Alabama in 1846 - Montgomery, Mobile, Huntsville

Thomas Gamaliel Bradford issued this map of Alabama in 1846, engraved by G.W. Boynton or the firm of S. Stiles, Sherman & Smith for Bradford's own atlas, one of the elegant large-format publications that, alongside Henry S. Tanner's contemporary work, set Bradford apart from other American atlas publishers of the 1830s and 1840s. This example represents the map's second edition, identifiable by its olive brown border coloring in place of the green, and occasionally pink, border used on the first printing. Bradford built his publishing career after working for the American Encyclopedia, going on to edit and translate a geography originally published in French before producing his own major works, including An Illustrated Atlas, Geographical, Statistical and Historical of the United States in 1838, and he was among the first American mapmakers to depict Texas as an independent country. The Alabama plate reflects that same careful, well-engraved house style on high-quality paper, a genuine departure from cruder contemporary atlases.

The map is hand colored by county, with early railroad lines marked among the state's developing transportation infrastructure alongside its established towns, rivers, forts, and post offices. Rivers thread throughout the state, the natural transportation corridors that shaped Alabama's settlement patterns before railroads had extended very far into the interior. Forts and post offices are both marked in detail, the military and civil infrastructure of a state still consolidating its administrative reach across a rapidly growing population barely a quarter century after Alabama achieved statehood in 1819. The county-by-county coloring throughout gives the map an immediately legible sense of how far the state's formal political organization had extended by the mid-1840s.

This map is a fitting gift for an Alabama family tracing roots back to the state's early statehood decades, someone researching ancestors connected to the state's earliest counties, or a collector interested in Bradford's well-regarded large-format atlas work specifically. It stands alone among the Vault's Alabama offerings as a mid-1840s snapshot of the state's rail and postal infrastructure at a formative stage in its development. It's available unframed in a full range of sizes, from a compact study print to a larger statement piece.