Virginia Military District

Virginia had historic claims to much of the Northwest Territory, which included Ohio, dating from its colonial charter.

The District encompassed all of the following Ohio counties: Adams, Brown, Clinton, Clermont, Highland, Fayette, Madison, and Union, and portions of these counties: Scioto, Pike, Ross, Pickaway, Franklin, Delaware, Marion, Hardin, Logan, Clark, Greene, Champaign.

The precise boundaries of the district was a subject of contention for many years, involving multiple acts of Congress and a Supreme Court decision (Doddridge vs. Thompson et al., 9 Wheaton 469).

The last extension act was passed on March 3, 1855, allowing two years for claims made prior to January 1, 1852, to be surveyed and patented.

This caused such an uproar that Congress was forced to act, and on May 27, 1880, passed legislation limiting the rights of the college to unappropriated lands.

[1] Virginia soldiers of the Continental line, who served in the Revolutionary War, were eligible to procure a bounty award in the form of land, according to a formula based on rank and time of service.

After the location was chosen and boundaries surveyed, the owner of the warrant exchanged it for a patent, which was equivalent to a deed in fee simple and passed all title of the government to the holder.