37.     Featherstone & Co. I                                                            1852

 

The Featherstone company of lithographers and printers produced two maps of Exeter in the 1850s (see also 40). William Charleton Featherstone was born circa 1794-95 in Plymouth and died 3rd February 1858 in Exeter. He married Jane and they had one son, Samuel, but it was Jane who registered William’s death and it was probably she who announced the sale of her late husband’s business to John Pollard in the Exeter Flying Post of 18th March of the same year. William worked from a large number of addresses and he is listed at 67 Fore Street in Pigot’s 1822 directory and under the Weekly Times Office 1828. As early as 1825 he printed a broadsheet on the proposed railway to Exeter (printer to J Godfrey). Between September 1832 and April 1833 18 issues of The Western Spy were published: the first two under Featherstone, the others by W C Pollard. He also published the Western Times for a while but severed connection with the paper to start up Featherstone’s Exeter Times in 1836 which was not successful and ran for only four months. 

Title: MAP OF THE CITY OF EXETER, EMBRACING ALL THE Alterations and Improvements to the Present Period.

Size: 445 x 590 mm with scale Chains 22 = 73 mm.

Imprint: DRAWN, PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY FEATHERSTONE & Co. Lithographers and Printers. 246, High Street, Exeter. 

A panel on both sides shows the ‘Street List’. There is a scale bar and the City Arms. There is a note on population: Population 1851, City of Exeter, 32,818 but including St. Thomas &c. 38,886. Three panels at the bottom list the parishes, the churches and public buildings. One interesting feature is the ‘cross’ shape to the City Prison which reappears on later maps: Warren correctly showed the prison as a shallow ‘H’ shaped building.

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Illustration reproduced by kind permission of Devon Archives & Local Studies.
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 40.     Featherstone & Co. II                                                                    1858

 

The actual dating of this smaller map by Featherstone is not known but seems to be a few years later than the large plan executed in 1850 (see 37 above). On the one hand the reservoir is still portrayed as a single basin although two filter beds had been added in 1854 but it is probably the only map to include the Exeter & Yeovil railway line as projected. As the actual South Western line was completed in 1860 the map must have shortly pre-dated the arrival of the new line. 

Title: MAP OF EXETER.                        

Size: 185 x 233 mm with Scale of Feet 1000 = 40mm (or 1 Mile = 211 mm).

Imprint:  Featherstone Lithographer 246 High Street Exeter. There is a note below this: Circulating Library Bedford Street. See below (all top left in plain panel). 

Note the inset plan showing the location of Featherstone’s Circulating Library and their printing office (bottom left). There is a scale bar, North point (west is at top) and two tables of Reference – Churches and Chapels. The prison shape has been altered from that in Featherstone’s earlier plan, and now has the correct H form. The South Devon Railway is clearly shown and the Intended Exeter & Yeovil Railway.

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Illustration reproduced by kind permission of Devon Archives & Local Studies - MM B/EXE/1855/FEA.
Documents held at Devon Archives are copyright. Copying, printing, reproducing or sharing images of them on this website is not permitted.