The warrants and surveys which I have been quoting come from two of four books, which Peggy S. Joyner has published. All four of these books, which are really volumes of one common theme, are:
Ms. Joyner's address, as of 1990, was 3113 Riveredge Drive, Portsmouth, VA 23703.
Anyone working on land problems in the Northern Neck should also obtain copies of the two volumes of " Northern Neck Land Grants ", by Gertrude Gray. The information in these two books is also available from the State Library in Virginia, but Gray's books are so much easier to use than the card index of the State Library. What is great about the State Library is that one can down load an actual copy of a grant in a few minutes work.
It is a lot of fun to work out the plots of land ownership. Then, as one drives over the territory, you can say to yourself, for instance, "This is where Michael Kaifer lived." But, I have noted the frustrations of working with the patents and grants. When I come back in a reincarnation, maybe I will devote myself to land research. In the life after, maybe it will be spent in research on the records in England. Copies of many of these are available in the Virginia State Library, which has an online search system for the copies that they do have. Unfortunately, these records are not available for downloading. And, if I were to have still another life, working on the German church records would be a challenge.
Alas, there is so much to do and so little time left. What we can hope to do is to build in such a way that people in the future can extend our work.
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.