Presenting....."First Landowners of Pennsylvania: Colonial and State Warrant Registers
in the PA Archives, Harrisburg 1682-ca 1940"

These files document the first purchasers of land in all 67 counties of Pennsylvania

This CD contains three major resources for researchers:   (1) the warrant register for Original Purchasers (starting in 1682);
(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.

As the published description of the registers states, "This is the primary finding aid [in the Pennsylvania Archives] for locating patents and surveys when the name of the warrantee is known.   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."   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.

Philadelphia Warrant Register (Note there are 10 specific pieces of information for each tract)

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