Plates and figures
Maps and Illustrations
Coastal charts, the Monrovia survey, treaty scenes and founding documents. Open any plate to zoom and pan, then follow the chapter references into the digital edition.
Maps and charts · c. 1833
Chart of the Grain Coast, Cape Mesurado to the St. John
Soundings, river mouths and coastal villages between Cape Mesurado and the River St. John. Charts of this kind guided the vessels that carried settlers and the naval squadrons that policed the slave trade.
Maps and charts · 1821
The Approach to Cape Mesurado
The headland as it appeared to vessels standing in from the Atlantic — the promontory whose transfer was negotiated in December 1821.
Maps and charts · 1837
Plan of the Settlement of Monrovia
Half-acre town lots, sixty-foot streets, the fort on the crown of the cape. The survey shows how land tenure — and therefore political membership — was distributed in the colony.
Illustrations · 1822
Landing at the Cape
Boats coming ashore below the headland. The first months at the cape were defined by disease, scarce provisions and an unsettled question of title.
Illustrations · 1821–1845
The Palaver and the Treaty
A negotiation between colonial agents and Dei and Bassa leaders. What the settlers recorded as a conveyance, the coastal polities understood within a law of stewardship, alliance and tribute.
Illustrations · 1847
The Declaration of Independence, July 1847
The convention at Monrovia. Independence resolved the sovereignty question raised by Britain and France, and left the question of indigenous citizenship unresolved.
Documents · 1847
Constitution of the Republic of Liberia
The founding instrument of the republic — its articles of government, its guarantees of conscience and press, and its definition of who belonged to the new state.
Documents · 1821–1862
The Documentary Record
Agency letters, colonial minutes, treaty copies and ledgers — the paper on which the claims of this volume are tested.