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I live on a farm that my family bought in the
early 1800s, but I cannot find any deeds for it before
1880
and what does all this mean?
| S
24 T4
R8 |
MRS | Survey No.
2765 |
SE1/4 NE 1/4 | VMD or
VMS |
16 poles to a white
oak |
.
Where was that county?
Counties were created when the population in the area
was large enough to need some sort of legal administration. In the
case of Ohio counties existed before there was a state. The first counties
were very large; as population increased, they were divided into smaller
counties. It is important to know when counties were formed and when
their boundaries changed in order to locate records, this is especially true
of land records.
Old maps can also help you find villages and small towns
that no longer exist. See the maps on another page of this site.
Maps of county formation:
The sites below will provide a general description,
without reference to current maps, alas, of the creation and the boundaries
of counties east of the Mississippi.
Current and historical maps
To locate property and homesteads, use both current
and historical maps, such as county road maps and old atlases. The
names of landmarks and roads may change. The USGS GNIS database can
help identify historical names. (see below)
Historical Topo
Maps
From USGS, free to download
Clark County
Maps
From Engineer's Office, free to download, or purchase a printed copy from
the Map Room in the A. B. Graham Building.
USGS
Geographic Names Information System
This site is very useful for finding cemeteries, streams, roads, etc., named
after a family (surname). With a GPS unit one can use the latitude
and longitude to locate each feature exactly. Otherwise a current
road map is necessary.
Finding the farm
Old deeds, mortgages, land patents and related documents can often provide
family information. For example, a deed of partition was often prepared
when the husband/father died intestate. All of the heirs would have
to agree on how property should be divided; this may be found as part
of an administration, or simply recorded at the courthouse in the Recorder's
Office. If there was a will, the estate papers should detail any property
transactions, but may not have a copy of the deed transferring the
property. This is especially helpful for the period before birth and
death records were kept--1867 for Ohio. You may have to look in several
counties if you cannot identify the time period for the property transaction
hence the importance of knowing the county's boundaries and when it was
formed.
Earliest land records
The most difficult land records to find are those relating the states that
were British colonies. Colonial proprietors could grant land to whomever
they pleased. There were records, but some are difficult to locate.
Patents were the documents that later transferred land from the US Government
to an individual. Many of these are available online; but the earliest
are not. For Ohio some can be found at the Ohio Historical Society.
In order to understand the documents related to land ownership, it is necessary
to understand the basic features of surveys.
Bureau of Land
Management
All the the US surveys:
http://www.glorecords.blm.gov/Visitors/PrincipleMeridiansAndBaselines.html
You can search this site for patents issued after 1820.
Surveys
Most of Clark County is in the Between the Miami Rivers Survey, originally
part of the Symmes Grant made about 1800. Symmes later lost most of
the land because he was unable to pay for it. The northeastern and
southeastern corners of the county are part of the Virginia Military District
which is land promised by Virginia to its soldiers. Higher ranks qualified
for larger tracts of land. The difference in the surveys is easily
seen on a county map. Except for the portions of the VMD, the survey
is rectangular. The VMD parcels are quite irregular as they were surveyed
using "metes and bounds."
Ohio Lands booklet about all of the Ohio surveys.
Rectangular survey method
This type of survey is a grid; the columns are "ranges" and the
rows are "townships" (not to be confused with administrative/political
townships). This system is used in all of the surveys west of the original
thirteen states, except for the Between the Miamis Survey in Ohio.
In this survey, the ranges and townships are reversed. Where a range
and a township intersect, there is an area of approximately six square
miles. This area is divided into 36 numbered "sections."
The section, township and range are the legal description of a parcel
of land, and it never changes, regardless of the changing political
boundaries. When cities are created, however, these large sections
are divided into lots, and referred to by the lot number; in unincorporated
areas, the section, township and range will be cited in any legal document
regarding the land.
The first standard rectangular survey was done in eastern Ohio in the late
1700s. George Washington helped survey the "first seven ranges" in
eastern Ohio.
This page
http://www.landprints.com/LpRectangularSurveySystem.htm
shows more than you need to know to understand deeds, but the diagrams are
good.
Metes and bounds
This type of survey consisted of references to landmarks such as trees, stones,
roads, and streams. It was not an accurate system because trees can
die, stones can be rolled away, roads can narrow or widen with use, and streams
can meander.
See this site
http://www.tngenweb.org/tnland/metes-b.htm
for a good description and examples of this type of survey.
Other sites:
Plat your old deed
Once you understand how to read your old deed, you can go online to
this site, and create a map of the property, similar to the one above.
Records and explanations online
This a site for software used by some professionals for plotting land
from old deeds. You don't need the software, but their
information page is very helpful, and they have a list of deeds already
plotted.
IGI
Batch numbers for Ohio
Use this in connection with the LDS site at www.familysearsch.org.
If you know the batch numbers, you can view all of the records in that
batch. This list includes only the major record sources such as county
records. Other records, which were also given batch numbers when processed,
are a bit harder to find. If, in using the LDS site, you find another
batch number, it is a good idea to look at all of the records in the
batch. You an also "google" for other sites that list batch numbers
for specific states.
Ohio
History
This publication is online as is the index. It deals mainly with Ohio,
but has some information on other areas. It was originally published
in quarterly and annual numbers, and is available at some libraries.
Some very good illustrations are included.
BYU
Brigham Young University has put entire publications online. If you
have broadband you can download these works which are out of copyright.
Gutenberg Project
This site also has the text of books online which you an download.
It doesn't have as many of interest to genealogists as the BYU site, but
there are some histories and other books of interest.