Tom Chapman- We'll try this once again. You might want to make a hard copy to reread if you forget. You recommended the maps (Warrantee/patentee) at the Westmoreland Tax Mapping Office. You said you had three of them. If you look at those maps, you will find your properties with names on them. Each property has an estate name or nickname, such as "SPRINGFIELD". Under that name is the acreage figure. Under that is the name of the patentee; that is the name of the first owner, other than the Commonwealth. Under that is the name of the instrument which the state granted and the date of its granting. Most,by far, will read "patent", then the date the patent was ISSUED by Pennsylvania. THEN, a series of letters and numbers. In Westmoreland maps, these refer to the patent books archived in Harrisburg. The information from these books was used to create the warrantee/patentee maps which you have samples of.. EXAMPLE-- PB P 3 156 . This translates to Patent Book! s, Series "P" , volume three, page 156. Sometimes an application number will be given. In other counties (Fayette), more information is given right on the map. This includes the name of the person who APPLIED for the warrant and the date it was received by the land office (an important date for establishing priority of claim), the date of the SURVEY, and finally the date the PATENT was issued and to whom. Getting back to Westmoreland County, the only way you can find the additional information that Fayette wrote on their maps is to write to Harrisburg, giving the owner's name(s) you are looking for, plus the information on the maps you aready have. They will send you PHOTOCOPIES of images in the archives. Typically, once the name is found by them, they will copy the front and back of the application, the front and back of the survey , and one or two pages in the patent book. The patent books have acquired marginal notes over the years, and these might help you in your search(es). The costs per name plus up to 10 photocopies was $15 in 2004 for out of staters, $10 for Pennsylvanians. The Address: Pennsylvania Archives, 350 North St. ,Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, 17120-0090. A few additional facts: sometimes the "sooners" of 1769 -1784 did not bother to register their claims in the land office until at least one change of ownership had taken place, by whatever legal instrum! ents ( or none) they could use at the time. Sometimes there were disputes as to who had the prior claim. These latter were begun by filing a "caveat" (latin for "beware") in the land office. These administrative legal actions ( sound familiar?) were archived in their own reference book- the Caveat Book. Searches at Harrisburg (another reason for not stopping at the information listed on the maps in the Westmoreland tax office) will include these data. The legal principle to keep in mind ( caveat- there are exceptions. This kept lawyers rich.) is that the first registered at the land office was presumptively the legal owner. Also, until 1780 when the Virginia warrants for land in what was Western Pennsylvania were transferred to Pennsylvania, two people could have good claims for the same land if one was warranted in PA and one in VA. Also one must keep in mind the various dates for the inception of the various municipalities. For instance, the land upon which the Duque! sne Incline operates in present day Pittsburgh was in Washington County, Pennsylvania for a short time and in The District of West Augusta, County of Yohogania, VIRGINIA at the same. Fortuntely these problems are rare and only of interest to historians and genealogists. Is this all clear? Allen D. McCrady