SURVEYING

[Tindal Pearson Porter, licensed surveyor, Brisbane, Australia.] Autograph Letter Signed (Tindal P. Porter) to his brother George, describing his life at the mining township of Nigger Creek, Herberton, North Queensland.

Author: 
Tindal Pearson Porter (1857-1914), English-born licensed surveyor, Brisbane, Australia [Nigger Creek, Herberton Queensland, Australia]
Publication details: 
B<orrama?>, Nigger Creek, Herberton [Queensland, Australia]. 2 November 1910.
£220.00

5pp., 4to. In good condition, on five sheets of aged and lightly-stained paper. Written in a difficult crabbed hand. Porter begins the letter by explaining that he is writing at night during steady rain, and that the previous day he rode in from his camp 'to "come in from the wet" and have been weather-bound here ever since'.

Manuscript 'Report on the Road from Frimley to Yorktown [Surrey, England]' 'Ewart' [Sir John Spencer Ewart, while a Sandhurst cadet], with coloured manuscript map and four other field sketches by him; with sketches by 'Sterling' and 'Gordon'.

Author: 
Lieut-Gen. Sir John Spencer Ewart (1861-1930), KCB, Adjutant-General to the Forces in the British Army [Frimley, Surrey; Yorktown House; Aldershot; Sandhurst]
Publication details: 
Report on War Office 'Form 33'. Ewart's four additional sketches dated 1880 and 1881, the other material undated.
£280.00

The collection, deriving from the Ewart family papers, is in good condition, on aged paper, with fraying to the extremities of the report. Sir John Spencer Ewart, son of General Sir John Alexander Ewart, Colonel of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, entered Sandhurst in 1880, and left the following year, with the sword of honour, to join the Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders. (For more information about Ewart and his father, who also obtained 'special distinction' at Sandhurst, see their entries in the Oxford DNB.) ONE. Manuscript 'Report'.

Delicate coloured field plan of 'Part of Hartford Bridge Flats [now near the site of Blackbushe Airport, Hampshire] surveyed and drawn by J. A. Ewart [later General Sir John Alexander Ewart], 35th. Regt. in 12 hours'.

Author: 
General Sir John Alexander Ewart (1821-1904), KCB, Colonel of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders and hero of the Indian Mutiny and Crimean Campaign [Hartford Bridge Flats, Hampshire; 35th Regiment]
Publication details: 
[Hartford Bridge Flats, Hampshire.] Undated, but between 1838, when Ewart was gazetted to the 35th Regiment, and 1848, when he exchanged to the 93rd Highlanders.
£95.00

On a piece of thick paper, 36.5 x 38 cm. In fair condition, on aged and spotted and dusty paper, flattened out after being tightly furled, with one short closed tear in margin repaired with archival tape. The field plan is delicately drawn in ink to a 'Scale of four inches to one mile', and coloured in green, blue, grey and red.

Autograph Letter Signed from Epaphras Hoyt to 'the Commissioners of Canals, in Massachusetts', giving the results of his 'surveys and levels, in the valley of Deerfield River', and discussing the possibility of a tunnel through the Hoosac Mountain.

Author: 
Epaphras Hoyt (1765-1850) of Deerfield, Massachusetts, Major-General of the Massachusetts Militia and writer on military matters [Hoosac Tunnel]
Publication details: 
Deerfield, Massachusetts; 20 September 1825.
£1,250.00

4pp., 4to. Fair, on lightly-aged paper. An important document, not least for the fact that its author discusses the building of a 'tunnel 4 or 5 miles through the [Hoosac] mountain', anticipating the commencement of the construction of the Hoosac Tunnel by 23 years. The letter is closely and neatly written, with the first page headed 'The following Results of my surveys and levels, in the valley of Deerfield River, are respectfully submitted to the Commissioners of Canals, in Massachusetts. | Viz.

Syndicate content