Historical U.S. Land Records & Deeds Online

Land grants, homestead applications, plat maps, bounty land warrants and even deed records can be found online through a variety of sources, from county deed offices to state and federal archives.

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Bureau of Land Management: General Land Office Records

An abandoned wagon marks the site of a former homestead. — Getty / IanChrisGraham

Learn how to find homestead records, land patents, and other land records in this searchable database of over 2,000,000 pre-1908 Federal land title records for the 30 Public Land States (these do not include the 13 colony states).

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Spanish Land Grants of Florida

Search or browse digital copies of land claims filed by Florida settlers after the transfer of the territory from Spain to the United States in 1821, documenting original land claims going back to 1790.

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Georgia Virtual Vault - Land Records

Digitized land documents available for free searching/browsing in the Georgia Archives' Virtual Vault include Chatham County Deed Books (1785-1806), District Plats of Survey (surveys of land districts in counties made prior to distribution of land by lottery, 1805-1833), and Headright and Bounty Plats of 1783-1909.

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Archives of Maryland Online Land Records

Search or browse digitized volumes of Provincial Court Land Records (1676-1700), plus access links to digitized land records and survey/plat maps for the state of Maryland.

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Massachusetts - Salem Deeds: Historic Records

Browse digitized images from the entire run of Essex County, Massachusetts, land deeds dating from 1640 through 2016. The collection includes 533+ deed books!

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Minnesota Maps Online - Original Land Surveys & Plat Books

The Minnesota Historical Society offers this search feature for Minnesota's original public land survey plats, created during the first government land survey of the state by the U.S. Surveyor General's Office during the years 1848 to 1907. Also included are the later General Land Office and Bureau of Land Management maps, up to the year 2001.

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New Hampshire County Registries of Deeds

Links to New Hampshire counties that have index and/or image records of their land deeds online. Many of them include historical deeds as well as current ones.

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Spanish & Mexican Land Grants of New Mexico

Many Spanish and Mexican land grants in the area that eventually became the present-day state of New Mexico can be viewed online in Heritage, the online catalog of the New Mexico State Archives.

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Pennsylvania - Land Records at the PA State Archives

A wide variety of scanned land records can be viewed online at the website of the Pennsylvania State Archives, including patent indexes, survey books, warrant books, donation lands, depreciation lands, land grant applications, and township warrantee maps.

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South Carolina Colonial Plats

Search by personal name or geographic feature to access free plat images digitized from a duplicate set of the original recordings of plats for colonial land grants in South Carolina, including their certificates of admeasurement. Digitized from "Colonial Plat Books (Copy Series), 1731-1775" by the South Carolina State Archives.

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Texas General Land Office - Land Grants & Maps

This free, searchable Land Grant Database contains a listing of original land grants from the Texas General Land Office (GLO), including Spanish, Republic and State land grants. Millions of land grant images have been digitized. If a file has been scanned, there will be a PDF link next to the database listing. More than 2 million digitized maps are also available online.

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Virginia Land Office Patents & Grants

Searchable database of scanned images of Virginia land documents by which the Crown (1623 - 1774) and the Commonwealth (from 1779) transferred new land to individual ownership. Includes land patents issued prior to 1779; land grants issued by the Virginia Land Office after 1779; grants issued in the Northern Neck from 1692-1862; and original and recorded Northern Neck surveys (1786-1874).

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Missouri Land Patents Database, 1831 - 1969

Search this free database of records (some original and some transcribed) of federal land donated to the state for sale, with patents issued by the State of Missouri, including Township School Land, 1820 – 1900, Seminary and Saline Land, 1820 – 1825, Swamp Land, 1850 – 1945, and 500,000 Acre Grant, 1843 – 1951.

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University of Alabama – Soldier Land Grants

Search or browse 359 digitized United States Land Office certificates of title for soldiers, their heirs, and assignees, dated from 1848 to 1881 and arranged alphabetically by the last name of the soldier. These land grants (generally 40 acres) were given in token of military service during the Creek, Cherokee, and Seminole Indian Wars, the Mexican War, the Florida War, and the War of 1812 or in recognition of volunteer service in a state militia.

U.S. Land Records Online

Bureau of Land Management: General Land Office Records

Massachusetts - Salem Deeds: Historic Records

Spanish & Mexican Land Grants of New Mexico

Pennsylvania - Land Records at the PA State Archives

South Carolina Colonial Plats