My Trails into the Past

Last week, I wrote about Amos Gorrell, Jr. being enumerated on the 1870 agricultural and population schedules. See this post here. The ag schedule indicated he had 25 acres of land. The population schedule did not indicate that he owned real estate. The conclusion from that would be he was renting the land he was living on. However, I have found a land transaction where he purchased about 24 acres of land from James & Virginia Staples in Cooper County, Missouri on 6 Aug 1869 and it was witnessed by W. L. Scott, the Justice of the Peace. [1] This piece of land was located at the Southwest fractional quarter of the Northeast quarter of Section 2, in Township 48, Range 19. I wanted to know where this was and used Randy Majors website where I could map the section, township, and range, and it would appear on a Google map. [2] From RandyMajors.com Because he purchased only a fractional quarter of a quarter, or less than 40 acres, I don't know exactly where i...

I love land records—though it is truly a love-hate relationship. Land records can give you a lot of information but they are not as forthcoming with easy information like those of vital or census records. You have to dig a bit.  You have to analyze a lot. There are complicated words and abbreviations you must understand. One record does not tell you much. You need to collect all of the land transactions for your ancestor. There are some questions to ask, too, such as: When did he get the first piece of land? How did he get it? Did he buy it, get it as a land grant, homestead it, or was it bounty land? What happened to it later when he moved or died? This journey into land records began with the 22 October 1927 obituary for William C. Gleeson, the brother of my great-grandmother, Anna M (Gleeson) Sullivan. The obituary stated that he was “prominent in Eastern Oregon some years ago, where he was one of the first to engage in dry land farming.” [1] William li...