4.95 Surveythe fabric inof g America By John E. Dailey, LS A series that focuses on unique wrinkles in our survey heritage. Ohio Lands and Survey Systems nyone who loves chal- terms of what goods could be extracted Revolutionary War. The new nation, lenging surveys should and shipped to England for sale. Those which had not yet settled on a name or come to “Ohio, The to whom the Crown owed money were governmental structure, was deeply in Heart of It All.” If you based in England, and they accepted the debt with no hard cash to pay its huge are tired of surveying Crown’s land in exchange for payment. debts. squares and overworked They, too, had to rely on sketchy The Continental Congress, a loose Are-running Colonial surveys, come to descriptions of their on-site managers affiliation of the thirteen former Ohio. We have it all. and explorers as to what they owned. colonies, had no taxing authority and lit- Any discussion of Ohio Lands must tle authority to encumber the colonies start with a brief history, so here we go. Overlapping Grants with any debts. It had pursued the war In the 1600s, the English Crown Since accurate maps and descriptions and had borrowed a great deal of believed it owned all of North America were non-existent, a lot of guesswork money to pay for war material. It had by right of either discovery or conquest. entered the negotiations. Having no idea also promised their soldiers some sort of Most of the landowners were in England that there was almost 3000 miles of land compensation. The time of reckoning and had never seen the Americas. The to the west, the King often granted char- was at hand. vastness of the land, difficulty of commu- ters to developers and colonies for land The Ohio country was the frontier at nication, and lack of creditable that stretched “from sea to sea,” namely that time. The Atlantic Coastal plane, geographic information compounded the from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific east of the Appalachian Mountains, was problems facing the Crown and the Ocean. Again, due to the lack of infor- becoming overcrowded. After England absentee landowners. mation, many of these grants renounced her claims to the Western The French were the first to actually overlapped and encroached upon each lands at the end of the war, the race was explore the area that is now Ohio. Robert other which caused legal problems on. The “West” had vast areas of vacant Cavalier, Sieur de La Salle, who explored almost immediately. He gave the same land, and people began to move. These the Great Lakes area and the Ohio River western land to the Connecticut Colony, were some of the original “Squatters.” in late 1669 and early 1670, claimed the the Penn family, the New York Colony The Native American claims had not territory for France. It became a matter of and the Virginia Colony. Any attorney yet been settled, so there were serious dispute between the French and English with a modicum of land law experience confrontations between the Indians, the until the end of the so called French and would salivate at this predicament. squatters, and other settlers moving west. Indian War in 1763. The Treaty of Paris During the Revolutionary War, Several wars, battles and treaties ensued. in 1763 assigned all of the “Great West” to George Rogers Clark, operating under Finally their claims were extinguished and the English. the authority of the Governor of most of the Native Americans were The Crown had many debts, accrued Virginia, sought to capture the British moved further West out of Ohio. by war and gambling, and very little hard Forts in what is now Illinois. In February, Through some serious negotiations cash to pay those debts. The one thing it 1779, Clark and his men defeated Henry and compromises, Connecticut, New did have was land. In order to satisfy Hamilton, the Lieutenant Governor of York, Pennsylvania and Virginia agreed some of the creditors, the King granted Canada, and his troops at Vincennes, to cede their western lands to the newly large tracts of land to the Penn family, the now in Indiana. With that victory, the formed government. Pennsylvania ceded Massachusetts Bay Colony, the Americans effectively took control of its western lands but maintained access to Connecticut Colony, the Virginia what was to become the Northwest Lake Erie. Connecticut ceded all her Settlement, and after the Dutch were Territory. Great Britain formally relin- western lands with the exception of a expelled from New Amsterdam, the New quished its right and interest in the strip of land 120 miles long starting at the York land developers, as well as others. Northwest Territory by the Treaty of new westerly line of Pennsylvania and The English had a