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George Washington owned a copy of this rare and important map of New England, published only three months after the battle.
The inset map of Charleston and the Battle of Bunker Hill features burning buildings, rifle pits, and massed American and English forces, including artillery. It is regarded as the first pictorial representation, and second printed plan, of the battle.
The inset plan of Boston shows the extensive British tent encampments around the Liberty Tree on Boston Common.
The main map illustrates troops converging on Cambridge from across the region. One group marching eastward through western Massachusetts is labeled “March of General Washington” and includes “Piquets,” “Riflemen,” “Virginia Horse,” and “New York Grenadiers.” Another group in Rhode Island is labeled “March of the Troops from Connecticut” and “Company of Artillery.” Groups on other roads include “Rangers from New Hampshire,” “March of the New Hampshire Troops,” and “March of the Troops from Providence.”
[BUNKER HILL].
Map.
The Seat of War, in New England, by an American Volunteer, with the Marches of the Several Corps Sent by the Colonies Towards Boston, with the Atack on Bunkers-Hill. London: Robert Sayer & John Bennett, September 2, 1775. Hand-colored. 1 p., 18? x 21? in., framed to 19? x 23 in.
Inventory #28017
Price: $38,000
Historical Background
On June 13, 1775, the Patriot forces besieging Boston learned that the British planned to occupy the hills around the city. On the night of June 16, Colonel William Prescott and 1,200 American troops occupied Bunker Hill and Breed’s Hill on the Charlestown Peninsula just north of Boston.
On June 17, the same day Congress named Washington General in command of Continental forces, the Redcoats attacked. Their first two assaults on Breed’s Hill were repulsed. With the Patriots running out of ammunition, the third and final attack drove the American forces from the Charlestown Peninsula, which would soon allow the British control of Boston. However, the Americans inflicted serious casualties, demonstrating that they could engage regular British army troops, boosting American morale and strengthening resolve for independence.
The Battle of Bunker Hill inset was informed by a June 25, 1775 letter from General Burgoyne to Lord Stanley: “Howe’s corps ascending the hill in the face of entrenchments, and in a very disadvantageous ground, was much engaged; and to the left the enemy pouring in fresh troops by the thousands, over the land; and in the arm of the sea our ships and floating batteries cannonading them: straight before us, A large and noble town in one great blaze; the church steeples, being of timber, were great pyramids of fire above the rest, the whole a picture and a complication of horror and importance beyond any thing…”
Sayer and Bennett also published The American Military Pocket Atlas (1776) with six maps of the American geographic landscape, which became known as the “Holster Atlas” because British officers carried it in a leather case attached to their belts.
Robert Sayer (1726-1794) and John Bennett (ca. 1745-1787) operated one of the largest print- and map-publishing businesses in London from 1748 to 1794. Sayer began selling prints in December 1748 on Fleet Street in London and in 1753 became a liveryman of the Stationers’ Company. Former servant and apprentice John Bennett officially became Sayer’s partner in 1777, but they began trading as Sayer & Bennett in 1774. The partnership ended in 1784, when Bennett suffered a mental collapse, though the firm continued to use the name until 1786, when it became Sayer & Co. or Robert Sayer & Co. Sayer’s health began to fail in 1792, and at his death, his assistants Robert Laurie and James Whittle operated the business from 1794 to 1812.
Condition: Early linen backing; top margin with residue from earlier frame; small hole in upper left; light damp stain to lower right; some toning throughout; old tear and reinforcement above “Hampshire”; remnants of archival tape at edges; water staining to backing at upper right corner; mounted in eighteenth-century carved and gilt frame.
Provenance: Brunk Auctions, October 17, 2024, lot 1117 < New England Collection < Christie’s New York, Fine Printed Books and Manuscripts Including Americana, December 4, 2014, lot 61.
References: Guthorn, British Maps of the American Revolution, 150/6; Krieger & Cobb, Mapping Boston, p. 103; McCorkle, New England in Early Printed Maps, 775.1; Nebenzahl, Bibliography of Printed Battle Plans of the American Revolution, 6 & 6a; c.f. Ristow, Cartography of the Battle of Bunker Hill; Schwartz & Ehrenberg, The Mapping of America, plate 117.
