1855 Kellogg View of Boston from Chelsea

Looking over Boston.

This is a c. 1862 - 1864 E. B. and E. C. Kellogg hand-colored lithographic view of Boston from Chelsea, probably adapted from William Henry Bartlett's earlier composition. It presents the city through three defining features: its crowded maritime waterfront, the State House above Beacon Hill, and the Bunker Hill Monument rising over Charlestown. A wooded foreground, occupied by a man carrying a bundle of sticks, a boy, and a dog, turns the urban prospect into a picturesque landscape suited to domestic display. The publishers' imprints point to an early 1860s issue.

A Closer Look

The view looks southwest across the Mystic River toward Boston, with the Charlestown peninsula extending into the scene from the right. The long wooden Chelsea Bridge cuts diagonally across the water, drawing the eye from the wooded foreground toward the densely built city. Beyond it stands a conspicuous arch-roofed building, likely a shiphouse associated with the Charlestown Navy Yard. Sailing vessels occupy the open water, while a thicket of masts marks the farther commercial waterfront.

The State House crowns the central skyline, its dome elevated above a closely packed succession of rooftops and church steeples. At right, the Bunker Hill Monument provides a separate vertical landmark against an otherwise open sky. Dedicated on June 17, 1843, the monument commemorates the battle fought on June 17, 1775. Its inclusion places Revolutionary memory alongside the city's government and maritime economy.

The foreground is unusually prominent. A spreading tree fills much of the right half of the composition, while cut logs, thick undergrowth, and a winding path establish a rustic setting immediately outside the city. Green hand-coloring emphasizes this leafy frame, with blue and reddish accents distinguishing the figures. The Chelsea Bridge connects these contrasting environments visually: the viewer encounters Boston from a wooded hillside rather than from its streets or wharves.

Publication History

The print was jointly published by Edmund Burke Kellogg (1809 - 1872) and Elijah Chapman Kellogg (1811 - 1881) of Hartford, Phelps and Watson of New York, and F. P. Whiting of New York. The lower margin gives the Kelloggs' address as 248 Main Street, Phelps and Watson's as 18 Beekman Street, and Whiting's as 87 Fulton Street. This combination of publishers helps date the undated impression. Nancy Finlay places the F. P. Whiting imprint in 1862 - 1866 and Phelps and Watson's distribution of Kellogg prints in 1859 - 1864. Their overlapping activity suggests an issue around 1862 - 1864. These New York connections also explain the multiple imprints: the Hartford lithographers relied on outside publishers and distributors to circulate their prints to a broad popular audience.

The probable antecedent is Bartlett's Boston, and Bunker Hill (from the East), engraved by Charles Cousen and published in London by George Virtue in 1839. The earlier view shares the bridge, city skyline, and monument, but its foreground includes men and cattle rather than the stick carrier, boy, and dog seen here. The Kellogg print is therefore a redrawn adaptation, not an impression from Bartlett's engraved plate. A related hand-colored lithograph titled Boston was also published by F. Silber in Berlin. The precise sequence connecting the Silber and Kellogg adaptations remains uncertain.

Cartographers

William Henry Bartlett (March 26, 1809 - September 13, 1854) was an English topographical draughtsman, illustrator, and travel writer based in London and active internationally during the 19th century. His contribution to geographical publishing lay chiefly in drawings of towns, architecture, and landscapes reproduced by professional engravers. Born in Kentish Town, London, he attended boarding school before beginning a seven-year apprenticeship in 1822 with the antiquarian John Britton (1771 - 1857). Britton trained him in architectural drawing and sent him throughout England to sketch buildings for illustrated publications; Bartlett continued working for him after completing his apprenticeship in 1829. On July 6, 1831, he married Susanna Moon (1811 - 1902), with whom he had five children. His subsequent travels supplied illustrations of continental Europe, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, and North America for London publishers. Bartlett made four visits to North America between 1836 and 1852. During his first visit, in 1836 - 1837, he sketched the northeastern United States, including the White Mountains, Niagara Falls, and Washington, D.C. Professional engravers translated his drawings into steel plates for American Scenery; or, Land, Lake, and River: Illustrations of Transatlantic Nature, with text by Nathaniel Parker Willis (1806 - 1867). Published in London by George Virtue (1794 - 1868), the work began appearing in thirty monthly installments in June 1837 and was issued in two volumes dated 1840. Bartlett's Canadian travels supplied the drawings for Canadian Scenery Illustrated (1842), whose views document settlements, waterways, transportation, and everyday life. He also wrote and illustrated travel books and edited Sharpe's London Magazine from March 1849 to June 1852. His unfinished The History of the United States of North America, completed by Bernard Bolingbroke Woodward (1816 - 1869), appeared posthumously with engravings reused from his North American publications. Bartlett died aboard the French steamer Egyptus, between Malta and Marseilles, on September 13, 1854, while returning from the eastern Mediterranean, and was buried at sea.   Further Details...

