Diaries of William Lloyd Holden, 1829 and 1830

William Lloyd Holden was employed by William Andrewes Bryant in his project - ultimately unsuccessful - to survey and publish maps of all the counties of England and Wales. He worked for Bryant from about 1823, when he was 18 years old, to sometime between 1831 and 1835. His two surviving diaries, for 1829 and 1830, cover his work in Cheshire, the West Riding and the Yorkshire Dales, as well as a long visit to family and friends in London over Christmas and New Year, 1829-30. They provide a unique insight into that way that county maps were produced in this period, which saw the final flowering of the private county mapmaker. Most significantly they demonstrate clearly that the maps were primarily an exercise in compilation and synthesis from existing maps, supplemented with additional information from personal observation, rather than wholly new surveying. The diaries also chronicle the interests and social and cultural activities of an intelligent and widely read young man with a lively interest in the people and places which he came across in the course of his work.