SABRE Maps/Scottish Popular Edition coverage project

This SABRE Maps Coverage Project is to provide online coverage of the OS One Inch Scottish Popular Edition and associated maps such as the Trossachs and Loch Lomond Tourist sheet, which is technically a New Popular Edition sheet, but included here due to its Scottish location.

Whilst the Scottish Popular Edition was the equivalent of the Popular Edition of England and Wales and hence created just after World War 1, there were no One Inch Fifth Edition maps or standard New Popular Edition maps printed of Scotland, and the Scottish Popular Edition continued until the late 1950s.

The post-war Scottish Popular Edition is useful for us to have as it shows mapping at a relatively detailed scale during the post-war era up to the 1950s, when the One Inch Seventh Series coverage project comes into play. It is also the first mapping at the One Inch scale in Scotland to show road numbers, something that the pre-war editions did not, although "A" roads were marked (but without numbers) from 1935.

Currently therefore, it is these post-war editions that this Coverage Project focusses on at this time.

Which projection type are these maps?

See Also: SABRE Maps/Calibrating

See Also: OS Popular Edition

Post-war revisions of the OS One Inch Scottish Popular Edition have the OSGB National Grid printed on them, but they actually use the Cassini (Delamere) projection and should be georeferenced accordingly. Using the National Grid only will result in poor alignment and the full map area not being available. The corner co-ordinates for georeferencing purposes can be found on the main Popular Edition information article.

Pre-war revisions do not have the National Grid printed on them, but are on the same Cassini (Delamere) lines.

However, Scottish One Inch Tourist Maps of the Scottish Popular period are horribly confusing. The post-war map of Loch Lomond and the Trossachs as mentioned above is actually a New Popular Edition based sheet, and so really is an OSGB National Grid map and should be geroreferenced as such, however its 1930s version is on Cassini (Delamere) lines and to add to the confusion, its 1920s counterpart is on the older Bonne (Scotland) projection; as are the majority of other Tourist sheets from between WW1 and WW2 unless stated. The exceptions are the Fifth Edition related sheets of Oban and The Cairngorms, which is only the 1936 edition (revision 4036) of the latter, which are National Yard Grid maps, whilst the Invergordon to Loch Ness sheet (revision 3200/33) looks similar to the Fifth Edition related sheets, but is actually on the Cassini (Delamere) projection.

Scottish Popular-era Tourist Sheet projections

Name	Dates	Projection Type	Notes
The Cairngorms	up to and including 1933	Bonne (Scotland)
The Cairngorms	1936	National Yard Grid	Revision code 5036 only
Invergordon to Loch Ness	1933	Cassini (Delamere)	Very similar in appearance to Fifth Edition style sheets, but is surrounded by alphanumeric grid
Oban	4036	National Yard Grid
The Trossachs and Loch Lomond	1920s	Bonne (Scotland)
The Trossachs and Loch Lomond	1930s	Cassini (Delamere)
The Trossachs and Loch Lomond	1940s	OSGB National Grid
All other Tourist sheets		Bonne (Scotland)

How do I find out the date of the map?

Later Scottish Popular Edition maps have revision codes that look like this New Popular Edition example, F in this example

Early post-war Scottish Popular Edition revision codes look like this New Popular Edition map, 1214 in this example, which is one of the relatively short-lived unique codes

See Also: SABRE Maps/OS Copyright

Annoyingly, the OS didn't actually put the exact date of the map on each map. The date that appears on the map (usually with the words First published by the Director General at the Ordnance Survey Office) often is not the correct date of the map, but the date of the first revision of the map. Annoyingly, even where a seemingly obvious date is visible (such as "Roads 1946"), that does not tell the full story. For that, we need to capture the actual revision code found on the map.

Revision codes on post-war Scottish Popular Edition sheets can be found located right at the bottom left of the map sheet, underneath the margin texts, and can be either a numeric code (such as that shown to the left), a letter code (such as that shown to the right), or a combination of the two (such as 8046/Cr). Post-war Scottish Popular map revision codes are somewhat arcane and fall under three general groups:

• During the immediate postwar period the revision codes include the print run size and the year of printing, so 18046/Ch being 18000 copies, printed in 1946 at Chessington.
• During the late 1940s and early 1950s, the OS switched to a unique code per printing, so 2205 can be found on one sheet, with the next revision of that sheet being 2336.
• The final Scottish Popular maps have the familiar "letter codes" to indicate revisions, but generally they included the previous printings in their calculation. Just because there is an F revision doesn't mean that there is an E in existence!

Progress by every Post-War sheet ever printed

Note: There are no post-war revisions of sheet 89, as its area was covered entirely by New Popular Edition maps.

If two revisions were printed in a single year, then the one nearest to the centre of the year is listed as being from that year, and the other revision shifted into the earlier or later year as appropriate. Only standard civilian colour editions are listed. Some maps are not listed with their exact date within the best source available for dating, Richard Oliver's A Guide to the Ordnance Survey One-Inch Popular Edition of Scotland, published by the Charles Close Society, and in those cases the date has been inferred from the unique revision code.

