Tuesday, July 5, 2011

FOUND! Nehemiah Newan's Revolutionary War Land Grant Survey!

WOW! This is a biggie for this newbie:) Yesterday on the 4th of July, killing time before the burgers went on the grill and then off to see the fireworks, I took a stab at the archives at the Pennsylvania Historical & Museum web site. I landed on the home page for the state archives at:
http://www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt/community/state_archives/2887

From there I went to Land Records. Here's the link:
http://www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt/community/land_records/3184

The chart offered boxes to choose from and finally I clicked on Donation Land Series:
http://www.phmc.state.pa.us/bah/dam/rg/di/r17DonationLandSeries/DonationLandMainInterface.htm

I chose Donation Land Register at:
http://www.phmc.state.pa.us/bah/dam/rg/di/r17DonationLandSeries/r17-174DonationLandRegister/r17-174MainInterface.htm

Then I found the Listing of Veterans Entitled to Donation Land at:
http://www.phmc.state.pa.us/bah/dam/rg/di/r17DonationLandSeries/r17-174DonationLandRegister/r17-174VeteransListingInterface.htm

That brought up a PDF page and there I found Nehemiah Newan but spelled Newmeans! He was listed as a sergeant and awarded 250 acres on 5 April 17, 1794. Cool.

But where was this land? That's what I wanted to know. While I was there I clicked on over to check the listing of claimants whose land was in New York or partially in New York. I had suspected that he might make that list as he was living in upstate New York in 1810 through 1820. Nope, not there so that theory is eliminated.

On we go. Next stop, the Donation Land Register: Numeric Tract Listing:
http://www.phmc.state.pa.us/bah/dam/rg/di/r17DonationLandSeries/r17-174DonationLandRegister/r17-174NumericTractInterface.htm

Ok, so he was awarded 250 acres. I Clicked around the lists of 250 acres and found:
http://www.phmc.state.pa.us/bah/dam/rg/di/r17DonationLandSeries/r17-174DonationLandRegister/r17-174DonationLands%2014.pdf

There he is, 6th from the bottom, number 13 under the 250 acre awards! That gives me the land survey book number and page number: Book D-52, page 27.

Found it! Now back to the Archive's Land main page at:
http://www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt?open=512&objID=3184&&SortOrder=100&level=4&parentCommID=3162&menuLevel=Level_4&mode=2

And there clicked on: Copied Survey Books to go to "COPIED SURVEYS, 1681-1912" at:
http://www.phmc.state.pa.us/bah/dam/rg/di/r17-114CopiedSurveyBooks/r17-114MainInterfacePage.htm

Here I clicked on the correct Volume number, D-52-27 at:
http://www.phmc.state.pa.us/bah/dam/rg/di/r17-114CopiedSurveyBooks/r17-114MainInterfacePage.htm

And there it was. After all this time wondering where Nehemiah Newan's land was and if his move to Canandaigue, Ontario County, New York was the location of his bounty land grant, well, not.

So going forward I'm working off three theories. First that he sold his Westmorland County PA land and purchased the land in New York state. Or he might have been part of some sort of land swap so I'll need to check the PA Archives again. That sure is a good web site. Last theory is that he might have somehow "double dipped" and received two land grants. Don't even know if that's possible but there's research to be done on that topic as well.

Whatta 4th of July!!!

Reply to comment from Frank's Daughter: Burgers OK. Fireworks all in my head;)

1 comment:

  1. So, did ya burn the burgers?

    Great research trail! Thanks for sharing!

    ReplyDelete