c.1785 South Carolina Surveyor Instructions
At the end of this document you will find the full text of the South Carolina General Assembly's official instructions for the State's Deputy Surveyors in place by 1785. Studying these brief instructions will help researchers properly interpret and understand the land warrant and survey process in South Carolina and contextualize early grants of vacant land...
Very informative article! This may help me in a dilemma I have with land records. My ancestor John Hindman had a 100 acre grant in Craven County surveyed March 15,1773, granted May 4th,1775, and the Memorial is dated Sept. 15, 1775 for a plat on London Bridge Creek off Broad River that appears to have been in NC before the state boundary change. Only one other person, Francis Wilkey, had adjoining land and his Memorial notes his land was in NC then SC. John's Memorial does not say that. Both John and Francis signed a petition dated May 15,1775 protesting having to obtain new land grants after the border change. Subsequently I can find no record of what happened to John's original land grant. There are no further land records or plats mentioning his ownership. I have extensively searched for the purpose of making sure my John Hindman is the same John who immigrated in 1772 from Antrim Ireland and got that land grant. I have often thought that perhaps my John never settled on that land because of the Indian conflicts and then the Rev War conflicts in the area.
Anyway, my John Hindman wound up in 1790 living in Spartanburg on Cane Creek, a subsidiary of the Tyger River, and that land is well-documented. Pruitts were neighbors, actually Thomas Pruitt bought from Samuel Daline (son of John) a plot of land in May 1809 that Samuel (brother of John) sold to John in 1791, land that Samuel bought from Joshua Smith in Dec 1788 who bought it from Owen Forrester who was granted the land in 1787. (whew!!).
Just thought I'd relate my experience to show how complicated tracing land records can be and getting info like these surveyor instructions is very appreciated.
Glad you found this article helpful. It is interesting to me that your Hindman ancestor wound up on Cane Creek of the Tyger River. Benjamin Pettit b1769 also lived there and his wife was Elizabeth Hindman. Nobody has been able to determine who her parents were. I know there were several Hindmans in the area. Benjamin Pettit's family Bible shows Elizabeth Hindman was born June 20, 1771. Later censuses indicate she was born in SC. Do you have any thoughts on this?
Sorry, just saw this reply! I have researched this Elizabeth Hindman. She is mentioned in narratives for a neighbor Archibald McCravy, whose wife Jane Cathcart bore a child the same night as Benjamin and Elizabeth. There are numerous references out there. The FindaGrave memorial for Sarah Petty Cathcart (236561164) has a meandering story about lineage that ends with a mention of Elizabeth. The narrative for this memorial is horrible and disjointed and mostly wrong. It needs to be fixed but that involves providing the Manager a correct version, which I don't have. This Elizabeth may be the child of a Samuel Hindman in the 1790 Spartanburg census. I have this Samuel as a brother of my 4th GGrandfather, based on research and this article on page 164 to 169: https://www.piedmont-historical-society.org/quarterlies/phs_vol18_no4.pdf
Thank you for sharing that very well researched article. In it I note that Samuel Hindman's wife is said to have been a woman named Jean. Benjamin Pettit and Elizabeth Hindman named their first daughter Jean. This is the first instance of this name occurring in the Pettit family I have found. I admit this fact in and of itself is very weak evidence that Elizabeth's parents were Samuel and Jean Hindman but it does point that direction.
They also named children Silas and Hiram which are also anomalies in the Pettit family. Perhaps these came from the Hindman family as well.
By the way, I did a search for Hindman land records in my files and found this modern plat that shows Hindman's branch of the Tyger River. Thought you might find it interesting.
Yes, I've seen that. I actually have an excessive amount of information on Hindman land in that area. What I'm currently trying to find is what happened to his original 1773 land grant on London Bridge Creek. Page 22 in doc below
https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML1126/ML112650824.pdf
I've spent way too much time researching land records. I've saved over 100 plats and notes on every land grant or sale involving Hindman's in Spartanburg. His original grant may never have been settled by him, I think
Actually the tract history starts on page 19, not 22. Very detailed info on most of the land ownership (but not Hindman!!).