Augustine Herman

Augustine Herman
First Lord of Bohemia Manor
In office
September 1660 – September 1686
Succeeded byEphraim George Herman
Personal details
Bornc. 1621
Mšeno, Kingdom of Bohemia
DiedSeptember 1686
Cecil County, Province of Maryland, British America
SpouseJannetje Varleth
Residence(s)New Amsterdam
Cecil County, Maryland
OccupationMerchant
ProfessionLand surveyor, draughtsman[1]
Signature

Augustine Herman, First Lord of Bohemia Manor (Czech: Augustin Heřman, c. 1621 – September 1686) was a Bohemian explorer, merchant and cartographer who lived in New Amsterdam and Cecil County, Maryland. In the employment of Cecil Calvert, 2nd Baron Baltimore, he produced a remarkably accurate map of the Chesapeake Bay and Delaware Bay regions of North America, in exchange for which he was permitted to establish an enormous plantation that he named Bohemia Manor in what is now southeastern Cecil County, Maryland.[1]

Land rights to the area now known as St. Augustine, Maryland were granted to Herman by Lord Baltimore prior to 1686 but the Herman family was never able to lay proper claim to the title.[1]

Chroniclers have spelled the surname variously: Herman, Herrman, Harman, Harmans, Heerman, Hermans, Heermans, etc. Augustine Herman himself usually wrote Herman, which is now the accepted style. He frequently added "Bohemiensis" ("the Bohemian", "the Czech"), as a suffix.

  1. ^ a b c Fiske, John (March 2005). Old Virginia and Her Neighbors Part Two. Kessinger Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4179-3463-8.