Keeping Track of the Ps and Ws

Abbreviations and symbols are great, but can be confusing when users are unaware of what they mean.

Such is the case of P and W on the Bureau of Land Management website.

The results page on the Bureau of Land Management website indicates that names on the patent are either the name of a warrantee or a patentee. The warrantee is the person(s) who qualified for bounty land based upon their or someone else's military service. Warrants were for a specific amount of property--but not location specific. The patentee is the person to whom a deed was issued for a specific piece of property. Patentees could have obtained title to federal property through a cash sale, a preemption claim, a homestead claim, surrendering their own warrant, or surrendering a warrant they had purchased from someone else (in addition to a few other ways).

Generally speaking cash land sales have the least in the way of genealogical documentation. Homesteads, preemption claims, and warrant applications have more genealogical material in them.

We've mentioned these files in the past, but will be looking at some new examples in upcoming blog posts.

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Pension Suggests Bounty Land Applications for Thomas Brown

Thomas Brown's War of 1812 pension does not directly provide enough information to connect him to his potential daughter, Charlotte (Brown) Lake, despite the fact that the file is a rather large one. But teh file folder suggests additional records that should be accessed.

Cover sheet from Thomas Brown pension file--
based on his War of 1812 service in Kentucky; obtained on  Fold3

The upper right hand corner of the cover sheet indicates that bounty land was received based upon  Brown's service. There is no indication of the applicant for that bounty land.

The bounty land references indicated that there were two separate applications based upon Brown's service--one under the 1850 act and one under the 1855 act. Both were for 80 acres.

Upper right hand corner of cover sheet from Thomas Brown pension file--
based on his War of 1812 service in Kentucky; obtained on  Fold3

The first part of the number indicates the number of the warrant that was issued. The numbers contained three parts so that a clerk seeing the number would be able to find the warrant, know the amount of the acreage, and the act under which the warrant was issued.

The image below was obtained from the Bureau of Land Management website. The warrant number, acreage, and year of the act are shown on the patent.

The warrant was issued to Thomas' widow--his second wife Sallie. It is possible that the names of his heirs in addition to his widow are listed in the paperwork. There is no guarantee that any of his children are listed in the bounty land application. The more realistic situation is that there are affidavits in the application that provide details not given in the pension application.

Stay tuned.

War of 1812 Warrants on BLM Site--A Suggestion

[note: this post is not meant to be a comprehensive discussion of these records]

Researchers sometimes forget about the War of 1812 and the military benefits later provided to its veterans and widows. The majority of benefits for War of 1812 service took the form of land warrants which were good for a specific quantity of land in areas still owned by the federal government.

The bulk of these warrants were given in the 1850s, stemming from legislation during that time. The warrrant image in this post was created from the surrendered warrant of Clara Lake and was based upon her husband's service in the War of 1812 from Virginia.

One quick (but not full-proof) way to locate these warrants is through the Bureau of Land Management website. When searching for these warrants on the site, make certain you search for warrants (I leave the patents unchecked as that's for the person who actually settled the property which may or may not have been the veteran/widow and which may "clutter" my search results). 

Make certain you have the location set to "any." The warrants are tied in the database to the location where the property was patented (actually settled). That location may have nothing to do with where the veteran served from during the war or lived at during the warrant application.

Richard Lake and his wife Clara lived in Virginia and Kentucky. The property was eventually patented in Iowa by the person who purchased the warrant. If I had ignored the result because the Lakes never lived in Iowa, I would have missed the reference.

And when there is a patent on the BLM site based up on a military warrant, there are two things at the National Archives that you want to obtain copies of:

• the application for the warrant
• the surrendered warrant

The application tends to have more detailed information on service and life after the service, but the surrendered warrant can have clues as a well. 

And for people who lived during this era, we need all the clues we can get. 

A Straw Man in a Credit Under File

It is all about how things are ordered and how people are described.

There are two deeds in the "Complete 'Credit Under' Land Entry of James Shores, assignee of Thomas J. Rampley" of Coshocton County, Ohio. Both are dated 21 April 1829. One transfers interest in the patent from Thomas Tipton to James Shores. The other transfers title in the patent from James Shores, Administrator of the Estate of Thomas J. Rampley, deceased, to Thomas Tipton. Both list the same property (part of section 5 in what is now Jackson Township, Coshocton County, Ohio) that is described in Thomas J. Rampley's "Complete 'Credit Under' Land Entry." Copies of both deeds are contained in the records of the complete claim file at the National Archives.

Part of the patent to James Shores obtained on the Bureau of Land Management website.

Why are there two deeds that are seemingly parallel?

There's a reason and the reason is that the deeds are not parallel. They also need to be viewed in the proper order. Both are dated the same date, but one was executed first--the one from James Shores.

The thing is, it was not James Shores who really executed the deed. It was James Shores in his capacity as administrator of the estate of Thomas J. Rampley who deeded the equitable interest in the land claim to Thomas Tipton. Then, Tipton immediately deeded that interest to James Shores in his own right. This was not done to confuse researchers nearly 200 years later.

part of the 21 April 1829 deed from Thomas Tipton to James Shores, obtained in the "Completed "credit under" Land Entry" of  James Shores, assignee of Thomas J. Rampley; National Archives

It was done to keep the title clean and appease the General Land Office. It would have looked odd if Thomas Shores as administrator had deeded the land to himself, particularly since there were heirs of Thomas Rampley who had an interest in the property upon his death. And there were heirs: Thomas' widow, Christianna, and several children--including the wife of James Shores.

Tipton was what is referred to as a "straw man." The intent was never to have him actually own the property in question. The deed to him and the deed from him served to clearly give Shores title and document the payment.

The order of the deeds matters--the deed from Shores was first. The description of Shores matters as well--words like "administrator" are not thrown around in documents willy-nilly.


