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Subject: Excerpt Of History
Date: Mon, 3 Jan 2005 19:38:59 EST



New Hampshire Grants

(HAPPY BIRTHDAY RENEE CUMMINGS)

The New Hampshire Grants were land grants, including 131 towns, made between
1749 and 1764 by the governor of the Province of New Hampshire, Benning
Wentworth (they are thus also known as the Benning Wentworth Grants). The land
grants, totalling about 135, were made on land claimed by New Hampshire west of
the Connecticut River, but which properly belonged to the Province of New
York. The resulting dispute led to the eventual establishment of the U.S. state
of Vermont.
Real estate
According to Wentworth, the border between New Hampshire and the Province of
New York was ambiguous, especially if he leaned on the dictate from Britain
"that the northern boundary of Massachusetts be a similar curve line pursuing
the course of the Merrimack Rive at three miles distance on the north side
thereof, beginning at the Atlantic Ocean and ending at a point due north of a
place called Pautucket Falls, and by a straight line drawn from thence west
till it meets his Majesty's other governments." Wentworth took this to mean
that New Hampshire's jurisdiction extended as far west as the jurisdiction of
Massachusetts extended—in New Hampshire's case this meant a line 20 miles east
of the Hudson River. New York correctly stated that the letters Patent
granted the Duke of York all of the lands west of the Connecticut River to Delaware
Bay.
Wentworth made the first grant, Bennington, a township west of the
Connecticut River, on January 3, 1749. Cautioned by New York to cease and desist,
Wentworth promised to await the judgment of the king, and refrain from making
more grants in the claimed territory until it was rendered, but in November
1753, New York reported that he had continued to grant land in the disputed area.
Grants briefly ceased in 1754, because of the French and Indian War, but in
1755 and 1757, Wentworth had a survey made 60 miles up the Connecticut river,
and 108 grants were made, extending to the line 20 miles east of the Hudson,
and north to the eastern shore of Lake Champlain.
Arrangement
The grants were usually six miles square (the standard size of a U.S. survey
township, although the Public Land Survey System is not used in Vermont) and
cost the grantee(s) £20. The grants were then subdivided amongst the
proprietors, and six of the lots were set aside—for the Society for the Propagation
of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, for the Church of England, for the first
clergyperson to settle in the township, for a school and two for Wentworth
himself. The permanent annual tax on each grant, called a quitrent, was one
shilling, paid directly to the King.
Royal adjudication
In September 1762, New York caught New Hampshire surveyors working on the
east side of Champlain, provoking the former state's government to reinterate
its claim to the area, citing both its own patent and the New Hampshire letters
patent of 1741. In March 1764, Wentworth released a statement to the effect
that the resolution of jurisdictional dispute required a royal verdict, which
he was certain would be made in his favor. Meanwhile, he encouraged his
grantees to settle in to the land and to cultivate and develop the land.
The New York went to the British authorities, requesting a confirmation of
their original grant, and the crown resolved the border dispute between New
York and New Hampshire in favor of New York. The royal order of July 26, 1764,
in response to New York's petition, affirmed that "the Western bank of the
Connecticut, from where it enters the province of Massachusetts Bay as far north
as the 45th degree of northern latitude, to be the boundary line between the
said two provinces of New Hampshire and New York." Wentworth issued his
final two grants on October 17 of that year: Walker, Vermont and Waltham,
Vermont.
Invalidation
New York interpreted the decision as invalidating Wentworth's grants entirely
—to the great dismay of area residents—and subsequently divided the
territory into four counties, Albany, Charlotte, Cumberland and Gloucester. New York
required that grantees surrender their charters, and in many cases buy their
lands back from New York at greatly increased prices. Those who would not
pay lost legal title to their lands, as New York reassigned them to others. The
people who would later become Vermonters petitioned the governor of New York
to confirm the New Hampshire Grants, he complied in part by declaring that no
other grants should be made until the King's wishes were known. Land not
previously granted by New Hampshire was considered open for distribution.
In 1770, the New York Supreme Court advanced New York's case by declaring all
of Wentworth's grants invalid. This infuriated residents of the area,
including Ethan Allen and his Green Mountain Boys, leading to the Vermont Republic
and general rebellion against the New York government.
Outcome
Following the American Revolutionary War, during which period and beyond the
people of the Green Mountain State had been self-governing (having written
their own constitution and settled into the habit of sovereignty), it became
clear that the New Hampshire Grants should become a state. The idea was pursued
at several stages, ending in failure for one reason or another until 1790,
when New York consented to the admission of Vermont into the Union, ceded
control of the New Hampshire Grants to Vermont and stated the New York-Vermont
boundary should be the western edge of the New Hampshire Grants and the
mid-channel of Lake Champlaign. The Vermont-New Hampshire boundary is the
Connecticut River.
Vermont voters ratified the United States Constitution on January 6, 1791 and
the U.S. Congress passed the resolution admitting Vermont into the Union on
February 18. On March 4 of the same year, the New Hampshire Grants, as
Vermont, became the first American state admitted to the Union after the original
13 colonies.
In order to prevent further legal to-dos, the government of Vermont paid the
government of New York $30,000 (New York had sought $600,000) in compensation
for that state's lost Grants.
Despite Wentworth's land sales throughout the mid-18th century, New York had
continually issued land patents in the same area, however, in contrast to the
New Hampshire grants, the New York patents were generally irregular, and
issued to wealthy landowers. The New Hampshire grants were town-sized, and
generally settled by middle-class farmers, setting the stage for Vermont's
populist uprising of the Revolutionary era. So, in general, after statehood, the New
York boundaries were ignored in favor of the New Hampshire boundaries and
designations. Some of these New York patents are now referred to as paper
towns, because they existed only on paper.


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