Rare Civil War Broadside Map of Lower Mississippi

Magnus, Charles (1826 - 1900).
Panorama of the Mississippi Valley and its fortifications.
Lithographed map.
C. Magnus, 12 Frankfort St, c. 1863.
23 ¼" x 25 ¼" sheet.
Since each city town or village is depicted in a birdseye view, we surmise that an artist made the trip up or down the river before the Civi War and hand drew the town portraits. Even such one-building sketches as Hales Store down the bluff from our shops is shown. Forts were probably added after the war began as the main purpose of the map was to satisfy curiosity about where the Union was making headway. Original hand coloring a bit heavier in places. Amazingly good condition for such a fragile broadside, with a few tiny inconspicuous stains, else very good . Museum display map. Stephenson 42.5. Four vertical strip maps from St. Louis to the Gulf each with a vignette printed in blue. The Magnus issue is more attractive than either the James T. Lloyd or that of his competitor H.H. Lloyd. Stephenson states it was engraved by F.W. Boell although this is not stated on the surface. He also gives a scale which is also not present. On fragile paper so most did not survive, it is seldom seen. Shows two tables of distances and the four birdseye views: St. Louis, Memphis, Vicksburg and New Orleans (one in each panel). Extraordinary detail of roads, railroads, towns, villages, forts, churches, saw mills, occasional landowner or plantation names, steamboat provisioning and woodloading stops, court houses, and individual stores (e.g. in our neck of the woods, Lauderdale County, Tennessee, "Hales Store" is depicted as a single building, parts of which still existed eighty years later). This fact leads to speculation that an artist came down, or up, the river before The War sketching settlements as small as Hales Store and as large as New Orleans. If this was the case, when The War came along all Magnus had to do was add “AND ITS FORTIFICATIONSâ€Â, plus the new Civil War forts, such as Wright, Randolph, Harris, Pillow, and the rejuvenated Pickering at Memphis This map is a definitive artifact of the way the lower Mississippi River looked physically, militarily, and politically during the Civil War. Top and bottom margins repaired. Mylar encapsulated