Sapelo Sound

Washington D.C.: Published by the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey, 1920. Large folding nautical chart, printed on heavy paper stock. Uncolored. A rare original coastal survey of Sapelo Sound including St. Catherines Island, Sapelo Island, and Black Beard Island.

Established by President Thomas Jefferson in 1807 as the Survey of the Coast, the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey was the United States' first civilian scientific agency. This agency has followed its mission to survey the U.S. coastline, create nautical charts of the coast, and help increase maritime safety since its founding, and has often played fascinating roles in significant chapters of U.S. history. It served in all theaters of the Civil War in the service of the Union Army and Navy, pioneered acoustic exploration in the wake of the sinking of the Titanic, and during WWI it worked to detect enemy submarines. In addition, this agency worked to survey and produce detailed maps and renderings of the U.S. coast. These nautical survey maps (commonly referred to as "T-sheets") provide fascinating insights into the history of the United States coastline, which has and will continue to shift. These maps are the most important data source for understanding the physical and ecological characteristics of the U.S. shoreline. The present map is notable for its inclusion of St. Catherines Island, the northernmost outpost in Spanish Florida between 1587 and 1680 with Catholic friars and Spanish soldiers living among the Guale Indians for over a century there. After the Spanish abandoned the island, Mary Musgrove, a Muskogee leader and translator for James Ogelthorpe, claimed the island. Later, Button Gwinnett, a signer of Declaration of Independence, also called this island home. The map also shows Sapelo Island, home to the Hog Hammock community. This community traces its origins to the end of the civil war, when it was established as a reservation for former slaves. Many of the full-time inhabitants of the Hog Hammock Community today are African Americans known as Gullah or Geechees, who descend from enslaved West African people brought to the island in the 1700s and 1800s to work the island plantations. This community is one of the few of its kind to survive the centuries and is closely tied to its home on Sapelo Island. This map is a highly detailed and accurate sea chart of Sapelo Sound, and an important historical view of the developing coastal Georgia.