These maps were engraved by James Wallis (fl.1810-25) who was also a printer and publisher in London. There were according to Worms and Baynton-Williams, three James Wallis’ active at the time who are often confused with each other. There is a bookseller (fl.1787-1807) of Ivy Lane and Paternoster Row and an engraver and jeweller of Fleet Street who became bankrupt in 1810. The belief is that this James Wallis was born in Southampton in 1784. He was apprenticed to John Roper in 1799 and made free 1811.

These maps were first published in about 1812 in ‘Wallis’s New Pocket Edition of the English Counties or Traveller’s Companion’. The maps are easily distinguished by the design of the title at the top of the map. They include a wealth of information with a key in the lower margin. Initially the maps bore no plate numbers which were duly added over time.

This work was produced by a Patrick Martin. Todd, ‘Dictionary of Printers’, records a Patrick Martin residing at 196 Oxford Street from 1813-1818 who ran a business from next door at number 198. We know little else about Martin other than the issue of the ‘Sportsman’s Almanack’ in 1818. The maps themselves are bound alphabetically, despite the previously published index indicating otherwise. In this example though, Nottinghamshire is bound early. Although apparently written by Martin, the work was published by Simpkin & Marshall, a firm which remained extant until the 1940s. This Almanac was specifically produced for the sportsman. The text is divided into the twelve months and provides useful information for field sports, shooting and fishing. Empty tables are provided for ‘Game Taken’, ‘Memorandums’ and ‘Cash Accounts’. The title page of the book bears the required red stamp of the tax being paid of one shilling and three pence. Provenance: inscription on front free endpaper ‘Cha Potter’; Burden collection duplicate acquired in 1976. Beresiner (1983) pp. 234-7; not in Chubb (1927) 344; Smith (1982); Worms & Baynton-Williams (2011).