Background
He was born at Hutton-in-the-Forest, Cumberland, England, eldest son of the Rev. Sandford Tatham and his wife, a daughter of Henry Marsden of Gisborne Hall, Yorkshire.
(This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)
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He was born at Hutton-in-the-Forest, Cumberland, England, eldest son of the Rev. Sandford Tatham and his wife, a daughter of Henry Marsden of Gisborne Hall, Yorkshire.
Sent to Virginia in 1769 to seek his fortune, he became a clerk in the trading house of Carter & Trent, on James River. Early in 1776 he removed to the Watauga settlement in the Tennessee country, where he was employed in the mercantile establishment of John Carter. For a time he was clerk of the celebrated Watauga Association.
He drafted the petition (July 5, 1776) of the inhabitants on the western waters praying for incorporation into the government of North Carolina. Throughout the Revolution he served the American cause intermittently, taking part first in the defense of Fort Caswell-on-Watauga in July 1776, and last in the operations at Yorktown, October 1781.
In 1780, in collaboration with Col. John Todd of Kentucky, Tatham prepared a "History of the Western Country, " which is said to have received the approbation of Jefferson. This work was never printed and the manuscript has been lost.
After a brief mercantile venture in Philadelphia and a visit to Havana in 1783, Tatham returned to Virginia where he became clerk of the council of state. He studied law under Samuel Hardy, a member of the council, and subsequently under William R. Davie of North Carolina, and was admitted to the bar March 24, 1784. He was a delegate from Robeson County in the general assembly of North Carolina in 1787, and was elected by that body a lieutenant-colonel of militia.
After a visit to England, he was prevailed upon to organize a geographical department for Virginia, and in 1791 published A Topographical Analysis of the Commonwealth of Virginia for 1790-91. Tatham returned in 1792 to the Tennessee country, where he practised law, mapped the region, and gathered considerable materials for its history. Visiting Spain in 1796 on a mysterious mission connected with affairs in the West, he was ordered to leave the country.
Removing to London, he devoted much time to literary pursuits, contributing to magazines and publishing works on engineering and agricultural subjects: A Plan for Insulating the Metropolis by a Canal (1797); Remarks on Inland Canals (1798); The Political Economy of the Inland Navigation (1799); An Historical and Practical Essay on the Culture and Commerce of Tobacco (1800); Auxiliary Remarks on an Essay on the Comparative Advantages of Oxen in Tillage (1801); National Irrigation (1801); Report on a View of Certain Impediments and Obstructions, in the Navigation of the River Thames (1803); and Navigation and Conservancy of the River Thames (1803). In 1801 he was appointed superintendent of construction of the elaborate Wapping Docks in the Thames at London.
Returning to America in 1805, Tatham was engaged for some years in a survey of the coast from Cape Fear to Cape Hatteras. In that field he was a pioneer. He was an assiduous collector of manuscript maps and historical data, and his invaluable collection was offered for sale, without success, to Congress in 1806 and again in 1817. In his proposal of 1806, Tatham was probably the first to define the functions of a national library for the United States. He spent about five years as draftsman and geographer in the Department of State at Washington, and in 1817 President Monroe gave him a comfortable position in the government arsenal on James River. Tatham was the friend and correspondent of Jefferson and other statesmen of his times, and collaborated with Robert Fulton in the field of canalization.
He had become addicted to the use of intoxicants and in a moment of intemperance stepped in front of a gun about to be fired in a salute and was killed instantly. Papers he left and his conversation previously indicated that the act was deliberate.
(This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)
He was a man of brilliant parts and great versatility, but was eccentric and lacking in mental poise.
He was unmarried.