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Cassini
Maps |
15
High Street, Upton upon Severn |
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1:2,500 County Series
The first maps at 1:2,500 (roughly 25 inches to the mile, or
roughly one square inch to one acre) were Published in 1855 with
coverage of the cultivated parts of Great Britain being completed in
1896. By then, a Almost every man-made feature of any significance is displayed on
these maps which thus form a definitive record of the changing
landscape of Britain since the middle of the 19th century. They are of
considerable importance to historians (although this would have been
inconceivable to their creators). The detail zooms in to house-level
and offers a wealth of additional information concerning land usage,
communications and boundaries. For genealogists they are of particular
use and interest. Not only do they offer countless research clues
which no other source can match but they also reveal every nuance of
the landscape inhabited by past generations, so helping to explain
many of the preoccupations and limitations that ruled |
Ordnance
Survey's first maps, produced in response to the fear of Napoleonic
invasion, were published in 1805 at a scale of one inch to the mile.
As the century progressed, however, it became clear that more detailed
maps were needed for purposes such as land registration, public
sanitation, railway construction, civil defence and the administration
of the Tithe and Enclosure Acts. The experiment of the Irish mapping
produced at 1:10,560 in the 1820s proved successful and – after
prolonged debate about the scale, format and (inevitably) the cost of
the new surveys – it was eventually agreed that the whole country
would be surveyed at 1:2,500 except for areas of moorland and mountain
where 1:10,560 was deemed sufficient. The small army of surveyors was
once more despatched across Britain while teams of engravers and
printers in Southampton eagerly awaited the material this operation
would so painstakingly collect.
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