525), the peninsula is attached to the mainland. This and other reasons render it probable that it was drawn up under the supervision of Anton de Alaminos, pilot of Leon on his first voyage, who ever denied the existence of an intervening strait.123 I cannot agree with Mr. Smith that it points to any prior discoveries unknown to us.
On some early maps, as one in the quarto geography of Ptolemy of 1525, the region of Florida is marked Parias. This name, originally given by Columbus to an island of the West Indian archipelago, and so laid down on the “figura ò pintura de la tierra,” which he forwarded to Ferdinand the Catholic in 1499,124 was quite wildly applied by subsequent geographers to Peru, to the region on the shore of the Caribbean Sea, to the whole of South America, to the southern extremity of North America where Nicaragua now is, and finally to the peninsula of Florida.
We have seen that early maps prove De Leon was not, as is commonly supposed, the first to see and name the Land of Flowers (Terra Florida); neither did his discoveries first expand a knowledge of it in Europe. Probably all that was known by professed geographers regarding it for a long time after was the product of later explorations, for not till forty years from the date of his first voyage was there a chart published containing the name he applied to the peninsula. This is the one called Novae Insulae, in the Geographia Claudii Ptolemaei, Basileae, 1552.125
The only other delineation of the country dating from the sixteenth century that deserves notice—for those of Herrera are quite worthless—is that by Jacques Le Moyne de Morgues, published in the second volume of De Bry, which is curious as the only one left by the French colonists, though geographically not more correct than others of the day. Indeed, all of them portray the country very imperfectly. Generally it is represented as a triangular piece of land more or less irregular, indented by bays, divided into provinces Cautio, Calos, Tegeste, and others, names which are often applied to the whole peninsula. The southern extremity is sometimes divided into numerous islands by arms of the sea, and the St. Johns, when down at all, rises from mountains to the north, and runs in a southeasterly direction, nearly parallel with the rivers supposed to have been discovered by Ribaut, (La Somme, La Loire, &c.)
Now this did not at all keep pace with the geographical knowledge common to both French and Spanish towards the close of this period. The colonists under Laudonniére and afterwards Aviles himself, ascended the St. Johns certainly as far as Lake George, and knew of a great interior lake to the south; Pedro Menendez Marquez, the nephew and successor of the latter, made a methodical survey of the coast from Pensacola to near the Savannah river (from Santa Maria de Galve to Santa Helena;) and English navigators were acquainted with its general outline and the principal points along the shore.
Yet during the whole of the next century I am not aware of a single map that displays any signs of improvement, or any marks of increased information. That inserted by De Laet in his description of the New World, called Florida et Regiones Vicinæ, (1633,) is noteworthy only because it is one of the first, if not the first, to locate along his supposed route the native towns and provinces met with by De Soto. Their average excellence may be judged from those inserted in the elephantine work of Ogilby on America, (1671,) and still better in its Dutch and German paraphrases. The Totius Americæ Descriptio, by Gerhard a Schagen in the latter, is a meritorious production for that age.
No sooner, however, had the English obtained a firm footing in Carolina and Georgia, and the French in Louisiana, than a more accurate knowledge of their Spanish neighbors was demanded and acquired. The “New Map of ye North Parts of America claimed by France under ye name of Louisiana, Mississippi, Canada, and New France, with ye adjoining Territories of England and Spain,” (London, 1720,) indicates considerable progress, and is memorable as the first on which the St. Johns is given its true course, information about which its designer Herman Moll, obtained from the “Journals and Original Draughts” of Captain Nairn. His map of the West Indies contains a “Draught of St. Augustine and its Harbour,” with the localities of the castle, town, monastery, Indian church, &c., carefully pointed out; previous to it, two plans of this city had appeared, one, the earliest extant, engraved to accompany the narrative of Drake’s Voyage and Descent in 1586, and another, I know not by whose hand, representing its appearance in 1665.126
On the former of these maps, “The South Bounds of Carolina,” are placed nearly a degree south of St. Augustine, thus usurping all the best portion of the Spanish territory. This is but an example of the great confusion that prevailed for a long time as to the extent of the region called Florida. The early writers frequently embraced under this name the whole of North America above Mexico, distinguishing, as Herrera and Torquemada, between Florida explored and unexplored, (Florida conocida, Florida ignorada,) or as Christian Le Clerq, between Spanish and French and English Florida. Taking it in this extended sense, Barcia includes in his Chronology (Ensayo Cronologico de la Florida) not only the operations of the Spanish and English on the east coast of the United States, but also those of the French in Canada and the expeditions of Vasquez Coronado and others in New Mexico. Nicolas le Fer, on the other hand, ignoring the name altogether, styled the whole region Louisiana, (1718,) while the English, not to be outdone in national rapacity, laid claim to an equal amount as Carolina. De Laet127 was the first geographer who confined the name to the peninsula. In 1651 Spain relinquished her claims to all land north of 36° 30´ north lat., but it was not till the Definitive Treaty of Peace of 1763, that any political attempt was made to define its exact boundaries, and then, not with such entire success, but room was left for subsequent disputes between our government and Spain, only finally settled by the surveys of Ellicott at the close of the century.
Neither Guillaume de l’Isle nor M. Bellin, both of whom etched maps of Florida many years after the publication of that of Moll, seems to have been aware of his previous labors, or to have taken advantage of his more extensive information. In the gigantic Atlas Nouveau of the former, (Amsterdam, 1739,) are two maps of Florida, evidently by different hands. The one, Tabula Geographica Mexico et Floridæ, gives tolerably well the general contour of the peninsula, and situates the six provinces of Apalacha mentioned by Bristock; the other, Carte de la Louisiane et du Cours du Mississippi, is an enlarged copy with additions of that published five years previous in the fifth volume of the Voyages au Nord, on which is given the route of De Soto. Bellin’s Carte des Costes de la Nouvelle France suivant les premiéres Decouvertes is found in Charlevoix’s Nouvelle France and is of little worth.
