About 1710, Robert Beverley, the historian, had marked 13,000 acres beyond the frontier, which he proposed to patent. The size of the tract alone tells us that he was beyond civilization. Otherwise, it would be impossible to find a tract of that size in one piece. We know where the land lay; it was stretched out on the south side of the Rapidan River, above (to the west of) where the future Fort Germanna would be built.
Just a slight discourse here on the procedures that were involved. First, one had to find land to which no one else had any pretensions. What constituted a pretension? Some markers with your name on them. A common form of marker was to shave a spot on the side of a tree down to the wood and then to carve one's initials into this. When an area was rapidly developing and several people might be looking for land, there could be an element of compromise. Legally, one should file for a patent on the land as soon as possible. This involved getting the land surveyed which cost money. Then one paid the fees to the colony, which might be in the form of head rights or cash. Once the patent was issued, your pretensions were now embedded in law. Still, it paid to keep one's boundary markers in place so that all comers would know the extent of one's claim. The more expensive part of proving up the land was the requirement that it be developed with a certain amount of land cleared, an orchard planted, and a house built.
When a person set his initial boundary markers, he had in mind that he wanted a certain number of acres. But when he set his boundaries, he had only a crude idea of how much land was included. The rule was probably to be generous to yourself and set the boundaries a little bigger than for the number of acres you had in mind. When the surveyor came, you might tell him that you wanted 400 acres surveyed and he would find that amount in your claim. Probably though there would be a little extra left over in that your initial claim was larger than the surveyor would measure out. Just because your initial estimate was oversize, one did not retreat to the surveyed boundaries. One left the original markers and told everyone who inquired that these markers were your boundaries, even though you did not have a legal claim to the extra land.
Later, when you were a little better off financially, you might call the surveyor in again for a resurvey that was made to the extent of the original markers which you had been claiming even though there was no legal title to this extent. The term that the surveyors used was "on a resurvey surplus land of xxx acres was found." On occasion, 400 acres would blossom into something like 800 acres as the surplus land was included.
Robert Beverley had probably ridden over the land he was interested in. He had a surveyor mark the boundaries, taking into account other claims that might exist. The normal next step would be to pay his fees at the rate of 5 shillings per 50 acres. This would have given him a temporary title to the land. Then he would have settled a number of people on the land and prove it up. If the land were not proven up, the title could revert to the crown. Until the land was proven, the title was only temporary. If the colony took the land back for failure to prove it, they did not refund the monies which had been spent.
(07 Jun 01)
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.