In a message dated 4/5/04 2:11:46 PM Eastern Standard Time, [email protected] writes: > > Was the Erie Canal opened that allowed easier travel? > ----- Original Message ----- I think my own family went there because their mother in New York died and the father remarried. There was land available. Others were possibly given grants for Revolutionary War service? This is from the Frontier State 1803-1825 ;by William Utter "Certain emigrants came with claims which gave them preferred treatment. The Virginia Mililtary District had been reserved by agreement between that state and Conress to satisfy the land warrants with which Virgniia had compensated her Revolutionary Veterans. The National Government was also rewarding soldiers with land grants, and a considerable section known as the U. S. Military District had been set aside for this purpose. Certain Canadians who had suffered loss because of sympathy for the American cause during the war were granted land within the strip known as the Refugee Tract. A half million acres, the so called Firelands, at the western end of Connecticut Reserve were set aside for citizens of that State who had suffered when her coast s were ravaged by war. " He cites H. Carpenter Origins and Locations of Firelands, of Western Reserved published in 1935 and the Ohio Land Grants