TWENTY-FIRST CONGRESS. Sess. I. Ch. 146. 1830.

408

Statute LMay 28, 1830.

Certain claimsconfirmed.

Act of May24, 1828, ch.93.

Proviso.

Proviso.

Lands inha-bited beforeApril 15, 1813.

Proviso.

Pre-emptiongranted to cer-tain persons.

Chap. CXLVI .—An Act to confirm certain claims to lands in the district ofJackson courthouse, in the state of Mississippi .

Be it enacted hy the Senate and House of Representatives of the UnitedStates of America, in Congress assembled, That all the claims to landsreported by the register and receiver of the land office for the district ofJackson courthouse, in the state of Mississippi , under the provisions ofthe act of Congress , approved on the twenty-fourth day of May, onethousand eight hundred and twenty-eight, entitled “An act supplemen-tary to the several acts providing for the adjustment of land claims in thestate of Mississippi, ” as founded on any order of survey, requette, per-mission to settle, or other written evidence of claim derived from theSpanish authorities, which ought, in the opinion of the said register andreceiver, to be confirmed, and which, by the said reports, appear to bederived from the Spanish government prior to the twentieth of Decem-ber, one thousand eight hundred and three, and the land claimed to havebeen cultivated and inhabited on or before that day, shall be confirmedin the same manner as if the title had been completed : Provided, That,in all such claims, where the plat and certificate of survey, made prior tothe fifteenth day of April, one thousand eight hundred and thirteen, underthe authority of the Spanish government, in pursuance of such claim, hasnot been filed with the said register and receiver, such claim shall not beconfirmed to any one person for more than twelve hundred and eightyacres; and that for all the other claims comprised in the reports as afore-said, and which ought, in the opinion of the register and receiver, to beconfirmed, the claimant to such land shall be entitled to a grant therefor,as a donation not to exceed twelve hundred and eighty acres to any oneperson: And provided also, That the claim of the representatives ofLouis Boisdore, numbered four, in report numbered three, shall not beconfirmed to more than twelve hundred and eighty acres: and all theconfirmations of the said incomplete titles and grants of donations, herebyprovided to be made, shall amount only to a relinquishment for ever, onthe part of the United States , of any claim whatever to the tract of landso confirmed or granted without prejudice to the interests of thirdpersons.

Sec. 2. And be it further enacted, That every person, or his or herlegal representatives, whose claim is embraced by the said register andreceiver in their reports numbers five, six, and seven, of actual settlers, ortheir legal representatives, not having any written evidence of claim, shall,where it appears by the said reports that the land claimed or settled onhad been actually inhabited and cultivated by such person or persons, inwhose right the same is claimed, on or before the fifteenth day of April,one thousand eight hundred and thirteen, be entitled to a grant for theland so claimed or settled on, as a donation: Provided, That not morethan one tract shall be granted to any one person, and the same shallnot exceed six hundred and forty acres, to include his or her improve-ments, and to be bounded by sectional or divisional lines; and that nolands shall be thus granted which are claimed or recognised by the pre-ceding section.

Sec. 3. And be it further enacted, That every person, or his or herlegal representatives, comprised in the aforesaid reports of actual settlers,not having any written evidence of claim, who, on the third day of March,one thousand eight hundred and nineteen, did, as appears by thosereports, actually inhabit and cultivate a tract of land in the said district,not claimed under any written evidence of title legally derived from theFrench, British, or Spanish , governments, or granted as a donation, shallbe entitled to become the purchaser of the quarter section, or two eighthsof any section, on which the improvements may be, and including thesame, at the same price for which other public lands are sold at private