The map of “Carolina, Florida, and the Bahama Islands,” that accompanies Catesby’s Natural History of those regions, is not so accurate as we might expect from the opportunities he enjoyed. The peninsula is conceived as a nearly equilateral triangle projecting about two hundred and sixty miles towards the south. Like other maps of this period, it derives its chief value from locating Indian and Spanish towns.
The dangerous navigation of the Keys had necessitated their examination at an early date. In 1718, Domingo Gonzales Carranza surveyed them, as well as some portion of the northern coast, with considerable care. His notes remained in manuscript, however, till 1740, when falling into the hands of an Englishman, they were translated and brought out at London under the title, “A Geographical Description of the Spanish West Indies.” But how inefficient the knowledge of these perilous reefs remained for many years is evident on examining the marine chart of the Gulf of Mexico, by Tomas Lopez and Juan de la Cruz, in 1755. The seafaring English, when they took possession of the country, made it their first duty to get the most exact possible charts of these so important points. No sooner had the treaty been signed than the Board of Admiralty dispatched G. Gauld, a capable and energetic engineer to survey the coasts, islands, and keys, east and south of Pensacola. In this employment he spent nearly twenty years, from 1764 to 1781, when he was taken prisoner by the Spanish, and shortly afterwards died. The results were not made public till 1790, when they appeared under the supervision of Dr. Lorimer, and, in connection with the Gulf Pilot of Bernard Romans, and the sailing directions of De Brahm, both likewise engineers in the British service, employed at the same time as Gauld, constituted for half a century the chief foundation for the nautical charts of this entrance to the Gulf.
Among the writers of the last century who did good service to American geography, Thomas Jefferys, Geographer to his Majesty, deserves honorable mention. Besides his more general labors, he edited, in 1763, the compilation of Roberts, and some years after the Journal of the elder Bartram; to both he added a general map of the region under consideration, “collected and digested with great care and labor from a number of French and Spanish charts,” taken on prize ships, correct enough as far as regards the shore, but the interior very defective; a plan of Tampa Bay; and one of St. Augustine and harbor, giving the depth of water in each, and on the latter showing the site of the sea wall.
Besides those in the Atlas of Popple, of 1772, the following maps, published during the last century, may be consulted with advantage:
Carolinæ, Floridæ nec-non Insularum Bajamensium delineatio, Nuremberg, 1775.
Tabulæ Mexicanæ et Floridæ, terrarum Anglicarum, anteriarum Americæ insularum. Amstelodami, apud Petrum Schenck, circ. 1775.
A Map of the Southern British Colonies, containing the Seat of War in N. and S. Carolina, E. and W. Florida. By Bernard Romans. London, 1776.
Plan of Amelia Island and Bar, surveyed by Jacob Blaney in 1775. London, 1776.
Plan of Amelia Island and Bar. By Wm. Fuller. Edited by Thomas Jefferys. London, 1776.
Plano de la Ciudad y Puerto de San Augustin de la Florida. Por Tomas Lopez. Madrid, 1783.
Nothing was done of any importance in this department during the second Spanish supremacy, but as soon as the country became a portion of the United States, the energy both of private individuals and the government rapidly increased the fund of geographical knowledge respecting it.
The first map published was that of Vignoles, who, an engineer himself, and deriving his facts from a personal survey of the whole eastern coast from St. Marys river to Cape Florida, makes a very visible improvement on his predecessors.
The canal contemplated at this period from the St. Johns or St. Marys to the Gulf gave occasion to levellings across the peninsula at two points, valuable for the hypsometrical data they furnish. Annexed to the report (February, 1829,) is a “Map of the Territory of Florida from its northern boundary to lat. 27° 30´ N. connected with the delta of the Mississippi,” giving the features of the country and separate plans of the harbors and bays.
The same year J. R. Searcy issued a map of the territory, “constructed principally from authentic documents in the land office at Tallahassie,” favorably mentioned at the time.128
The map prefixed to his View of West Florida, and subsequently to his later work, by Colonel Williams, largely based on his own researches, is a good exposition of all certainly known at that period about the geography of the country. Cape Romans is here first distinguished as an island; Sharks river is omitted; and Lake Myaco or Okee-chobee is not down, “simply,” says the author, “because I can find no reason for believing its existence!” Unparalleled as such an entire ignorance of a body of water with a superficies of twelve hundred square miles, in the midst of a State settled nigh half a century before any other in our Union, which had been governed for years by English, by Spanish, and by Americans, may be, it well illustrates the impassable character of those vast swamps and dense cypresses known as the Everglades; an impenetrability so complete as almost to justify the assertion of the State engineer, made as late as 1855: “These lands are now, and will continue to be, nearly as much unknown as the interior of Africa or the mountain sources of the Amazon.”129
What little we know of this Terra Incognita, is derived from the notes of officers in the Indian wars, and the maps drawn up for the use of the army. Among these, that issued by the War Department at the request of General Taylor, in 1837, embracing the whole peninsula, that prefixed to Sprague’s History, which gives the northern portion with much minuteness, and the later one, in 1856, of the portion south of Tampa Bay, are the most important. The latter gives the topography of the Everglades and Big Cypress as far as ascertained.
While annual explorations are thus throwing more and more light on the interior of the peninsula, the United States Coast Survey, now in operation, will definitely settle all kindred questions relative to its shores, harbors, and islands; and thus we may look forward to a not distant day when its geographical history will be consummated.