Key

Available on SABRE Maps

Online, but needs replacement source

Unconfirmed Revision

Within the pipeline

Pipeline (Military edition)

Acquired but not scanned

Copy needed

In copyright (copy available)

In copyright (copy needed)

No map printed (or empty cell)

Sheet	Name	1944	1945	1946	1947	1948	1949	1950	1951	1952	1953	1954	1955	1956	1957	1958	1959
1	Yell and Unst (Shetland Islands)					2201
2	North Mainland (Shetland Islands)					2202
3	Central Mainland (Shetland Islands)					2203
4	South Mainland (Shetland Islands)					2204
5	Orkney Islands (North)					2205	2336
6	Orkney Islands (Mainland)					2206
7	Orkney Islands (South)					2207
8	Butt of Lewis					2208
9	Cape Wrath				2209								B
10	Tongue				2210
11	Thurso & Reay				2211
12	Wick				2212
13	Loch Roag and Tarbert				2213
14	Stornaway					2214
15	Lochinver and Loch Assynt				2215							B
16	Lairg and Loch Shin				2216
17	Helmsdale				2217
18	Harris					2218
19	Ullapool and Loch Ewe				2219						2353
20	Strath Oykell				2220
21	Dornoch				2221
22	Sollas				2222
23	Benbecula					2223
24	Portree and Dunvegan				2224								B
25	Raasay and Applecross				2225									A/
Sheet	Name	1944	1945	1946	1947	1948	1949	1950	1951	1952	1953	1954	1955	1956	1957	1958	1959
26	Loch Maree and Achnasheen				2226									A/
27	Strathpeffer and Invergordon				2227						B
28	Nairn and Cromarty				2228						B
29	Elgin and Keith				2229						B
30	Banff and Fraserburgh				2230
31	Peterhead				2231
32	Lochboisdale and Eriskay				2232
33	Bara and Mingulay				2233
34	The Cuillins, Rhum and Canna				2234	2331							B
35	Sound of Sleat				2235		2337						B
36	Lochcarron and Dornie				2236								B
37	Inverness				2237					2348
38	Grantown-on-Spey and Strath Dearn				2238							B
39	Dufftown and Huntly			5046		2324
40	Inverurie and Ellon			5046		2310
41	Glen Shiel and Glen Garry				2241				2341
42	Fort Augustus				2242						B
43	Kingussie				2243		2332				2354
44	Ballater and Strathdon			5046Cr		2318			2342
45	Aberdeen			4546		2311					C
46	Ardnamurchan and Loch Shiel				2246									A/
47	Ben Nevis and Fort William				2247		2338				2351
48	Loch Ericht and Loch Laggan				2248								B
49	Grampian Mountains and Blair Atholl				2249				2343
50	Glen Clova and Lochnagar			3046		2315					2344
Sheet	Name	1944	1945	1946	1947	1948	1949	1950	1951	1952	1953	1954	1955	1956	1957	1958	1959
51	Stonehaven and Brechin			4546		2319								A//
52	Coll and Tiree				2252		2333
53	Sound of Mull				2253
54	Loch Etive and Glen Coe				2254	2325					2352
55	Killin and Loch Rannoch				2255
56	Dunkeld and Pitlochry				2256		2326					C
57	Forfar and Dundee			5046Cr			2327							A//
58	Arbroath and Montrose			4846/Cr		2323						C
59	Iona and Colonsay		2545/Cr		2302
60	North Jura and Firth of Lorne		3045/Cr			2316
61	Oban and Loch Awe			8046/Cr		2328						C
62	Loch Katrine and Loch Earn		4045/Cr		2293									C
63	Perth and Strath Earn			5046/Cr		2320						C
64	Dundee and St Andrews		5045/Cr		2294							C
65	Dunoon and Loch Fyne		4045/Cr			2308
66	Loch Lomond		5045/Ch			2312		2339
67	Stirling and Dunfermline		5045/Cr			2305								C/
68	Firth of Forth		5045/Cr				2321				C
69	Islay			5046/Cr			2329
70	Sound of Jura		3045/Cr			2317
71	Island of Bute		4045/Cr		2299
72	Glasgow		10045/Ch		2307				2340
73	Falkirk and Motherwell		6045/Cr		2292		2330					D		D/
74	Edinburgh		10045/Cr			2322				2349
75	Dunbar and Lammermuir			9046/Cr
Sheet	Name	1944	1945	1946	1947	1948	1949	1950	1951	1952	1953	1954	1955	1956	1957	1958	1959
76	Kintyre		3045/Cr			2301
77	Island of Arran		3545/Cr		2295				2347
78	Kilmarnock and Ayr		8045/Cr						2345
79	Lanark			5046/Cr			2334					C
80	Peebles and Galashiels		5045/Cr			2313						C
81	Kelso			8046/Cr						2350
82	Ailsa Craig and Girvan		2545/Cr			2303
83	Loch Doon		2545Cr		2296
84	Nithsdale and Moffat			2546/Cr	2297
85	Hawick and Eskdale		3045/Cr		2300
86	The Cheviot Hills			5046/Cr			2335
87	Newton Stewart			3046/Cr		2304
88	Dumfries		3045/Cr		2298
89	Solway Firth and River Esk
90	Stranraer		3545/Cr			2309
91	Wigtown		3545/Cr			2314
92	Castle Douglas and Kirkcudbright		3545/Cr		2306
-	The Trossachs and Loch Lomond						3388

Key

Available on SABRE Maps

Online, but needs replacement source

Unconfirmed Revision

Within the pipeline

Pipeline (Military edition)

Acquired but not scanned

Copy needed

In copyright (copy available)

In copyright (copy needed)

No map printed (or empty cell)