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Title: J. De Cordova's Map of the State of Texas Compiled from the records of the General Land Office of the State by Robert Creuzbaur
- Author: Jacob De Cordova
- Date: 1858
- Condition: See description
- Inches: 33 1/2 x 34 [Image]
- Centimeters: 85.09 x 86.36 [Image]
- Product ID: 308761
Texas at the Threshold of Secession
Among the most consequential and elusive nineteenth-century maps of Texas, Jacob de Cordova’s monumental survey stands as a cornerstone of the state’s cartographic record. More than a handsome wall map, it became the essential framework upon which later depictions of Texas were built—an ambitious synthesis of official surveys, evolving settlement patterns, land claims, transportation routes, and the fast-changing geography of the young state. Created in collaboration with surveyor Robert Creuzbaur and compiled from the most current material available through the Texas General Land Office, de Cordova’s map represented Texas at a scale and level of detail unprecedented for its day. First published in 1849, it was among the earliest major maps issued after Texas entered the Union in 1845 to draw substantially upon the General Land Office’s official records. Its scope, accuracy, and exceptional density of information established a new standard for mapping the state.
De Cordova himself was an extraordinary figure in Texas history. One of the earliest Jewish settlers in Texas, he aided the cause of independence by supplying goods from New Orleans during the Texas Revolution before relocating to Galveston in 1837. A gifted linguist—already fluent in five languages—he immersed himself in his new home and learned several Indigenous dialects. He later served in the Texas House of Representatives, settled in Austin, and, with his brother, published the Texas Herald.
Recognizing the enormous commercial potential of Texas after the Mexican War, de Cordova became one of the state’s most energetic land promoters. For roughly three decades, he cultivated immigration and investment through promotional campaigns that extended across the United States and into Europe. The map was central to that effort: it transformed the vast and often abstract promise of Texas into a legible, compelling vision of towns, counties, roads, rivers, frontier settlements, and available opportunity.
Its importance was recognized immediately. Sam Houston urged Congress to acquire 500 copies of the 1849 issue, defending both the map’s quality and de Cordova’s character during a Senate appropriations debate with Jefferson Davis. De Cordova published the map under his own direction from 1849 through 1854; beginning in 1856, publication rights passed to the prominent New York map publisher J. H. Colton.
This edition is especially evocative, portraying Texas in the tense final moment before secession and the Civil War. It also records a decisive shift in the state’s development: the arrival of rail transportation. As the third state of the map to depict Texas railroads, it offers materially expanded and revised information over its predecessors. Rail lines appear under construction in the Houston region, with connections toward Galveston, Richmond, and the Washington area, while another route extends eastward from Marshall in Harrison County.
The progression is revealing. The 1856 edition—the first to show a Texas railroad—depicts only the line between Richmond and Houston. By 1857, a Marshall line is absent, and the proposed routes northwest of Houston are still fragmentary: one reaches Rock Island before turning toward Washington, while another heads directly in that direction but stops well short. Here, the developing network is presented with greater breadth and ambition, offering a vivid cartographic record of Texas entering the railroad age on the eve of a national rupture.
Condition
The map has been professionally conserved and presents handsomely. A few minor separations along the original folds have been expertly repaired from the verso, while three small areas of carefully executed facsimile restoration are present: two along the right-hand border—one in Arkansas, extending just to the “o” in Murfreesboro, and another in Louisiana, from Fort Jessup to the 30° latitude mark—and a third at a fold intersection. The sheet has been flattened and archivally backed, and the original covers are retained.
Rarity
The 1858 issue is notably uncommon in institutional catalogues. While major American repositories preserve earlier and later states of de Cordova’s landmark map, the present pre–Civil War edition is far less frequently encountered in readily accessible institutional and market records.
Background on Creator
Jacob Raphael de Cordova (1808–1868) was a Jamaican-born Texas land agent, colonizer, publisher, legislator, and among the most influential promoters of nineteenth-century Texas. After settling in Texas in 1839, he lived in Galveston and Houston, served in the Second Texas Legislature in 1847, published the Texas Herald with his brother Phineas, and devoted much of his career to encouraging immigration, settlement, and investment in the young state. Through his land agency, he accumulated vast land interests and helped lay out Waco in 1848–49; his landmark Map of the State of Texas, first issued in 1849, became the most detailed and influential Texas map of its generation.