Phelps & Watson Historical and Military Map of the Border & Southern States

Keeping a (Northern) audience informed about the ongoing American Civil War.

This attractive pocket map of the United States was published by Humphrey Phelps and Gaylord Watson in New York in the late summer or early autumn of 1863. At the time the map was issued, Charleston was subjected to an ongoing siege by the Union Navy, Quantrill’s raiders were terrorizing the plains of Kansas, and the smoke had barely cleared from the fields around Gettysburg.

The image helps to visualize the scale of the massive national conflict to its well-educated Northern audience. Battle sites are noted with red spots and underlined toponyms, while blue dots identify the location of demographics for each state in the conflict (including slaves, where applicable). In addition to a population advantage, states that remained committed to the Union retained a clear advantage in railroad trackage compared to their Confederate opponents.

Topography is shown with simple hachures and an interesting variety of place names, geographic features, and locations of interest are labeled throughout. A table in the lower right lists (alphabetically) major engagements of the war, beginning with the April 12, 1861 attack on Ft. Sumter and concluding with the battle of Chester Gap (Nov. 6, 1862).