Lord Baltimore commissioned the Bohemian-Dutch merchant Augustine Hermann to produce a map of his Maryland colony in exchange for a large land grant near the head of Chesapeake Bay. Hermann’s map was published in England in 1670.
In his A Biography of a Map in Motion: Augustine Herrman’s Chesapeake, Prof. Christian Koot uses contemporary accounts of Dutch and English navigation, land survey, and maritime map-making methods to imagine how Hermann gathered data and produced his map.
How accurate was Hermann? I used GIS software to find out.
I laid two prominent points from the Hermann map over GPS ground truth shown in a modern basemap — Elk Neck Point near Hermann’s Bohemia Manor in the north and Cape Henry at the mouth of the Chesapeake in the south.
How accurate are the points in between? See for yourself. Pan and zoom, swipe the bar to compare in the map here.
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I have seen the name wright on several maps of the eastern shore, how prominent were they? I also have seen the name wrights school on maps. my deceased grandmother was from this area. I think she was initialy amish, but not sure. can you help me. Richard taylor
Richard, I’ve been working my eastern shore ancestors for a while now and come across Wright’s constantly. There’s lots of free sources oniine if you have the time.
Archives of Maryland online, Plats.net and MDlandrec.net, and familysearch.org.
As to amish, perhaps her ancestors were, but could she have been Quaker? There’s Wrights in the 3rd Haven Monthly meeting in Talbot County but that meeting served some of my ancestors in Dorchester County.
I’ve been researching my mothers family, the Whiteley’s. There is limited information on Col William Whiteley,and Whiteleysburg Del but I saw that Col Whiteley was a founder of the Presbyterian Church in Greensboro. Any additional information on the Whiteley family would be appreciated.