AL, AR, FL, LA, MI, MN, OH, WI, 1790-1907 Land Records

This data set provides you with easy access to land records held by the General Land Office (GLO), Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Department of the Interior located in Springfield, Virginia. The records, which date from the late 1700s to 1907, reference approximately 1,645,000 individuals and are often the only available source for obtaining legal land descriptions and identifying transfer of property ownership from the U.S. Government to private landowners.

As the U.S. expanded westward from the original 13 colonies, Congress recognized the need for an orderly system of surveying and describing the federal lands to be opened for settlement. On May 20, 1785, the Continental Congress enacted a land disposal ordinance that established a public land survey system. Thus, survey plats were created for each survey. Then, most titles were transferred through patents (deeds) from the Federal Government. Records of these patents are contained in huge tract books. They tell who obtained what land from the Federal Government, and when. These conveyance documents include homesteads, cash sales, miscellaneous warrants, private land claims, swamp lists, state selections, and railroad lists.

Researching with this data set you'll quickly obtain a great deal of valuable information about an ancestor. Most fundamentally, you'll learn:

• Full name
• Location of the land they purchased
• Date of purchase
• Information that will help you obtain copies of the original records, which may contain more detailed information

More About this Online Data Set

This section provides detailed explanations of the type of information you'll learn from this data set.

1. Accession Number (State, Volume, Page)
   This is an alpha-numeric code unique to each document that directly relates a document image to the original hard copy document. It identifies the state, volume number, and page number of the original General Land Office document. This item is also referred to as the Document Reference ID. For example, "MI301__.023" identifies a Michigan document found in Volume 301, Page 23. This number is utilized when requesting copies of the original patent from the Eastern States office.

2. Document Number
   This is the primary identification number given to the original General Land Office document. A certificate number, warrant number, serial number, or patent number may be used as the Document Number. If you wish to order a copy of the original record from the Bureau of Land Management, you will use this number.

3. Land Office
   Name of a location (usually a city or town) where the General Land Office established a district Land Office to handle various land transactions. Patents that were issued were bound into volumes by Land Office names. Usually, several Land Offices existed for each state.

4. Aliquot Part Reference
   "Aliquot Part," described below, is a term related to the Cadastral Surveying Method. (A Cadastral Survey is the process of making an official survey or register of lands.) Although the exact surveying methods can vary slightly from one area to the next, the following are the general rules:

   Using the rectangular system of survey, land in each state was divided into Townships containing 6 square miles. Each Township was subdivided into 36 Sections, each containing 640 acres (640 acres=1 square mile). Each Section was further subdivided into halves and quarters, repeatedly, until the piece of land was accurately described. Without the use of Fractional Sections, Blocks, or Lots (in the case of uneven parcels of land), Aliquot Parts were used to represent the exact subdivision of the section of land. Halves of a Section (or subdivision thereof) are represented as N, S, E, and W (such as "the northern half of section 5"). Quarters of a Section (or subdivision thereof) are represented as NW, SW, NE, and SE (such as "the north-west quarter of section 5"). Sometimes, several Aliquot Parts are required to accurately describe a piece of land. For example, "E 1/2 SW" denotes the eastern half of the south-west quarter containing 80 acres, and "SWNENE" denotes the south-west quarter of the north-east quarter of the north-east quarter containing 10 acres. It is important to remember that the Aliquot Parts (e.g., "SWNENE") usually translates into words found on the land document. Please note that quarters are generally denoted with "1/4," but they are implied in these records. Thus, you will see "E 1/2 SW" rather than "E 1/2 SW 1/4" and "SWNENE" rather than "SW 1/4 NE 1/4 NE 1/4." In general,

   • A section contains 640 acres,
   • A half section contains 320 acres,
   • A quarter section contains 160 acres,
   • A half of a quarter contains 80 acres,
   • A quarter of a quarter contains 40 acres, etc.
     
     

5. Section Number
   Most townships contain 36 sections. However, some townships contain more. If you see a number greater than 36, you may want to double-check it, because it could be a mistake. Each section within a township is identified by this Section Number.

6. Township Number and Direction
   A Township is a major subdivision of the public lands under the rectangular system of surveys. Most townships are 4-sided measuring approximately 6 miles on each side and containing approximately 23,040 acres. A township is identified by its relation to a base line and a principal meridian. For example, "Township 5 North, Range 12 West" identifies a particular township that is 5 rows up from the base line.

   The Township Direction indicates which side (north or south) of the baseline the township is on. In the example "Township 5 North, Range 12 West," North indicates the Township Direction from the (horizontal) baseline.

7. Range Number and Direction
   A Range is a column of townships lying east or west of the principal meridian and numbered successively to the east and to the west from the principal meridian. The Range Number indicates the East or West relation to the principal meridian. In the example "Township 5 North, Range 12 West," the number 12 represents the Range Number that is used to identify the township that is 12 columns to the left of the principal meridian.

The Range Direction indicates which side (east or west) of the principal meridian the township is on. In the example, "Township 5 North, Range 12 West," West indicates the direction of the township from the (vertical) meridian.

8. Townsite Block
   A one, two, or three digit number used to describe a block (or piece) of land within a township. For example, "Block 6 in Township 5 North, Range 12 West."

