Mystery Land Identified

"Follow the land."

It's a statement one hears often when beginning genealogy. Well, today, I did find documentation which solved another tidbit of a mystery.

I had recently received pages from the book Selected Final Pension Payment Vouchers- Pennsylvania which seemed to point me towards Iowa. Iowa?

In this book was a typed copy of an 1863 will of the third wife of my 4th great grandfather. I spell this out as I am of the blood line with his first wife, who appears to have died by 1790. In the will, the lovely widow gives her 160 acres of land in Cass County, Iowa, to her daughter by her first marriage. Hmmm. Whose land was it? Why only her heir and not those of her dearly departed husband or those children the two had together? Most likely, that is one mystery that will not be solved.

I found the land record today on the Bureau of Land Management- General Land Office Records. Yes, the widow did have land in Iowa that was bounty land given to her for the Revolutionary War Service of her husband. She received the land in 1860, even though her husband had died in 1843 at the ripe old age of 82.

By 1860, she had returned to Washington County, PA, and was living with the daughter from her first marriage. I suspect that is why she gave the land to her. I still find it odd as she had sons from her marriage with grandpa.

While looking around the Land Management Records, I stumbled across other lands of interest.
Take some time and look around for yourself. You might be surprised as you find bounty land in states far away from the areas where your ancestors lived.

Click here to go the Bureau of Land Management.

-----
www.fayettefrontpage.com
Fayette Front Page
www.georgiafrontpage.com
Georgia Front Page