The Charles Close Society for the Study of Ordnance Survey Maps

One-inch engraved maps of the Ordnance Survey from 1847
By Roger Hellyer and Richard Oliver
The Charles Close Society, 2009. 714 + vi pages, A4 hardback.
Price £50 (£37.50 to CCS members) including UK postage. ISBN 978 1 870598 27 9

This monumental publication describes the development of the engraved one-inch maps of the Ordnance Survey from the 1840s to their gradual demise from 1914 onwards. An introductory essay of over 100,000 words by Richard Oliver is followed by an exhaustive carto-bibliography by Roger Hellyer, which has been compiled from the resources of not only all the major libraries in Britain and Ireland, but also those of many European countries and of North America. No other carto-bibliography now offered to the public is such value for money. No library or student of nineteenth century official mapping can afford to be without this volume: the introductory essay alone is practically worth the price.
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Projections and Origins, collected writings of Brian Adams.
Edited by Roger Hellyer and Chris Higley. A5 format softback, perfect binding, iv + 116 pages, including four pages of illustrations. £10.00 including postage (£7.50 to members). ISBN 978 1 870598 26 2

Brian Adams was a unique man with unique knowledge. Most of the standard references for the projections, construction data and, in many cases, the sheet lines of nineteenth and early twentieth century Ordnance maps are to Brian's articles scattered through the Sheetlines of fifteen or more years ago. For further information you have to hunt through his contributions to the forwards and appendices to several of the Society's books, as well as two others by David Archer.

Roger Hellyer has now had the opportunity to go through Brian's papers and has discovered further, unpublished, data on similar subjects. To preserve all this information in one easily accessible source, and also as a tribute to a distinguished and much loved Honorary Member of the society, we have produced this book.

This handbook was first published in 1993 and has been far and away the Charles Close Society's best-selling publication. This reflects its immense value to students of Ordnance Survey (OS), map historians and local historians.

This new edition has 64 more pages, several new sections, and is issued in hard covers. It offers not only amplification and updating of the previous edition but also has the most up-to-date bibliography in hard copy of writings on the OS. The chapter on the various scales of map published by the OS has been brought up to date to reflect the current position, and offers pithy assessments of the worth or otherwise of various types of map. All illustrations have been renewed or replaced.

A guide to the Ordnance Survey one-inch Seventh Series
by Richard Oliver Second Edition. The book consists of 68pp, A5, softback.
£5.00 (incl postage) ISBN 978 1 870598 23 1
The Seventh Series was the final stage in the development of the Ordnance Survey one inch to one mile (1:63,360) map before its replacement in 1974-6 by the 1:50,000 scale, and was the only completed uniform, or nearly uniform, map series to cover Great Britain at this scale. Though initially published between 1952 and 1961, its origins really lay in the 1920s, and in the desire to replace engraving and lithography by photo-mechanical methods for the production of the one-inch map.

This booklet, orginally published in 1986, describes the origins and development of the Seventh Series and provides comprehensive sheet listings of its various editions and versions, together with the tourist maps derived from it. The present edition improves on its predecessors by correcting a few minor mistakes, adding some further details to the introductory essay, and adding a new section on changes to the design and specification of the maps.

Military maps: the one-inch series of Great Britain and Ireland
by Roger Hellyer and Richard Oliver. The book consists of 294 + x pages, including 16 colour plates, hardback A4. £30 per copy (£22.50 to members). ISBN 978 1 870598 22 4
Military maps contains listings by Roger Hellyer of all the gridded one-inch military map series of England and Wales, Scotland and Ireland, and, since the second world war, Great Britain and Northern Ireland. It is organised in two completely separate sections, the first describing those series carrying the War Office Cassini Grid, the second those carrying the National Grids of Great Britain and Ireland. There is a special section describing the military mapping of London in each part of the book.

Richard Oliver's essay unifies the whole, bringing us first to the point where in the 1920s the War Office was provided with its own separate set of plates for the one-inch map. It then describes how civilian and military versions of the map diverge, reaching perhaps their widest point of separation in War Revision, then Second War Revision, then gradually come together again as National Grid one-inch mapping develops, finally to reunite in the present 1:50,000 Landranger. The history of one-inch military mapping in Ireland and later Northern Ireland is similarly described.

The book is graphically illustrated by sixteen colour plates, eight monochrome plates, and seven index diagrams designed by Chris Higley. It has appendices including previously unpublished tables showing editions of GSGS 3907 and 3908, also sales copies, civilian printers and military printing units. This is supplemented by a concordance of military map numbers, a chronology, a bibliography and a diagram briefly showing the organisation of Military Survey, its predecessors and its successors, from 1791 to the present day.

