The Homestead
Act of 1862 allowed US citizens to become the owner, free of charge, of 160
acres of US Government land. To become
owner was a three step process; file an application, improve the land and file
for a deed or title. Before applying,
the homesteaders were required to live five years on the land, improve the land
by establishing a building and grow crops.
My Great grandfather, James Jefferson ‘Jeff” Burnett did just that.
Jeff Burnett
filed a homestead claim in 1889, which is recorded in the National Archives, in
Washington DC. There are several
interesting documents which were included with the homestead application. One such document is the “Homestead Proof –
Testimony of Claimant” which can be found below. In this document Jeff Burnett tells that
there has been a house located on the land for about 10 years and he has
established residence for 8 years. The testimony
goes on to confirm there was a barn and stable, fowl house, smoke house, garden,
orchard, fencing and a well.
Although the
land was free, there were some filing fees which accounted to $16.54 or about 10 cents per acre. You can read more about the Jeff Burnett land
holdings here; http://burnettmusings.blogspot.com/2015/02/james-jefferson-burnett-land-holdings.html.
More about
James Jefferson Burnett can be found here; http://burnettmusings.blogspot.com/2014/11/james-jefferson-burnett-tenth-child-of.html.
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Homestead Proof – Testimony of Claimant, Land Entry Files, Louisiana, New Orleans Land Office, Homestead
Final Certificate # 6,290.
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that have supplied information or photos for this blog. If you use photos
or information from this blog, including use in your Ancestry.com family tree, please consider giving credit to those which have furnished the
information or citing the source for the material. Most of the credits or
citations can be found in the photo captions or in the footnotes section