rough idea of what Paris, September 3, 1783. In 1788, the lying between the 41st parallel of North they possessed along the Atlantic Coast, first permanent and legal white settle- latitude and Lake Erie. Virginia ceded its but had very little idea of what lay ment in Ohio was founded in Marietta. western lands except for an area that beyond the Appalachian Mountains. The boundary problems between the would be used to pay bounties to its The interior interested them mainly in Colonies continued until the end of the Revolutionary War veterans (more infor- Displayed with permission • The American Surveyor • December • Copyright 2004 Cheves Media • www.TheAmericanSurveyor.com Original Land Subdivisions of Ohio From Original Land Subdivisions of Ohio: Ohio Division of Geological Survey, compiled by James McDonald, James W. Wright, Christian D. Steck, Lawrence H. Wickstrom, Brian D. Gara, and Lap Van Nguyen. 2003, MG-2, 1:500,000 scale, 1 plate and GIS files. Displayed with permission • The American Surveyor • December • Copyright 2004 Cheves Media • www.TheAmericanSurveyor.com Ohio Township Numbering , Vol. III, C.E. Sherman, 1925., Vol. Original Ohio Land Subdivisions: Ohio Cooperative Topographic Survey Topographic Original Ohio Land Subdivisions: Cooperative From From Displayed with permission • The American Surveyor • December • Copyright 2004 Cheves Media • www.TheAmericanSurveyor.com vey system. The VMD contained 6,570 In 1792, in order to compensate the citi- numbered westward from the square miles, about 4.2 million acres of zens of these towns for their losses, the Pennsylvania line and the Townships are land. State of Connecticut set aside the west- numbered Northerly from the 41st paral- Over 16,000 metes and bounds origi- ern 500,000 acres of the Reserve. In lel. This was a very harsh land at the time, nal surveys are found in the VMD, 1795, each of about 1800 “sufferers” heavily timbered with many swamps, creating a patchwork of surveys which, received a deed to a portion of this land many mosquitos, and much fever. Several from the air, resemble a giant jigsaw puz- based on their claims of damages. This survey party members died of either zle. Because of the number of surveys area is still referred to as the “Firelands” dysentery or malaria. Considering the ter- and the difficulty of finding the physical or the “Sufferers Land.” rain and the instrumentation in use at that objects they relied upon for descriptions, The “Firelands” comprise of the west- time, the quality of the surveys performed this is probably the most litigated land erly 5 ranges of townships within the was quite good. The quantity of the sur- area in Ohio. Western Reserve and were created vey work completed in a very short Virginia relinquished and ceded to the before the survey of the Western period of time is also extraordinary. Federal Government its claim to any unal- Reserve began and before all the Indian Due to the irregularity of the South located land in the VMD in 1852. In claims were extinguished. The townships shore of Lake Erie, not all townships 1871, Congress deeded this land to the were numbered to agree with the later contain the full 16,000 acres. Since there State of Ohio, which in turn set it aside in survey of the Reserve, but each town- was no initial plan for the internal subdi- 1872 as an endowment for what is now ship was divided into four quarter vision of the townships such as in the The Ohio State University. At the time, townships, numbered counterclockwise PLSS, the townships were subdivided at 76,735 acres were believed available for beginning with “quarter-town” No. 1 in the whim of their purchaser. Some town- sale by the university. The Ohio State the southeast corner. ships have 100 lots, some have 90 sections, some have quarter townships and others have tracts. When describing This was a very harsh land at the time.... Several survey land within the Western Reserve, you have to again study the original subdivi- party members died of either dysentery or malaria. sion of the township. But the one thing you do find which in common across the entire Western University sold or quit-claimed these lands In 1795, ten years after Hutchins Reserve is the original New England fla- to individuals until the 1940s. began his survey for the Federal vor in the layout of the cities, towns and In Northeastern Ohio, other things Government, a group of New England- villages. All have a central town square were happening. In its 1786 Deed of ers purchased the remainder of the with development moving outward from Cession to the United States, the State of Western Reserve from the State of there. In many of the towns, if you did Connecticut retained the Western Connecticut.