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| Carington Bowles | |
|---|---|
| Name | Carington Bowles |
| Birth date | c.1724 |
| Death date | 1793 |
| Occupation | Map publisher, printseller, engraver |
| Years active | c.1740–1793 |
| Nationality | English |
| Notable works | London maps, prints of battles, views |
Carington Bowles was an English mapmaker, printseller, and publisher active in London in the mid to late 18th century. He operated a prominent shop that issued maps, prints, and views connected to major events and places across Europe and the Americas, supplying collectors, libraires, and institutions. Bowles’s output intersected with contemporary cartographers, engravers, and publishers and influenced print circulation during the Georgian era.
Born c.1724 into a family involved in the book and print trades, Bowles’s formative years coincided with the careers of contemporaries such as John Rocque, Thomas Jefferys, Richard Gough, Samuel Baker, and John Pine. Family connections linked him to London trade hubs like Fleet Street, St Paul's Cathedral environs, and the Strand. His kinship network overlapped with firms such as Bowles and Carington (later iterations) and associations with publishers including Edward Orme, Robert Sayer, Thomas Kitchin, William Faden, and John Bowles (publisher). The Bowles household corresponded with printers, engravers, and mapmakers engaged with events such as the Seven Years' War, the American Revolutionary War, and colonial enterprises involving British North America and the West Indies.
Bowles established a shop that became a commercial node for maps, views, and prints, engaging with artists and cartographers like George Vertue, William Hogarth, Paul Sandby, Thomas Hearne, and John Boydell. His business intersected with the output of publishing houses such as Cadell and Davies, Longman, Coxe, and Bowles & Carver; he supplied works used by institutions including the British Museum, the Society of Antiquaries of London, and the Royal Academy of Arts. Bowles issued maps covering regions referenced in treaties such as the Treaty of Paris (1763), the Treaty of Paris (1783), and events like the Siege of Quebec (1759), the Battle of Bunker Hill, and campaigns of figures including James Wolfe and Horatio Nelson. He sold prints depicting subjects tied to personalities like George III, William Pitt the Elder, William Pitt the Younger, and John Wilkes.
Bowles’s imprint issued single-sheet maps, folded atlases, town plans, and vistas created by engravers such as Isaiah Thomas, Benjamin Cole, Christopher Browne, Thomas Bowen, and Michael Drayton; he also reissued plates by Herman Moll, Nicolas Sanson, Martin Waldseemüller, and Gerard Mercator-inspired works. His catalog included topical prints tied to events like the Battle of Culloden, the Jacobite rising of 1745, the American Declaration of Independence, and colonial voyages led by navigators such as James Cook and George Vancouver. He competed with sellers including John Harris, George Willdey, and Rudolph Ackermann; he used distribution networks linked to Lloyd's Coffee House, the Royal Exchange, and bookshops near Leadenhall Market. Bowles engaged in plate-engraving, retailing, and sometimes plate-sharing, collaborating with cartographic firms such as William Faden, Robert Sayer, and John Stockdale while also commissioning artists like Paul Sandby for topographical views. His publications appeared in contexts associated with the Royal Geographical Society, the Hudson's Bay Company, and pamphleteers addressing imperial policy, reflecting market demand for prints connected to personalities such as Admiral Rodney, General Cornwallis, Sir John Moore, and Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington (later historicized).
Bowles’s personal life remained tied to the trade milieu of London, with residential and commercial ties in parishes around St Martin-in-the-Fields and St Dunstan-in-the-West. He maintained professional relations with printers, engravers, and booksellers appearing in directories alongside names like Charles Rogers, Horace Walpole, Thomas Cadell, and John Nichols. Bowles’s death in 1793 passed the business to successors who allied with firms such as Bowles & Carver and later retailers that informed 19th-century antiquarian collecting trends tied to Samuel Lysons and John Bowles Jr.. His legacy influenced map retailing practices adopted by dealers like Edward Stanford and informed collections at the British Library and provincial museums such as the Ashmolean Museum.
Surviving Bowles imprints are held in numerous institutional collections including the British Library, the Bodleian Library, the National Maritime Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Library of Congress, the National Archives (United Kingdom), and regional repositories like the Leicestershire Record Office and the Guildhall Library. Individual maps and prints by Bowles appear in auction records alongside works by Herman Moll, John Rocque, Thomas Kitchin, John Seller, and Benjamin Donn. Specific items include town plans of London, sea charts referencing Portuguese discoveries, views of Naples, depictions of the Cape of Good Hope, and battle prints of engagements like the Siege of Louisbourg (1758). Collectors and curators from institutions such as the Royal Geographical Society and the Museum of London continue to study Bowles’s imprint for insights into Georgian print culture and the commercial circulation of cartographic and pictorial information.
Category:English publishers (people) Category:18th-century English people