Three of the men in the First Germanna Colony aggressively sought land, usually by grants or patents. Perhaps it was not a random event that these three were also the trustees who purchased the original Germantown tract on behalf of the entire colony. Looking at the land acquired by grant by Jacob Holtzclaw there is:
The first tract was for 496 acres and it was located on Broad Run adjacent to William Stone. This was in 1724, only five years after the settlement at Germantown. Broad Run would place the land a distance of several miles from Germantown.In 1731, he obtained 362 acres on Goose Creek and Broad Run Mts. adjacent to John Fischback.
When Henry Watkins and Catesby Cocke obtained grants, the land was referred to as adjacent to Jacob Holtzclaw, a German. It was very rare to refer to the nationality of a person, yet two grants refer to Jacob Holtzclaw as a German.
In 1742, Jacob Holtzclaw obtained a grant of 357 acres on Hungry Run which was adjacent to other property of his.
In 1748, Jacob Holtzclaw obtained a grant of 335 acres in Fairfax County adjacent to the Manor of Leeds.
In 1748, Jacob Holtzclaw had a grant in the Little Fork area (future Culpeper Co.) for 1300 acres. This included a patent for about 650 acres which he had obtained back in 1729.
In 1750, Jacob Holtzclaw had a grant for 407 acres in Augusta County on the South Fork of the Shenandoah River. In 1752 he added 104 acres which was adjacent to this.
Much of this land was sold to other Germans who were later arrivals. Holtzclaw seems to have been very active in recruiting new members to the community. As they came, he often sold them land. Different interpretations could be placed on his actions. One was that recruiting was a way of finding purchasers for his lands. I believe he was motivated by a combination of factors. One, he wished to strengthen the community. The community was too small to attract a pastor. Unfortunately, the land he had for sale was scattered too far to build a close community.
Jacob Holtzclaw was also a member of the consortium which hoped to obtain a patent on the frontier for tens of thousands of acres. Perhaps they thought they could recruit Germans to populate the tract, but it appears that nothing came from this project.
Though his lands were scattered among several counties, Jacob Holtzclaw remained a resident of Germantown until he died.
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.