Closson Press

Authors: Sharon C. and Angus MacInnes
Available for the first time outside of the Pennsylvania Archives in Harrisburg, (1682-ca 1940) this CD contains the Colonial and State Warrant Registers for the first landowners in all 67 Pennsylvania counties. It holds three major resources for researchers: (1) the warrant register for Original Purchasers (starting in 1682) plus indexes; (2) two registers for Old Rights Purchasers (one for Philadelphia and one for Bucks & Chester Counties combined, also starting in 1682); and (3) all of the warrant registers (67 volumes, one for each county, starting with those in existence in 1733) for the original sales from the Penns, and then the state, to a majority of the first legally-recognized owners of private land throughout Pennsylvania.

These registers predate the deed books located in each county. Information given is warrant number, name of warrantee, type of warrant, acreage warranted, date of warrant, date of return, acreage returned, name of patentee, the patent volume, book, and page number and the survey book and page number. The names of the warrantees and warrant dates extracted from some of these registers were published in the Pennsylvania Archives (series 3) volumes 24-26, but the published version omits the warrant numbers, return of survey information, and patent information.

The registers on this CD, which document the first purchasers of land throughout the state, are a primary aid for locating patents and surveys in the Pennsylvania Archives when the name of the warrantee is known. Note that the published registers which were published also omit the names of the patentee and the location of the land (usually the watercourse or the township), two vitally important pieces of information for the genealogist.

2005, 3661 pages, CD
No ISBN assigned