1842 Wyld Map of the China Coast during the First Opium War

A rare 1842 separately-issued thematic map published in London by James Wyld to illustrate the primary theater of the First Opium War (1839 - 1842) as it progressed. It was this war that set the launched the Unequal Treaties and set the stage for nearly 100 years of foreign extraterritoriality in China. With an unusual east facing orientation, the map covers the coast of China from Canton (Guangzhou) and Macao (near modern day Hong Kong) as far north as Beijing, and inland as far as Nanjing (Nanking).

The First Opium War

The First Opium War, or the Anglo-Chinese War, (1839 - 1842) was a series of engagements fought between the United Kingdom and Qing China over trade and diplomatic relations. By the middle of the 19th century an enormous trade imbalance had developed between Europe and China due to high demand for Chinese goods (silk, porcelain, tea) in Europe and low demand for European goods (English wool anyone?) in China. To balance the trade, the British East India Company introduced Indian-grown opium to the Chinese market. The opium trade led to waves of addiction throughout China and reversed the trade imbalance within a couple of years.

In 1839, the Daoguang Emperor, seeking to stem the tide of narcotic addiction in China, banned opium entirely and blockaded China’s only open trade port - Canton (modern day Guangzhou). They also seized and destroyed nearly 20,000 chests, roughly 1200 tons, of opium. Foreign traders within Canton were confined to their offices without access to outside foo or supplies - essentially forcing them into a 'capitulate or starve' situation.

The British subsequently dispatched a naval and military force to China. The Royal Navy used its cannon power to inflict a series of decisive defeats on the Qing at various Chinese ports, forcing them to the negotiating table - a tactic later referred to as 'gunboat diplomacy.' By 1842, when this map was drawn, the Qing were forced to sign the Treaty of Nanking, the first of the Unequal Treaties. The Treaty created five open treaty ports and ceded Hong Kong to the British Empire. The Opium trade quickly resumed, but escalating tensions led to the Second Opium War (1856 - 1860) just 14 years later.

Insets and Subplans

The map features five insets. These include:

• Attack of Canton under the command of Sir Hugh Gough K.C.B., 25th May 1841
• Plan of the city of Ting-Hai in Chusan
• Plan of the city of Peking
• Attack on the forts in the Canton River
• The Harbour and Island of Amoy

Wyld's News Maps

Wyld was particularly masterful at capturing political events throughout the world as they happened and leveraging his impressive publishing operation to quickly produce and distribute pertinent maps to the invested public. The speed with which Wyld was able to assess news events and produce an informative and new fully engraved map contributed significantly to his commercial success. Wyld's news maps, while a small subset of his large cartographic corpus, arguably represent his most significant work - forming a vital record of currently developing new events from an even-handed if Anglo-centric perspective. Such maps had an ephemeral period of interest, were separately issued, and necessarily printed in small quantities, leading to their extreme scarcity today.

Publication History and Census

This map was issued in several states. It first appeared in 1841, during the First Opium War. A second edition (the present example), with various updates, was issued in February of 1842. The OCLC identifies s subsequent revised 1846 edition. At the outset of the Second Opium War (1856 - 1860) another updated version of the map was issued, followed by a fourth edition published in 1860, towards the end of the war. The OCLC identifies holdings in various institutions, but the map is extremely scarce to the market.