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Search the Land Records from All States, , View Property Reports Now!
The Secretary of State's Office is the place to start when researching Kentucky land acquisitions. All chain of title in the Commonwealth traces back to Virginia land patents and Kentucky land patents. In fact, all Kentucky deeds eventually trace back to an original patent recorded in the Kentucky Land Office. The Secretary of State maintains the security and preservation of these historical documents. They assist a variety of researchers such as historians, genealogists, and applicants for honorary societies as well as attorneys, mineral rights researchers, and land owners tracing the history of their properties. Researching land patents is as easy as determining the surname of your ancestor, when he might have obtained a land patent, and the area in which he might have been located. A number of publications can help you determine if your ancestor was involved in a land patent.
Military Registers & Land Records: Under the terms of the Proclamation of 1763, issued by England's King George III, soldiers who served in the French & Indian War received bounty land warrants as payment for service. The warrants provided the capacity to obtain land patents. The rank of the soldier determined the acreage awarded by the warrant. The same principle of "land for military service" applied to soldiers serving during the Revolutionary War. Each colony determined the acreage per rank, the requisite duration of service, and the location of their respective Military District. The Military District for Virginia rested in southwestern Kentucky and south-central Ohio. The Military Registers and Land Records site includes information regarding Military Warrants issued to Virginia veterans prior to 1792 and all Kentucky patents authorized by those warrants.
Revolutionary War Warrants: Access information on 4748 Revolutionary War Warrants issued to Virginia veterans or their assigns prior to 1792 on the Revolutionary War Warrants database. View color images from the Warrants Register and all Kentucky patent files authorized by Revolutionary War Warrants.
West of Tennessee River Military Patents: Research and view color images of 242 patents in the Jackson Purchase authorized by warrants issued to Virginia Revolutionary War veterans or their assigns on the West of Tennessee River Military Patents database.
Non-Military Registers & Land Records: In Kentucky, there are four steps involved in land patenting: 1) the Warrant (or Warrants) authorizing the survey; 2) the Entry reserving the land for patenting; 3) the field Survey; and 4) the Governor's Grant finalizing the patent. No title is conveyed until the Grant is issued. The Kentucky Secretary of State's Land Office is the repository for all records pertaining to patents issued within the Kentucky boundary, including patents issued by the state of Virginia prior to Kentucky's statehood in 1792.
In Non-Military Registers and Land Records, includes databases, legislation and frequently asked questions regarding patents not authorized by military warrants.
Certificates of Settlement & Preemption Warrants: Access information regarding Certificates of Settlement and Preemption Warrants issued to Kentucky's earliest settlers on the Certificates of Settlement and Preemption Warrants database. View color images of patent files as they are linked to the "Authorized Patents" field on a daily basis. Digitized images of the Certificates of Settlement and Commissioners' Authorizations for Preemption Warrants may be available by clicking the Preemption Warrant Number field. With the permission of The Library of Virginia, the Kentucky Department for Libraries & Archives is digitizing microfilm of the Certificates of Settlement and Preemption Warrant Approvals. Records are added to the "Certificates of Settlement and Preemption Warrants database" on a regular basis.
Lincoln Entries: Research 4763 Entries filed with the Lincoln County Surveyor's Office when Lincoln County comprised one-third of Kentucky on the Lincoln Entries database. (Military Entries in southwestern Kentucky are not included on this database.) Link to scanned images of each Entry.
County Court Order Patents: Research 70239 patents filed with the County Court Order Series dating from 1835 to the present on the County Court Order Patents database. Search by patent number, grant book & page, or perform an advanced search to access information by grantee, survey name, county, watercourse, survey year or grant year. Images of all documents filed with patent numbers 0001 - 08241 are linked to the database.
Jackson Purchase: Use the 1885 Loughridge Map to determine locations within the Jackson Purchase, the only area in Kentucky mapped by the public land system mapping method used by the federal government. Use Jillson's "Kentucky Land Grants, West of Tennessee River" to identify Ranges, Townships, Sections, E/W then use this database to find the exact location of the patent or key in a specific location and see it depicted on the Loughridge Map. You can also search the Jackson Purchase database.
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Search Kentucky Land Grants
All early property in Kentucky was historically under Virginia's jurisdiction. In May 1779, Virginia passed an act which divided
its western lands including Kentucky County, which consisted
of all of the present-day state. Just eighteen months later,
Kentucky County was discontinued, and Fayette, Lincoln, and
Jefferson counties were organized from it. The only extant land
entries for this time are those in Land Entry Books of Jefferson
and Lincoln counties, but these include some Kentucky County
records. Originals are kept by the county clerk of Jefferson
County and are entitled “Land Entry Book No. A.” Lincoln
County records are at the Kentucky Land Office, Frankfort.
