The Office of Coast Survey is the oldest U.S. scientific organization, dating from 1807 when Congress directed that a "survey of the coast" be carried out. By 1836, it was called the U.S. Coast Survey and in 1878, the name was changed to the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey. Today the Office of Coast Survey is a division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration NOAA.

The survey teams, composed of civilians as well as Army and Naval officers, charted the nation's waterways and produced a wide array of reports, survey charts, hydrographic studies of tides and currents, astronomical studies and observations, and coastal pilots. These charts are an important record of the changing nature of the nation's coastlines. In additional to coastal charts, the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey produced land sketches, Civil War battle maps, and the early aeronautical charts.

A very attractive chart produced by the Coast Survey, fully and beautifully engraved with excellent coastal detail and the city of Gloucester shown in a grid plan. The water is filled with hundreds of soundings, hazards, sea-bottom type identifiers, and buoys. Sailing directions, information about the tides, and a key for the abbreviations used for seafloor type classification appear beneath the title. A chart with the location of two lighthouses, a note on various hazards, and two distance scales run along the chart's bottom. Drawn by L. Daser and W.T. Martin and engraved by G.B. Metzeroth and J.L. Hazzard. Produced under the direction of A.D. Bache.

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Condition: B+

Issued folding, now flat, with a tiny hole at a fold intersection and some faint toning along the folds. The map has been remargined at bottom left with border replaced in facsimile.