COLTON (Joseph Hutchins).
Colton's General Atlas, containing One Hundred and Seventy Steel Plate Maps and Plans.
Fifth edition of Colton’s world atlas, which was first published in 1856, and reprinted regularly thereafter.
John Hutchins Colton (1800-1893) was one of the leading American cartographic publishers. This atlas provides an encyclopaedic and up-to-date description of the world, the maps accompanied by text - “descriptions, geographical, stastistical, and historical” - compiled by Richard S. Fisher.
This atlas was published in 1859; in that year the failure of the Bolivian Government to pay a $25,000 bill for creating an atlas of that country forced Colton into bankruptcy, and the use of his plates passed to the partnership of Johnson and Browning.
Reference: Phillips, Atlases, 827.