Thomas Gilliland
One Land Warrant & Two Certificates 
Washington County, Georgia
1784

Source: Georgia Headright and Bounty Land Records, 1783-1909
Images of the original documents may be viewed at https://familysearch.org

Kate’s notes: Hugh, William and Thomas Gilliland are listed among those men who served as Georgia soldiers of the line during the Revolutionary War. What is curious about Thomas is that his name appeared on a 1774 petition from the Quaker colony at Wrightsboro, McDuffie County (created from Wilkes), repudiating the patriot uprising against British rule.
    At this site is an interesting history of the Wrightsborough Quaker community during the time of the Revolution: http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~wrightsborough/cox-2.htm  Within that research you will find that there were some members of the community who joined the region’s Whig militia under Col. Elijah Clarke. You will also find Col. Clarke’s name on not only land bounty documents related to Thomas but to William. There is nothing in William’s pension file that would indicate the nature of the Gilliland family’s relationship to the Wrightsboro Quaker community, whose initial core of settlers split from a larger community in North Carolina to settle in Georgia. For more background information, see:
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~gentutor/Wrights.pdf
    This file contains the records for one land warrant and two certificates issued to Thomas. All of these records were handwritten. Interpreting any handwritten document can be tricky so any portions in doubt have been indicated by brackets. I have not made any corrections for capitalization, punctuation or spelling.

First certificate dated February 1784, for 250 acres:

STATE OF GEORGIA.

This is to certify, That Thomas Gilliland hath stedfastly done his duty, from the time of passing an Act at Augusta, to wit, on the 20th of August, 1781, until the total expulsion of the British from this state; and the said Thomas Gilliland cannot, to my knowledge or belief, be convicted of plundering or distressing the country; and is therefore, under the said Act, entitled to a bounty of Two Hundred and Fifty Acres of good Land, free from taxes for ten years.

    Given under my hand, at Savannah the
    Second day of February 1784.

By his order.

H. Freeman                                Elijah Clarke, Col.

Second certificate dated April 1784, for 250 acres:

GEORGIA.                                                                                                              [No. 1125]
           THESE are to certify That Thomas Gilliland A Citizen is entitled to Two Hundred & fifty Acres of Land, as a Bounty, agreeable to an Act and Resolve of the General Assembly, passed at Augusta the 20 August 1781.
                                                   As per Certificate. E. Clark Col.
 Attest                                       GIVEN under my Hand, at Savannah, the
D Rees Secy                              25th Day of March
                                                   In the Year of our Lord One thousand Seven
                                                   Hundred and Eighty-four.
                                                                          [J Houstown]

On the reverse:

To the Honble the President & members of the Land Court at Augusta. Thos. Gilliland by his Son Wm. Gilliland prays your Hon.ble Bord[sic] to grant him a Warrant for 187 ½ Acres of Land on the within Certificate in Washington – and your Petitioner will pray
                                                                         Wm Gilliland
                                                                               for
                                                                         Thos Gilliland

Tho. Gilliland
Petn [abbreviated]
Granted
16th Apl. 1784
Entered.

Warrant for 287 ½ acres, dated May 1784:

To Joseph Pannill Surveyor for the County of Washington

You are hereby authorized and required to admeasure  and lay out, or cause to be admeasured and laid out, unto Thomas Gilliland a Tract of Land, which shall contain two Hundred and eighty seven & ½ Acres, in the said County of Washington

Taking especial Care that the same has not heretofore been laid out to any other Person or Persons: And you are hereby also directed and required to record the Plat of the same in your Office, and transmit a Copy thereof, together with this Warrant, to the Surveyor general, within the Term of three Months from this Date.

Given under my Hand, this fourteenth day of May 1784
Secretarys Office      }
Certified by                }                          John Habersham.
D Rees  Depy Secy    }                              [illegible]

On the reverse:

Warrt.
Thomas Gilliland
287 ½ Acres
Bounty
Washington County

713
Seven Hundred 
& thirteen
Executed
By Benj [paper damaged]

****************

-transcription by Kate Maynard, 2013