Shown is an extreme example of one of the irregularly shaped military surveys made in Adams County.
(By Stephen Kelley from the People’s Defender 1984)
We continue with our narrative of the Virginia Military District out of which was formed Adams County. For some reason or other, the VMD was not platted into uniform rectilinear surveys as was the battle of the state. Instead, the land was surveyed at random in a most haphazard manner which continues to baffle and confound landowners to this day.
Therefore, as could be guessed, the land which had the highest value was claimed and surveyed first. In Adams County, the rich bottomlands on the Ohio River and Ohio Brush Creek were quickly platted and entered at the land office in Marietta.
As was pointed out in last week’s column, many of the surveyors who were locating and surveying the military patents were paid by receiving a percentage of the land they were platting. Several of these men, including such notables as Nathaniel Massie, Duncan McArthur, Simon Kenton and Arthur Fox Sr., charged as much as fifty percent of the land grants they located for their clients. Armed with this information, it is easy to see why the rich and well-watered farmlands and potential village sites were first claimed and why some of the earliest surveyors became wealthy men.
As a result of these surveyors receiving a percentage of the lands they surveyed, needless to say, many were tempted to cheat. In 1900, Adams County historian Emmons B. Stivers wrote, “At that period lands were abundant and cheap, and it was the practice to give ‘full measure’ in the location of (patents ); and if the deputy surveyor had a contract for one-fourth or one-half of the lands located, the measure would be full and overflowing, for a certainty as he would get, besides his agreed share, the surplus.”
The first survey made in the VMD was completed by John O’Bannon in November 1787. From this time forward through most of 1794, all surveying was done under the hazard of attack by Indians. Again, quoting from Stivers, “But the ever vigilant and revengeful savages of the (Northwest) Territory stood as a bar to its entrance. From their lookouts on the Ohio, they scrutinized every pirogue that passed over its waters, and reckoned the military strength of every armed foe that threatened their shores. None but the most experienced Indian fighters dared enter the region with hope of returning alive. Under these difficulties the early surveys in the Virginia Reservation were made, and it was not until after the Treaty of Greenville that the danger of assault from the savages was removed.”
