Maps of Bath from 1676, 1764, 1818, 1835 and 1911

This first "Map of Bathe" is from "A discourse of Bathe, and the Hot Waters There" by Thomas Guidott in 1676, with the engraving by F.H. Van Houe.

The next map of Bath that I have was published by Andrew Dury in c.1764 entitled "Plan of the City and Suburbs of Bath".  Note that the orientation is 90 degrees from the previous map.

I also have a small book entitled "The Historical and Local New Bath Guide" published by J. Barratt and Son in 1818, which includes a map (apologies for the quality of the image as it is rather tricky to scan.).

 

This next map is from 1835 by J & C Walker.

 

 

Lastly here is a map from 1911 from a Railway Guide.

 

Maps of Somerset 1761 to 1850

This is a series of maps of Somersetshire, starting with one by Thomas Kitchin in 1761 for the Duke of York.

Next one by John Cary in 1793 ...

... Ellis in 1819 with canals visible, ...

 ... Hall in 1831 with the start of the railway, ...

.... Moule in 1848 with the railway to Exeter very clearly shown, ....

and Archer in c.1850 showing a proliferation of railway lines, as well as the County Divisons.

 

Early Strip Maps - John Ogilby 1675 & 1698, Bowen & Owen 1720 and Paterson 1785

I managed to acquire a number of early maps in a recent auction of some material from the Bath Postal Museum (sadly closed).  The earliest maps I acquired are strip maps drawn by John Ogilby published in 1675 & 1698, this first being of a portion of the London to Bristol road, going from London to Marlborough.

I also acquired a hand-colourised Ogilby strip map of the road from Chippenham to Wells and Marlborough to Wells. 

... and a plate from the 1939 reprint of the Ogilby maps showing London to Banbury.

In 1720 a half-scale version of John Ogilby's maps were published by Emanuel Bowen and John Owen - here is a strip map of the Chippenham to Wells road.

In 1785 Paterson's Itinerary was published as a book of strip maps, showing the houses of the gentry along the route.  The first one below shows Bath to Bristol ...

... while the second is Devizes through Philip's Norton.

 

Trio of Somerset Maps

Here are a trio of maps of Somerset, starting with a strip map of the London to Barnstaple road.

Next a sideways map that looks like a coloured version of John Cary's map of 1817.

And finally a Dugdales map from 1846.

Somerset Post Offices - interactive map

I've just finished creating an interactive map of the Post Offices in Somerset, with data taken from Ken Smith's list of the post offices in the county (all the UK lists are available here).

My website is available here - it may take a little while to load as it has to perform a fair amount of processing !

What I've done is to take Ken Smith's list in free form text, such as:

Abbots Leigh (Avon) 1837: PP.BRISTOL.  UDC 9-1-1852.  Rubber 1888.  T.O.5-11-1895(ALH).  MO-SB 1-6-1897. Closed 31-7-1974.  Re-open 16-2-1976.  Closed 10-10-1980.

Aisholt                          1835: PP.BRIDGWATER.  UDC 4/1853.  Rubber 1893.  T.O.20-12-1933(AIZ)(discont.2/2/1938). Closed Dec.1947.

Alford                           6-8-1850: UDC: BATH.  By 1883 CASTLE CARY RSO.  T.O.22-8-1893(AOD).  17-2-1920 BATH. 6-1-1941 CASTLE CARY.  Closed 1958/60.

converted it to a structured XML file and inserted the approximate latitude and longitude of each post office (as best I can, some locations are guesses):
  <PLACE>
     <NAME>Abbots Leigh</NAME>
     <LAT>51.462568</LAT><LNG>-2.657652</LNG>
     <TYPE>SO</TYPE><PT>BRISTOL</PT><SD>1837</SD><ED>1974</ED>
     <TYPE>SO</TYPE><PT>BRISTOL</PT><SD>1976</SD><ED>1980</ED>
     <DESC>1837: PP.BRISTOL.  UDC 9-1-1852.  Rubber 1888.  T.O.5-11-1895(ALH).  MO-SB 1-6-1897. Closed 31-7-1974. Re-open 16-2-1976.  Closed 10-10-1980.</DESC>
  </PLACE>
  <PLACE>
     <NAME>Aisholt</NAME>
     <LAT>51.122174</LAT><LNG>-3.122697</LNG>
     <TYPE>SO</TYPE><PT>BRIDGWATER</PT><SD>1835</SD><ED>1947</ED>
     <DESC>1835: PP.BRIDGWATER.  UDC 4/1853.  Rubber 1893.  T.O.20-12-1933(AIZ)(discont.2/2/1938) Closed Dec.1947.        </DESC>
  </PLACE>  
  <PLACE>
     <NAME>Alford</NAME>
     <LAT>51.086187</LAT><LNG>-2.558724</LNG>
     <TYPE>SO</TYPE><PT>BATH</PT><SD>1850</SD><ED>1883</ED>
     <TYPE>SO-R</TYPE><PT>CASTLE CARY</PT><SD>1883</SD><ED>1905</ED>
     <TYPE>SO</TYPE><PT>CASTLE CARY</PT><SD>1905</SD><ED>1920</ED>
     <TYPE>SO</TYPE><PT>BATH</PT><SD>1920</SD><ED>1941</ED>
     <TYPE>SO</TYPE><PT>CASTLE CARY</PT><SD>1941</SD><ED>1960</ED>
     <DESC>6-8-1850: UDC: BATH.  By 1883 CASTLE CARY RSO.  T.O.22-8-1893(AOD).  17-2-1920 BATH. 6-1-1941 CASTLE CARY.  Closed 1958/60.</DESC>
  </PLACE>

