Chesapeake Bay Nautical Chart, 1861

The story of this map

The Chesapeake is the biggest estuary in the country, and charting it properly took the US Coast Survey three full sheets. This print joins Coast charts 31, 32 and 33 — published in 1861 — into one continuous chart of the bay from its head down to the mouth of the Potomac, at the 1:80,000 scale the Survey used for its working coast charts.

Seen whole, it is a beautiful thing: the long body of the bay running down the middle of the sheet, its western shore cut by river after river, the Eastern Shore fretted with creeks and marsh. Sounding figures fill the channels, lighthouse symbols mark the points, and Annapolis sits on the Severn about halfway down. The engraving of the tidal marshes and the low wooded shores is some of the Survey’s finest work.

The year gives it an edge. In 1861 the Chesapeake became a wartime waterway almost overnight, and these were the sheets the Navy was working from.

It belongs in a Maryland or Virginia home, a sailing club, or a wall that can take a big, detailed print. Part of our Framed Nautical Charts collection. Printed to order on archival matte paper and framed in the country of delivery.

Before and after

Left: the archive scan exactly as published. Right: the file that goes to the printer.

Archive scanRestored

Restoration notes

Restoration plan: this chart is on three sheets (Coast charts 31–33) which must be aligned and stitched into one image, matching tone across the joins; then crop scan margins, balance colour cast and levels while keeping the paper tone, remove library stamps and scanner artefacts if present, gentle sharpening. No repainting of original content.

Every print carries its archive credit on the packing slip. Paper tone and small imperfections of the original are kept on purpose; nothing is redrawn.