Where oh where is the land…
It’s an amazing set of records that The Legal Genealogist picked up at the South Carolina Archives last week.
Amazing, first, because it’s a set of surviving land records from the 1760s.
Amazing, second, because it’s a set of surviving land records from my family, which didn’t leave nearly as many records as I would have liked.
And amazing most of all because it centers on a land grant not to a however-many-great grandfather.
The grant, clearly and unequivocally, was issued to Sarah Gentry.
Sarah.
My fifth great grandmother.
To be eligible for that land grant in her own name, Sarah had to have been a feme sole — an unmarried woman — when she obtained that land. And we believe that we was widowed by then, bringing her family of as many as seven sons with her when she moved with her father and brother from Virginia to South Carolina.1 The law at the time would have allowed 100 acres to the head of household plus 50 acres to each additional household member,2 so her grant of 450 acres makes sense (100 acres for Sarah, 50 acres for each son).
This plat for Sarah’s 450 acres, dated 7 January 1767, is online at the Archives’ website:3
Pretty cool, huh? The other documents related to the land — the grant itself on 23 February 17684 and the memorial Sarah had to file on 2 May 17685 — aren’t online, and I had to retrieve those in person, but now I have a complete picture of Sarah’s land.
Well…
Maybe not exactly.
Because there’s the minor little issue of exactly where this land was located.
I mean, you can see even from the descriptions of these documents — “Plat for 450 Acres in Colleton County,” “Land Grant for 450 Acres in Colleton County,” “Memorial for 450 Acres on Ninety Six Creek, in Colleton County” — that the land was in Colleton County, right?
Except that it wasn’t. Not really. Not what people think of today as Colleton County.
You see, in 1767-1768, what was then called Colleton County was a part of South Carolina that was a county in name only and ceased to exist in 1768.6 Geographically, it stretched all the way from the coast well inland:7
So don’t go looking for the Gentry land in the much smaller area known as Colleton County today. You won’t find it. It’s way up in the back country, in what became the 96 District, and what I expect today is Edgefield County.
Mapping Sarah is going to be a challenge…
SOURCES
- See “SONS OF NICHOLAS GENTRY, IMMIGRANT: Part 4. David-II Gentry,” Journal of Gentry Genealogy (http://www.gentryjournal.org/ : accessed 17 July 2018). ↩
- See “South Carolina Archives
Series Description: Colonial Land Grants, 1731-1775,” South Carolina State Archives (http://www.archivesindex.sc.gov/ : accessed 21 July 2018). ↩ - Gentry, Sarah, Plat for 450 Acres in Colleton County, 7 Jan 1767; Record Group S213184, “Colonial Plat Books, 1731-1775,” vol. 9, page 156, item 1; South Carolina State Archives, Columbia; digital image, South Carolina Online Archives (http://www.archivesindex.sc.gov/ : accessed 21 July 2018). ↩
- Gentry, Sarah, Land Grant for 450 Acres in Colleton County, 23 Feb 17678; Record Group S213019, “Colonial Land Grants, 1675-1788,” vol. 16, page 118; South Carolina State Archives, Columbia. ↩
- Gentry, Sarah, Memorial for 450 Acres on Ninety Six Creek, in Colleton County, 2 May 1768; Record Group S111001, “Memorial Books, 1731-1778,” vol. 9, page 486, item 2; South Carolina State Archives, Columbia. ↩
- See FamilySearch Research Wiki (https://www.familysearch.org/learn/wiki/), “Colleton (1682-1768) County, South Carolina Genealogy,” rev. 11 Mar 2017. ↩
- Map adapted from AniMap, Colleton County outline added in red. ↩
“Waters of Saluda” is a very helpful hint.
Hi Judy,
The person’s comment about the “waters of Saluda” might be your key. Saludo County and Edgefield County, as you can see, are right next to each other. Let us readers know what you discover please!
Saluda County was not formed until 1895 so would not have been an issue at the point in time Judy is searching. The reference in the grant to the “waters of Saluda” is a specific reference to the Saluda River which passed through several early counties. The “96 branch” and the “waters of Saluda” narrow the research focus to two early counties, one of which suffered significant record loss in 1873.
Such a great find! I hope you’re able to uncover more documents related to this land, and that you’re able to find out where exactly it was!
Oh, well, you know: the FAN club! All those names of neighbors. You have my sympathy, though, Judy. How many towns might have records relating to those folks? A friend of our family, born in New Hampshire, inherited land in NH that had been in the family for quite a long time, passed down from generation to generation until it came to him. He had the land description (metes and bounds of course) but no idea where the heck it was. He took a vacation to go from town to town, looking at cryptic, scattered records, and eventually was able to suss out where the land was. It took some time. That was decades ago, with the help of town clerks who loved solving a mystery. May you be as fortunate. (As I recall, he was back there at it for something like six weeks- no computers or indexes then.)
I think we’re related! I am descended from a Martha Gentry born in SC in about 1780… this woman has been a huge brick wall. I had no idea that there was a Gentry Journal of sorts.