A Guide to the Ordnance Survey one-inch Third Edition maps, in colour England and Wales, Scotland, Ireland.
by Roger Hellyer and Richard Oliver, A4, hardbound, 168 pages, 8 colour and 12 black and white plates £12.50 (£10.00 to members). ISBN 978 1 870598 21 7.

This new book contains a detailed history and description of these maps by Richard Oliver. It builds on the original monographs by the late Guy Mesenger, and includes much new information, both historical and cartobibliographical. Roger Hellyers meticulous cartobibliography covers all the third edition coloured maps series.

Popular Maps. The Ordnance Survey Popular Edition One Inch Map of England and Wales 1919-1926
by Yolande Hodson. 411 pages, B5, 46 illustrations, 13 colour plates, hardback. price £30.00 (£24.00 to members) ISBN 978 1 870598 15 6
This book tells the story of the Popular Edition one-inch map of England and Wales from sheet line construction to shop counter, and sets the development of the map within the context of the evolution of the one-inch series from 1801 to the 1930's. This book is the first Charles Close Society publication illustrated with a range of colour plates. It also includes a full catalogue of all known printings of the 146 sheets of the map.

Dr Yolande Hodson is a founder member of the Charles Close Society and was for some time Chairman. She was formerly employed by Military Survey and then in the Map Room of the British Museum (now the Map Library, British Library), and has been Historical Consultant to Ordnance Survey and Military Survey.

The Revised New Series colour printed one-inch map of England and Wales 1897-1914
by Dr Tim Nicholson. 95 pages, B5 27 black and white figures, colour plates softback. price £10.00 (£8.00 to members) ISBN 978 1 870598 19 4
Tim Nicholson has written a comprehensive study of this important series which changed the image of Ordnance Survey maps. The public were offered for the first time a map printed in up to five colours, folded in covers to fit in a pocket. The origins and impact of the new map are treated exhaustively in part one The Story of the Map. The second part reviews all Aspects of the map series and third part contains a listing of all known Map States.

An essential source book for a neglected map series of considerable significance in the development of modern mapping in Britain.

The "Ten Mile" maps of the Ordnance Surveys
by Roger Hellyer, 212pp, A4, softback, £17.95. ISBN 978 1 870598 12 5
"The result is truly encyclopaedic. ... much material for the railway historian." -John Loxton, Cartographic Journal, 1994
"The definitive text on this complex subject including much valuable information on Irish OS involvement. Tremendous value."

The maps of the Ordnance Survey: a mid-Victorian view
by Captain H Riall Sankey, RE with an introduction by Ian Mumford, 36pp, illus. A4, softback, £5.00. ISBN 978 1 870598 14 9
"This is a fascinating booklet, written in an accessible style, that documents an era in map making not just in Great Britian but throughout Europe and North America" - Paul Ferguson, Imago Mundi, 1996
"This slim booklet will surely be a standard reference for any student of the nineteenth century maps of the Ordnance Survey, or even later..." - Jeffrey Stone, Cartographic Journal, 1997
"...a must for anyone interested in OS maps, printing or technology generally."

A Guide to the Ordnance Survey One-Inch Fifth Edition
by Richard Oliver, 2000, 48pp, A5 Softback, £4.50 New Edition
ISBN 978 1 870598 17 0

This is an updated version of a booklet first issued in 1987. It includes much new and hitherto unpublished material, particularly about the origins and development of the Fifth (Relief) Edition. It includes a more accurate and complete description of the map's production methods and a more complete listing of the maps.

A Guide to the Ordnance Survey One-Inch Popular Edition of Scotland.
by Richard Oliver, 2000, 44pp, A5, softback, £4.00 New Edition
ISBN 978 1 870598 16 3

This is an updated version of a booklet produced in a very limited print run in 1990. It includes a far more complete list of printings of the maps, and a comprehensive introductory essay which describes the development of the mapping, most of it covering ground not covered at all in print hitherto.

A Guide to the Ordnance Survey One-Inch New Popular Edition.
by Richard Oliver, 2000, 60pp, A5, softback, £5.00 New Edition
ISBN 978 1 870598 18 7

This is also an updated version of a booklet first published in 1987 The layout is more spacious, easier to use and includes a more complete list of printings. The introductory essay includes a new section discussing some aspects of the Popular-style (Wales and northern) sheets and takes account of further unpublished OS materia.

A Preliminary list of Ordnance Survey "One-Inch" District and Tourist Maps and selected precursors in The British Library
by Karen Severud Cook and Robert P. McIntosh, 1991, 68pp, pbk, Out of print
ISBN 978 1 870598 11 8

"An inch to the mile": The Ordnance Survey one-inch map 1805-1974
edited by Yolande Hodson, 64pp, pbk Out of print ISBN 978 1 870598 08 8
(Prepared as the catalogue to the RGS OS Bicentenary exhibition. This is the fullest account of the One-inch map published to date.)