The American Coast Pilot; Containing Directions for the Principal Harbors, Capes, and Headlands, on the Coast of North and South America.1857

8vo. A beautiful 1857 (18th) edition of one of the most influential navigation guides ever published, in a lovely fine binding of contemporary tree calf. Burgundy spine label with titling stamped in gilt. This is the 3rd issue. 740pp + ads. Square tight binding. Clean interior, save for a 19th-century bookplate from S. Thaxter & Son nautical Instrument sellers, to the front pastedown. Original calf. Binding rubbed and worn, more so on spine which is somewhat brittle with chips. Sporadic foxing. Edmund March Blunt (1770 ? 1862) was an American navigator, writer, and publisher of nautical magazines. He established a nautical book and chart publishing firm that became the largest publishing firm in the early 19th century. In 1796, he published the American Coastal Pilot, which described every port of the United States. By 1815, Blunt had moved to New York where he opened a place of business at 202 Water Street, Beekman Slip, New York, "where charts and pilots for every part of the world, nautical books of every description, sextants, circles, quadrants, spy glasses, compasses and every nautical and mathematical instruments requisite at sea may be had on the most reasonable terms." In 1824, his two sons, George and Edmund went into business with their father at the publishing house of marine works called E. & G. W. Blunt Publishing. Blunt published Blunt's Coastal Pilot, which became American Coast Pilot. A lovely pre-Civil War edition. …