9. Meridian/Survey Area
   Meridians help indicate where a particular township is located. In Ohio, surveyors didn't use Meridians, but Special Survey Areas instead.

10. Acreage
    This is the total number of acres described on a land document. For those transactions that had more than one parcel of land associated with it, the total acres is zero for all but one land description. For example, if a document described three 80-acre parcels of land, two of the parcels will have "0 acres" listed next to them, and one parcel would have "240 acres" listed next to it.

    Because these records are arranged by individual parcel of land, you will see that the acreage listed for some parcels is "0." In these cases, look at the Aliquot Part Reference (see item 4, above) to determine the actual size of the plot of land. You will also want to continue searching for other records that have the same document number and patentee's name on them, so you can determine the total acreage associated with the transaction. For example, say you were searching for Allan Jones and came across a record that listed the acreage as zero, with a document number of 53. If you continued searching for records associated with Allan Jones, you might find four more records, for a total of five records containing the patentee name "Allan Jones."

    Name	Acres	Document #
    Jones, Allan	0	53
    Jones, Allan	640	53
    Jones, Allan	80	47
    Jones, Allan	0	53

    From this set of records you can see that Allan Jones purchased four parcels of land at once, because four records contain the same document number. One of these records lists an acreage of 640, while the other three list an acreage of 0, so you know that between the four parcels of land, he purchased 640 acres. To find out the exact size of each parcel of land, you would look at the Aliquot Part Reference in each record. The fifth record, with a document number of 47, was a separate transaction. It may or may not refer to the same Allan Jones.

    Even when a plot of land is listed with an acreage that is greater than zero, you should compare it with the Aliquot Part Reference. If the number of acres listed and the Aliquot Part Reference match, you know that only one plot of land was purchased in the transaction. If they do not match, you know that more than one plot of land was purchased. In this case, you should continue searching for other records containing the same warrantee's name.

11. Miscellaneous Document Number
    This is a secondary identification number found on the original GLO document. An application number, Choctaw certificate number, or survey number may be used as a Miscellaneous Document Number. Not all documents have a Miscellaneous Document Number.

12. Act/Treaty Authorizing Sale
    This is the congressional act or treaty that supports the transfer of land from the United States government to private owners.

13. Date Signed
    The month, day, and year that the land document was signed. This is the official date in which the parcel left federal ownership.

14. Date Surveyed
    This is the date on which the government completed its survey of the land.

15. Warrantee Name
    As payment for military service, the government often gave out land warrants (rights to a plot of land). In many cases, the soldiers or their families did not use the land, but sold their claim to it instead. When someone purchased a plot of land that the government had previously warranted to a soldier, that soldier's name was listed on the record as a warrantee. There were other cases in which the government warranted land to non-military individuals, but in the records on this data set, the only warrantee names listed are those of soldiers.

    Remember that the acreage listed for the warrantee's land may not actually be the number of acres that the plot of land contained. For details, see item 10, above. You should always look at the land description (the Aliquot Part Reference) and determine from that how many acres the parcel of land actually was.

16. Multiple Patentees/Multiple Warrantees
    This tells you if the document was issued to more than one patentee or more than one warrantee. The Comments or remarks field will sometimes make reference to the other names that are associated with the document. If this item is not listed, there were not multiple patentees or warrantees.

17. Comments
    This can contain a variety of information. If a document was canceled, this field will often say which documents replaced it. You may also find the names of patentees or warrantees if there was more than one of each.

18. Signed
    This indicates whether or not the purchaser signed the original document. If this is not listed, the document was not signed.

19. Document Canceled
    Land documents that were issued and later canceled were marked "Canceled" across the face of the certificate with either a stamp or a handwritten annotation. Canceled documents were usually replaced by another document. The Comments or remarks field for a canceled document will sometimes make reference to the document(s) that were used to replace it. If this item is not listed, the document was not canceled.

20. Reserved Subsurface Rights
    Land granted to a patentee was subject to certain vested and accrued rights for mining, agriculture, manufacturing, or other purposes. This indicates whether or not the land described in the patent involved the reservation of subsurface rights for any of these purposes. If this item is not listed, subsurface rights were not reserved.

21. Measured in Metes and Bounds
    Metes and bounds were used in measuring property prior to the creation of the Northwest Territories and the acts that governed their settlement. Metes and bounds were primarily used in the original colonies, Maine, Kentucky, West Virginia, Tennessee, and some parts of Ohio. A typical metes and bounds land description might read:

    "From the white oak adjoining the properties of Jim Jones and Ron Smith North 40 rods, thence 50 rods SE to a point adjoining Russell Johnson's SW corner, thence 30 rods back to the point of original containing 42 acres."

    If this item is not listed, the land was measured using the Cadastral Survey Method. The following are equivalents in the metes and bounds system:

    • 1 Mile = 80 Chains or 320 Rods or 5280 Feet
    • 1 Chain = 4 Rods or 66 Feet or 100 Links
    • 1 Rod = 5.5 Yards or 16.5 Feet or 25 Links
    • 1 Link = .66 Feet or 7 7/8 Inches
    • 1 Pole = 1 Rod
      
      

22. Fractional Section
    If a section of land is incomplete (e.g., it is less than 640 acres due to a body of water), then the section is denoted as a Fractional Section. If this item is not listed, the section was whole.