Land Title and Deeds

In the last half of the 17th century Marquette, Hennepin, Joliet and LaSalle explored the county drained by the Mississippi and Ohio rivers and their tributaries and claimed the land for the French empire in the New World.  About 1720 Sieur de Vincennes established a post on the lower Wabash. French families from Canada settled around the post as did French soldiers and traders. In 1742 a treaty with the Indians transferred all land in present day Knox County Indiana, a southern portion of Sullivan County Indiana, and some lands on the west side of the Wabash to the French. This was to be known as the Vincennes District and included present day Russell Township.  After George Rogers Clark took Vincennes during the Revolutionary War, the land in the area became part of the new American Republic. 

During the French and British control, this land was occupied and ‘owned’ by French and British citizens. After the American conquest and while Vincennes was commanded by the governor from Virginia, further disposition of the lands were made.  Then after the organization of the Northwest Territory in 1787 the disposal of the lands was regulated by Congress. By this time, all these different authorities granting land as the ‘spoils of war’ without a lot of concern for who might have owned it previously, began to affect the titles to this land.

In 1791 Congress passed a land law trying to clear up any confusion as to the land in the Vincennes District, including land to the west of the Wabash River. The head of any family residing in the Illinois country in the year 1783 would be granted 400 acres of land.  Lands not to exceed 400 acres per person that had been actually cultivated and improved in the Illinois country, under a supposed grant of authority, would be confirmed.

Thus, some of the earliest land grants along the west side of the river originated even before Illinois was a state.  These long narrow lots, starting at the river and running back several rods, still shown on modern plat books, look out of place against the rectangular Anglo- American land grants. These long lots north of present day Russellville, known as Locations #2, 3, 4 and 5 exist in Sec. 32 T5N R11W and Sec. 5 T4N R11W.