and then written some javascript to display markers using Google maps, a brief extract below:

       map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById('map'), {
         zoom: 10,
         center: new google.maps.LatLng((51.2, -2.7)),
         mapTypeId: google.maps.MapTypeId.ROADMAP
         });

      for (i = 0; i < offices.length; i++) { 
         // Create marker and hide it
         marker = new google.maps.Marker({
             map: map,
             title: offices[i].name,
             visible: false,
             icon: iconurls[offices[i].iconum],
             position: new google.maps.LatLng(offices[i].lat,offices[i].lng)
             });

Definitely back to my roots as a systems programmer in the 1980s !

The web page has three different types of filters to show just a subset of the offices:

1. By Date:  specify a Start date and/or an End date and click the "Apply Dates" button.  To reset, blank the date fields and click the button again. Either date may be specified by itself or in combination.  When a Start date is specified, only offices that were in existence after that date are displayed.  When an End date is specified only offices that were in existence before that date are displayed.
2. By Type:  check or uncheck the "Select Types" check boxes to display or not display offices of that type (the key below the map describes the types).  If an office is of the selected type within whatever date range is specified then it will be displayed.
3. By Post Town or RSO:  Expand the lists in the right-hand side bar to see the Post Towns, Railway Sub-Offices and Post Towns external to the County.  RSOs that were also Post Towns are listed under Post Towns.  Check the check box next to a Post Town/RSO to just see the offices under it - filtered by date range and/or type if specified.  Check multiple Post Towns/RSOs to see offices under any of the offices checked.  Uncheck the Post Town/RSO(s) to revert back to the whole county display.

The display will automatically zoom to show whatever offices need to be displayed - check the "Static Zoom" check box to freeze the zoom level.  Uncheck it to allow automatic zoom.

Click on any of the markers, or on the underlined links in the right-hand side-bar, to display details on an office in an info-window.

What is it for ?    I don't know yet !   But it is interesting, for example to put in different date ranges for a Post Town like Bath and see the extent of its "patch", for example up to 1840, 1840-1905, 1905-1950, and more recently.  Also interesting to see where the Railway Sub-Offices were (select RSO and SO-R by type).

The webpage would work for any County if someone creates the XML file - I've created a mainly empty one for Dorset with data for just a few Post Towns (all the other offices in Dorset are there, under "External Towns" / "undefined" but haven't had their data created).

Map of Somerset Penny Posts

The other set of maps I scribbled were the extents of the different Penny Posts across Somerset.  What I've ended up doing is taking the individual Penny Post maps and superimposing them on an image of Greenwood's map of 1821/29 of the Turnpike Roads in Somerset.

The superimposition is not exact and I may have another go at it - one wants the detail in the modern map to find the position of the Receiving Houses etc. but the road network as it was in the 1830s, so it is not straightforward to do.

The other thing that is needed on the map are the main Post Roads.  One should probably also add the Penny Posts from Post Towns outside Somerset that served towns inside Somerset (eg. Tiverton in Devon, Sherborne in Dorset).

It's also a bit of a muddle from a time perspective - not all the Penny Posts ran to their full extents at the same time ... but I found it fairly illuminating on the relationships and boundaries between the Penny Posts.

Taking Stock - and some Maps

It's now just about two years since I started this blog.  In that time I've managed to work my way through the larger places in Somerset (and those with the older postal history), at least those places that I have material for.

After a brief diversion onto some maps that I've "scribbled", I shall start working my way through the smaller villages in Somerset, those with UDC, Climax Rubber or CDS (double circle double-arc) cancels - with brief forays back into the older postal history of Somerst as I get any new (old) material.

o-------------o

Now for a few maps I've "scribbled" to do with Bath.  There is a site, www.scribblemaps.com, that allows one to scribble on maps - when I started playing with the site it was free, but there is now a $5 charge per month for the Pro features (I managed to get most of what I wanted to do done before the charges came in).

One thing I used the site for was to plot out the extent of the postal service managed out of Bath for:

1. the Penny Post period,
2. the Undated Circular cancel (UDC) period, 
3. the Rubber Climax cancels,
4. and the addresses that came under Bath in 1972 (taken from "Postal Addresses", March 1972 issued by The Post Offfice.

Here are the series of four maps, to the same approximate scale.  Where there is a number in a circle, that indicates that there are that number of points there, within the scale of the map.

It is interesting to see that the area managed by Bath expands after the Penny Post period, staying approximately the same for UDCs (mainly 1844-1857) and Rubber Climax handstamps (1885-1933), and then shrank back, so that by 1972 the area served from Bath was similar to that in the Penny Post period.