Nancy Dodge sent a note to the list concerning a land dispute between George Moyers and Adam Broyles which seemed to involve waste land. (As with so many law suits, I can’t say that I understand the details, which were not reported.) A well-known land dispute arose between John Wayland and John Broyles. John Broyles had a 1726 patent for 400 acres. John Wayland had a 1728 patent for 504 acres, which overlapped the Broyles to the extent of 384 acres. If one used only the original patents and failed to note the ensuing dispute, it would be very hard to plot the Wayland and other patents.
Two of the lines in the Wayland patent were extensions of the Broyles patent and they shared one line in common. It would appear that Wayland could not have laid out his patent without a good knowledge of the Broyles patent yet he managed to encroach on the Broyles patent to the extent of 384 acres. After the lawsuit, which he lost, Wayland had only 120 acres. This shows that one must take the original patent language cautiously.
I have seen maps of land division based on later sales. Whereas the northern corner of the John Rucker patent of 977 acres appears to be a line in common with Michael Holt, the later land sales show that the Rucker land extended into Holt land. This may have come about in several ways, including trades or sales. Or possibly it was the result of land use; he who occupies and uses the land has some claim to it.
Disputes about boundaries were a problem and lawsuits were a major method of resolution if the two parties could not reach a private agreement. Another way of establishing boundaries was precessioning. This was done under the supervision of the established church. A committee of men and the two adjacent land owners would walk along a boundary line. The presence of the owners and the witnesses established that this was a boundary. There was no requirement that the line they walked was defined in any legal terms. The line that they walked was the de facto boundary. On one occasion Alexander Spotswood was invited to precession his land (which would have taken days if not weeks) and he declined, saying that some of the boundaries were in dispute and he would not precession the land until the disputes were resolved.
A map of the original patents should not be taken too literally. It is a guide only. The original patents had waste land around them. The surveys were inaccurate and incomplete themselves. There were overlaps. There was some horse trading after the fact.
There were very few patents that can be cleanly and definitely matched to the land use today. One of the best was the original Conrad Amberger patent in the Mt. Pony area south of Salubria. Some of the others were the Blankenbaker-Utz-Fleshman-Thomas riverine patents across the Robinson River which, until recently, were marked by hedges along the boundaries.
(15 Feb 06)
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.