Wilma I have used the General Land Office search to find federal land transactions by my family. I then download the tif file of the land pattent document. On those documents it usually gives the residence of the person obtaining the land. For example, for one of my ancestors in Indiana who was buying land in Jackson Co., the earliest document showed he was from Clark Co. IN and a later transaction showed he was from Jackson Co. Then your MO Gilmores might be like my John Gilmore who moved to Porter Township in Greene (later Christian) Co. in the 1840s. There were no federal land patents listed for him. Try the local land records too and see if they give anything about residence. Ted On Tue, 2 Feb 1999 S1VEDETTE@aol.com wrote: > I have just found some information that troubles me. My John Isaacs had > land in Howard Co. MO. that he gave to his son David around 1818. From what I > can find, my John Isaac never lived in Howard Co. He must have had this land > bought by someone else in his name. NOW! Could my JOHN GILMORE who had land > in 1807 in St. Louis Co. have done the same thing? Does anyone know about > this early land records in MO? > If my John Gilmore was not in MO that early, then he might have still been > in Adair Co. KY. Hope you are confused, I am!! > > Wilma > >