Florida Land Records

See Also Researching in Land Records - Land records provide two types of important evidence for the genealogist. Prior to the Civil War, more than eighty-five percent of all Americans owned or leased land. Therefore, almost every researcher, whether a seasoned professional or weekend hobbyist, has required land records to document the existence, association, or movement of an individual or ancestral family. Most beginning genealogists underestimate the importance of using land records to pin persons to specific locales. In the South, which has far fewer vital records than New England, the land records are even more crucial to genealogical success. For answers to these and other questions, researchers look to Land records......

Spanish Land Grants - The state archives holds a vast body of records created about 1820-22 for the use of the federal government in affirming or denying earlier Spanish grants of land. In many cases these are the only surviving references to some of the pre-territorial residents of the area. The indexed documents are filed by claimant, and the amount of information they contain varies greatly, but the affidavits often tell when an individual arrived in Florida and how many were in his family, including names and ages. The acreage granted often depended on the number of "heads" in the family.
The original fragile records, largely in Spanish, are extant, but the WPA made a five-volume transcript, Spanish Land Grants in Florida, which includes Spanish Grants, British Grants and Private Land Claims, is available at the Flordia State Archives and in a number of libraries, as well as in an inexpensive microfiche edition from the archives.

Armed Occupation Act Records - In 1842, during the Second Seminole War, the federal government granted lands south of the line dividing Townships Nine and Ten South (a line running east and west about three miles north of Palatka) to individuals who agreed to claim, populate, and hold-by force of arms, if necessary-some of the undeveloped lands of East Florida. More than 1,000 persons responded, cleared the minimum five acres of their 160-acre grant, and lived on the property for the required five years. The records give the date an individual arrived in the territory, marital status, location of the grant holding, and the like.

Division of State Lands Records - The Land Ordinance of 1785 decreed a land-survey system known as the rectangular system of survey, and Florida was the first state, and remains the only state on the Eastern Seaboard, to be surveyed in orderly squares rather than under the old English system of "metes and bounds" utilized in the thirteen original "state-land" states. The original surveyors' field notes and plats have been transferred to the state archives, along with the original tract books and records of all grants of land from the state to the initial grantee, whether by purchase or otherwise. A fascinating and valuable resource, the notes and other files depict for the careful researcher the topography, settlements, and even the houses of the early territorial period and beyond. Preliminary Inventory of the Land-Entry Papers of the General Land Office, at the National Archives, lists Florida records beginning in 1825.

Homestead Files - The homestead applications filed by Florida settlers, between 1881-1905, have been transferred to the Florida State Archives. Information contained includes name of applicant, place of residence at time of application, tract description, and number of acres granted. There is a surname index. Other homestead records included in this Record Group 598 include tax receipts required to prove that claimants were paying taxes on their claims, unindexed miscellaneous and legal records concerning homesteads, and correspondence of the State Land Office, 1858-1913.

Subsequent Land Transactions - Deeds after the first grants are recorded generally through the clerk of the courts in the county seat

• Florida Land Books at Amazon.com
• BLM Land Records
• Land Records from All States
• Search County Property Records
• Search County Land Patents

U.S. House of Representative Private Claims, Vol. 1, Vol. 2 or Vol. 3

The right to own land has always been one of the great incentives for living in the United States. Yet researchers often overlook the importance of land records as a source of family history information. Written evidence of people’s entitlement goes back in time further than virtually any other type of record family historians might use.

Land records meet the needs of researchers in different ways and contain a variety of genealogical and historical data. They are a major source of information for many family histories and provide primary source material for local history as well. They are closely related to probate and other official court records and should be investigated in connection with them. Land and property are leading issues in the settlement of estates, and the majority of civil cases in the courts deal with real and personal property. Although land records rarely yield vital statistics, in many instances they provide the only proof of family relationships. Often they include the names of heirs of an estate (including daughters’ married names and a widow’s subsequent married name) and refer to related probates and other court cases by number and court name. In some places where other records are scarce, the land records take on extra importance. Occasionally these documents disclose former residences and more often provide the new address of the grantors or heirs at the time of the sale of the property.

Land records provide two types of important evidence for the family historian. First, they often document family relationships. Second, they place individuals in a specific time and place, allowing the researcher to sort people and families into neighborhoods and closely related groups. One of land records’ most important qualities is that they are sometimes the only records that allow us to distinguish one person of a common name from another.

The National Archives has bounty-land warrant files, donation land entry files, homestead application files, and private land claim files relating to the entry of individual settlers on land in the public land states. There are no land records for the original thirteen states or for Maine, Vermont, West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Texas, and Hawaii. Records for these states are maintained by state officials, usually in the state capital. Searching for the record of a particular land grant from the federal government requires contacting both the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the National Archives (NARA) .