Jefferys, Thomas

A Map of the Most Inhabited part of New-England, containing the Provinces of Massachusetts Bay and New Hampshire, with the Colonies of Conecticut and Rhode Island. London: Thomas Jefferys, 1774



4 sheets joined as 2 (upper half: 20 1/2 x 40 3/4 in.; 521 x 1035 mm. lower half: 21 3/8 x 40 1/2 in.; 534 x 1029 mm).  Handcolored in outline, townships granted by New Hampshire governor Wentworth fully colored in yellow, cartouche depicting the Plymouth landing in lower right corner; early reinforcement to one fold on each of the joined sheets, some offsetting, more pronounced in the lower half of the map. Hinged and matted.

Pritchard & Taliaferro, Degrees of Latitude, 35

4 sheets joined as 2 (upper half: 20 1/2 x 40 3/4 in.; 521 x 1035 mm. lower half: 21 3/8 x 40 1/2 in.; 534 x 1029 mm). Handcolored in outline, townships granted by New Hampshire governor Wentworth fully colored in yellow, cartouche depicting the Plymouth landing in lower right corner; early reinforcement to one fold on each of the joined sheets, some offsetting, more pronounced in the lower half of the map. Hinged and matted.
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The first large-scale map of New England, Pritchard and Taliaferro's sixth state, with the imprint altered to read November 29^th 1774. Published according to Act  by Tho^s. Jefferys.

Like many maps of the period, this one was compiled from numerous sources: Dr. William Douglass's map of New England (London, 1753) which showed settlements, rivers and boundary lines; a 1737 survey of Connecticut by Gardner and Kellock (unpublished); a 1741 draft by Richard Hazzens establishing the boundary between New Hampshire and Massachusetts; other surveys by Hazzens that provided more accurate renderings of Long Island, New York Harbor, and the Hudson River; and George Mitchell's survey of the area by the Merrimack River and that between New Hampshire and Massachusetts Bay.

Cartographic historian G. R. Crone identified the mapmaker as John Green on the basis of similarities  between this map and others attributed to him, but most importantly, Green distinguished places for which the locations had been determined astronomically (Pritchard and Taliaferro, Degrees of Latitude, p. 177). The cartouche specifies that the map is "composed from Actual Surveys and its Situation adjusted by astronomical observations." Crone later discovered that John Green was a pseudonym for Braddock Green. 

Jefferys had hired him around 1750 when he was chiefly producing maps of America and the West Indies. It is plausible that Jefferys had intended Green's map as a companion to Fry and Jefferson's Map of the Most Inhabited Parts of Virginia since both titles include the words "most inhabited part," share the same format of four folio sheets as well as the same design scheme of cartouches depicting scenes relative to their geographic locations. The inset of the town of Boston in the upper left corner replaced that of Fort Frederick on Lake Champlain after the first two states when the fort was destroyed during the French and Indian War.

This map also delineates the boundary dispute between New York and New Hampshire.  The map shows a large area colored yellow between the Connecticut River and Lake Champlain. Known at the time as the New Hampshire Grants, it would later become the state of Vermont. Governor Benning Wentworth, assuming that New York's modified boundary with Connecticut and Massachusetts (20 miles east of the Hudson River) would be extended even farther north, made the first of the grants in 1749—the township called Bennington—to a group that included his relatives and friends.  However, New York claimed that its boundary extended as far east as the Connecticut River, and Governor George Clinton of New York promptly informed Governor Wentworth that he had no authority to make such a grant. The dispute over control of Vermont was referred to the Crown. In 1764 New York's territorial claim to Vermont was upheld by British authorities. Vermont became the fourteenth state in 1791, but only after adjudication by a special commission, and payment of $30,000 by Vermont to New York to settle all pending land claims.