Kellogg (fl. c. 1831 - 1947) designates a succession of American lithographic printing and publishing partnerships based in Hartford, Connecticut, whose output included maps, topographical views, and popular pictorial prints. Daniel Wright Kellogg (1807 - 1874), a native of Tolland, Connecticut, established D.W. Kellogg and Company in Hartford about 1831, with his younger brother Elijah Chapman Kellogg (1811 - 1881) involved in its early operations. The business opened a wholesale and retail print shop on Main Street in 1834. Daniel moved west in 1836, but his name remained in the imprint until the partnership was dissolved in July 1840, when Elijah and Edmund Burke Kellogg (1809 - 1872) continued as E.B. and E.C. Kellogg. Their cartographic work encompassed allegorical maps, including An Illustrative Map of Human Life Deduced from passages in Sacred Writ (1847), as well as landscape and town views. They also printed views drawn by other artists, including Titus H. Darrow's New Haven, from East Rock, 1853. John Chenevard Comstock joined the business in 1848; the resulting imprints were Kelloggs and Comstock through 1850 and Kellogg and Comstock in 1851. Elijah subsequently traded independently as E.C. Kellogg until Edmund rejoined him in 1855, restoring the E.B. and E.C. Kellogg imprint. The brothers' partnerships and distribution arrangements extended their business beyond Hartford, notably through a New York office established with Horace Thayer in 1846. In 1867, the business became Kellogg and Bulkeley, with Edmund's son Charles E. Kellogg participating alongside William H. Bulkeley and Frank Bulkeley. Charles withdrew in 1874, ending the Kellogg family's involvement, although its name remained attached to the firm. The successor business increasingly emphasized commercial printing and merged with Case, Lockwood and Brainard in 1947 to form Connecticut Printers, which continued until June 1990.   Further Details...

Humphrey Phelps (June 10, 1799 - October 8, 1875) was an American map, guidebook, broadside, and print publisher active in New York City from the early 1830s through the 1860s. Born in Hebron, Connecticut, he developed a publishing business centered on geographical information for travelers, emigrants, and urban visitors. His early New York City plan, subsequently issued as Strangers Guide through the City of New York: With the Latest Improvements, carried a copyright dated July 1, 1830. During the mid-1830s, he published with B. S. Squire, Jr., their joint imprint appearing on maps and emigrant information concerning the expanding western states. Phelps subsequently worked through several publishing partnerships: the 1847 edition of Phelps's Travellers' Guide through the United States appeared under Phelps, Ensigns and Thayer, while Phelps, Fanning and Company issued Fanning's Illustrated Gazetteer of the United States and Phelps' Hundred Cities and Large Towns of America in 1853. His output ranged from portable folding maps and city guides to decorative geographical sheets, including Pictorial View of the World, copyrighted in 1846. He also participated in the market for historical and popular prints. With his nephew Gaylord Watson (1833 - 1896), he operated Phelps and Watson, a New York map and print publishing concern that distributed Kellogg lithographs during 1859 - 1864; this partnership dissolved on January 1, 1865. Phelps returned to Hartford, Connecticut, in 1868 and died there in 1875.   Further Details...

Condition

Good. Original color. Even overall toning.

References

Finlay, Nancy, 'Some Evidence for the Sale and Distribution of Kellogg Prints', conference paper presented at the Library Company of Philadelphia, October 15, 2010, p. 6. Library of Congress, LOT 4382-G, control number 90707332 (related 1839 Bartlett engraving). New York State Library, PRI5584, box 1, folder 3 (related 1839 Bartlett engraving).