A surprisingly rare map, engraved by J & C. Walker, marking all the allocated plots of land in New South Wales, with the owner's names, with a small vignette map of Australia showing the Swan River Colony, South Australia, New South Wales, and Tasmania. Dixon published the map, without the permission of Thomas Mitchell while on leave in England, so incurring Mitchell's undying wrath.

The mapmakers
Robert Harald Lindsay Dixon (1800–1858) emigrated to Tasmania with his brother in 1821. By 1826 Robert had left Tasmania for Sydney where he was appointed assistant surveyor in the Surveyor-General's Department under Lieutenant John Oxley. He surveyed the southern districts of New South Wales, largely from an open boat. He then accompanied Majors Mitchell and Edmund Lockyer on their expedition to survey the Grose valley near Mount Victoria. In 1827 Dixon explored the Burragorang valley where he became completely lost and nearly died. After recovering from that ordeal he made an extensive survey of the Blue Mountains which made it possible for Mitchell to open a road to Bathurst. However, the two fell out dramatically after Dixon took two years leave to England in 1836 where he published this map.

Dixon "played an outstanding part in extending geographical knowledge in New South Wales, and many of his surveys were performed under trying and hazardous conditions. He ranks high among early surveyors and explorers" (Cranfield for ADB online).

Joseph Cross, bookseller, publisher, copperplate printer and engraver had a shop at 18 Holborn "opposite Furnival's Inn" from about 1823 when he engraved 'A new map of the county of Monmouth'. Joseph Cross appears to have been joined in business by his son from between 1847 and 1854, when their imprint changed to "J. Cross & Son". Cross clearly had a keen interest in emigration to the Australian colonies, having published several works related, including: Atkinson's 'An Account of the State of Agriculture and Grazing in New South Wales' (1826); 'Chart of Van Dieman's Land' (1826); 'Chart of Part of New South Wales…' (1827 – 1829); Wakefield's 'A Letter from Sydney, the Principal Town of Australasia. Edited by Robert Gouger. Together with the Outline of a System of Colonization' (1829); Busby's 'Authentic Information Relating to New South Wales, and New Zealand' (1832); but most famously, "the earliest work relating to the inland exploration of Western Australia" (Wantrup): 'Journals of Several Expeditions Made in Western Australia During the Years 1829, 1830, 1831 and 1832: Under the Sanction of the Governor, Sir James Stirling' (1833), which includes his subsequent map of Western Australia.