DesBarres, Joseph Frederick Wallet "A Chart of Delawar (sic) River from Bombay Hook to Ridley Creek.” and “A Plan of Delawar (sic) River from Chester to Philadelphia…”

Joseph Frederick Wallet DesBarres. "A Chart of Delawar [sic] River from Bombay Hook to Ridley Creek.” and “A Plan of Delawar [sic] River from Chester to Philadelphia…” Prepared for The Atlantic Neptune.

London: Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, 1 June 1779. Etching. 30 1/4 x 21 7/8. Nebenzahl, 136. Sellers & VanEa, 1370; National Maritime Museum Cat.: 320: 130-31; Snyder, 85. 

After the French & Indian War, the job of surveying and mapping the American coastline fell upon J.F.W. DesBarres, who had commanded the mapping of the coasts of present-day eastern Canada. The resulting atlas, The Atlantic Neptune, was called by A.P. Loring, "the first great marine atlas of the eastern seaboard." This map is a chart of the Delaware River to as far as Philadelphia in two panels. The coastline, mouths of creeks, shoals and sand bars, and soundings are shown with careful precision, and rhumb lines are used to help with navigation of a ship up this relatively narrow river. In the inset map showing from Chester to Philadelphia shows the situation of the British ships off Philadelphia in mid-November, 1777.