Like many other colonies prior to the Revolutionary War,
Virginia had plenty of land, but little money. After the French
and Indian War ended in 1763, Virginia found it necessary to
pay the troops in bounty-land warrants. Military warrants were
issued for military service and treasury warrants could be purchased.
Warrants were issued authorizing surveys of property. The procedure
was ineffective for it did not require a survey of the land
prior to the issuance of the warrant. Instead, Virginia law
required the person locate his land wherever he chose and then
survey the property at his own cost. Unfortunately, the surveys
were not reliable as most were not adept at surveying, and their
attempts to do so sometimes resulted in conflicts in title and
loss of the land.
Original surveys, patents, warrants and grants as
well as indexes are filed in the Secretary of State's Office,
Room 148, Capitol Building, Frankfort, Kentucky 40601. The Kentucky
Historical Society and Kentucky Department for Libraries and
Archives have microfilm copies of these records.
Land and property records for Kentucky include deeds,
entries, warrants, surveys, mortgages, and indexes to these
documents. Under the Kentucky Court of Appeals, which served
as a court of record, deed books were maintained beginning in
1796. The first twenty-six books are designated as books A through
Z for the period 1796 to 1835, although earlier deeds and documents,
some dated as early as 1775, are recorded therein.
Within these twenty-six volumes are documents for residents
of Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, New York, New Jersey, and
Louisiana, as well as some foreign countries. Books A through
C comprise, for the most part, documents relating to the period
1775 through 1796, but other books also include early records.
When the Green River country opened, a law enacted in
1795 provided that each head of household would receive the
maximum of 200 acres at the rate of $30 per hundred acres. The
“In Fee Simple” title to the property was not to be
given to the landholder until the price of the land was completely
paid.
Once county jurisdiction was established, land was to
be surveyed and recorded at the county clerk's office. In most
cases, original county land and property records are maintained
by the respective county clerk's office, but microfilm copies
are available at the Kentucky Department for Libraries and Archives,
the University of Kentucky Library, Kentucky Historical Society,
Filson Club Library, and the FHL.
Some published land records are available in local, regional,
historical. or genealogical society collections or libraries.
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Excerpts From the Book "Family History Made Easy"
Prior to the Civil War, more than eighty-five percent of all Americans owned or leased land. Therefore, almost every researcher, whether a seasoned professional or weekend hobbyist, has required land records to document the existence, association, or movement of an individual or ancestral family. While many researchers may feel a sense of historical excitement when finding an ancestor in a land deed, many also fail to understand the importance of such a document and how land can be used to make vital links between generations; they are not aware that it can bridge distant origins and help solve even the most difficult problems. E. Wade Hone,
In Land and Property Research in the United States
U.S. House of Representative Private Claims, Vol. 1, Vol. 2 or Vol. 3
The right to own land has always been one of the great incentives for living in the United States. Yet researchers often overlook the importance of land records as a source of family history information. Written evidence of people’s entitlement goes back in time further than virtually any other type of record family historians might use.
Land records meet the needs of researchers in different ways and contain a variety of genealogical and historical data. They are a major source of information for many family histories and provide primary source material for local history as well. They are closely related to probate and other official court records and should be investigated in connection with them. Land and property are leading issues in the settlement of estates, and the majority of civil cases in the courts deal with real and personal property. Although land records rarely yield vital statistics, in many instances they provide the only proof of family relationships. Often they include the names of heirs of an estate (including daughters’ married names and a widow’s subsequent married name) and refer to related probates and other court cases by number and court name. In some places where other records are scarce, the land records take on extra importance. Occasionally these documents disclose former residences and more often provide the new address of the grantors or heirs at the time of the sale of the property.
Land records provide two types of important evidence for the family historian. First, they often document family relationships. Second, they place individuals in a specific time and place, allowing the researcher to sort people and families into neighborhoods and closely related groups. One of land records’ most important qualities is that they are sometimes the only records that allow us to distinguish one person of a common name from another.
The National Archives has bounty-land warrant files, donation land entry files, homestead application files, and private land claim files relating to the entry of individual settlers on land in the public land states. There are no land records for the original thirteen states or for Maine, Vermont, West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Texas, and Hawaii. Records for these states are maintained by state officials, usually in the state capital. Searching for the record of a particular land grant from the federal government requires contacting both the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the National Archives (NARA).
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