Citation reminder: We are a strong believer in citing genealogical source material in the spirit of Evidence Explained. However, we choose not to include properly formatted citations in these blog posts. There's always enough information in the post to create a citation and full citations are included in my how-to newsletter Casefile Clues. 

The Neighbor's Incomplete Claim

I've been using the Bureau of Land Management Tract Books that have recently been made available in digital form on the FamilySearch website. Those who completed the homestead process and actually obtained land are somewhat easier to locate records on because there will be local land records in the county in which the land was located.

The individual who completed the homestead process received a patent (first deed) for the land that would have been recorded in the county land records office. There also may be a deed where the homestead sold the land or where it was transferred to his heirs. There may also be real property tax records providing more information about the land or it may be mentioned in probate or estate settlement records.

That's not the case with homestead claims that were cancelled or were not successfully completed by the homesteader. There will be no local land records because the person who did not complete the claim did not get the land.

But there will be records of that cancelled claim.

The image in this post is part of the Bureau of Land Management Tract Book for township 14-11 in Dawson County, Nebraska. The entries are for various parts of section 25. The legal descriptions have been clipped from the image--as have details about whether the claim was finally patented or cancelled .The two claimant names that I have underlined in red were never completed.

And yet they are of interest to me. I'm not certain who the two women are, but I have a good hunch.

These records are not indexed by name. You have to know where the property is located.

I found these two women while looking for my great-great-grandfather Focke Goldenstein who also homesteaded in this same township. Two of Goldenstein's cousins (Willm and Jurgen Ehmen) also initiated claims in the same township. Goldenstein and the Ehmens had an aunt whose husband's last name was Albers.

When the records arrive from my contact at the National Archives, we will have an update.

There are not as many records in an incomplete claim, but there may be some materials in the cancelled claim that will help me to determine who these two woman are.

An 1817 Ohio Purchase

There is something gratifying about finding your ancestor's name in a record, particularly one that is not indexed.

This image is part of the entry for Thomas J. Rampley from the Bureau of Land Management Tract books for Ohio. And while these books are not indexed by name, there is organization. It is just that the organization is by location and not by name. I knew that Thomas made an initial payment for property in Section 5 of township 5-7 in Coshocton County, Ohio. The location was the information that allowed me to locate this reference. The tract books cannot easily be searched by name only.

Bureau of Land Management Tract Books , Ohio, Volume 7, Zanesville (Military district), page 1888[sic]; digital image, FamilySearch.com

This reference styles Thomas as "of Coshocton County, Ohio" on 15 November 1817. This is the earliest document I have that provides evidence of his residence in Ohio. 

The image shown here is just part of the image--there is a right hand page as well which contains more payment information. And there's another man who made his initial payment for property in the same section on the same date. 

From other sources, I already knew the other man was an associate of my ancestor and knew him back in Harford County, Maryland, where Thomas was from. I will look at the names of other men purchasing property in the same section. A map of the township would also be helpful and (in this case) the township to the north should be a part of my search as well because section 5 is along the northern line of the township.

BLM Tract Book Discovery

FamilySearch has recently placed the Bureau of Land Management Tract Books (titled: United States, Bureau of Land Management Tract Books, 1820-1908) on their website. Using the books takes a little bit of patience and a little bit of knowledge, but it's not impossible.

William Newman purchased property in Tipton County, Indiana, in the 1850s. Locating that parcel in the index was my first foray into using these materials.

This was known because Newman was located on the BLM website as having obtained a patent for property in section 29 of township 22N 5 E in Tipton County . A query was performed on the BLM website to determine the names of all others purchasing property in that section. One of them was William Tinsley, brother-in-law of William S. Newman.

This table shows all the entries from patents in the Bureau of Land Management website for the same section of property as the  William Newman purchase (29).

Names	Date	Doc #	Aliquots
COOK, JEFFERSON	12/1/1849	32698	NE¼SW¼
FLETCHER, STOUGHTON A	1/1/1850	33006	NE¼NE¼
HALL, ROBERT	1/1/1850	32751	W½SW¼
JACKSON, JOSEPH	3/20/1849	32070	S½NW¼
NEWMAN, WILLIAM S	1/1/1850	32863	NE¼NW¼
RABB, SAMUEL G	5/1/1850	34185	NW¼NE¼
STEWART, ROBERT	12/10/1850	34391	NW¼SE¼
TINSLEY, WILLIAM	1/1/1850	32862	NW¼NW¼
WOLFER, LEONARD	1/1/1850	32990	S½SE¼
WOOD, THOMAS	5/1/1850	34358	SE¼SW¼

The BLM database indexes completed patents. The tract book contains additional references and notations. The tract book indicated that William did not intend to just purchase the property for which he finally obtained a patent. His name is also listed in the tract books as having made an initial payment on another forty acres in the section, but that his deposit was refunded in 1854.

The entries in the tract book are helpful, but the actual patents (on the BLM site) indicate the county of residence of the purchasers, which is helpful in distinguishing between individuals and something that is not indicated in these tract book entries. The materials need to be used together--not in isolation.

I knew that William's patent was in the volume for the Indianapolis land office as that was indicated on his patent image obtained on the BLM website.

Vol 1, Indianapolis, page 71--part of the left hand side.

Vol 1, Indianapolis, page 71--corresponding right hand side.

There were no huge revelations, but I was surprised to see that William had also started the process to purchase additional property in this township.

On my list of things to do with this information are:

• Look at the residences of the other purchasers to determine where they were from at the time of the completed patent. Newman and Tinsley were from Rush County, Indiana. It is possible that other men--particularly those obtaining property at the same time--were from that area as well.
• Plat out the parcels to allow me to visualize the relationships between the locations.
• Look at purchasers of property in adjacent townships.