What is a Virginia Land Patent?
The Commonwealth of Kentucky is a daughter of the state of Virginia. Various royal proclamations and legislative acts, such as “Land Laws A & B” passed in May 1779 by the Virginia General Assembly, established the patenting process for “lands on the western waters”, i.e. Kentucky County or the Kentucky District. Under the Compact with Virginia, Kentucky agreed to honor patents issued by Virginia Governors prior to June 1792. (For further research on royal proclamations and Land Laws, see “Legislation” in the “Reference Library” on the Land Office website.) Patent numbers in the Virginia Patent Series (VA) range from 1 to 9441. There are 9540 patent files in the series due to patent number duplications. A few patent numbers were skipped.
