DIFFERENT LAND CLAIMS. 123 



and others The whole company were slain by the Indians, 

 except Boon, who returned to North Carolina in 1771. Eight 

 years afterwards, Boon, accompanied by his family and forty 

 men, from Powel's valley in North Carolina, traversed the wil- 

 derness and finally settled on Kentucky river, at a place which 

 they named Boonsborough. 



Immediately after the declaration of Independence, Con- 

 necticut set up a claim, to what is now New Connecticut, in 

 common parlance ; that is, the north part of Ohio, above latitude 

 41° north. Virginia claimed Ohio below that line, as being with- 

 in the limiis of her charter. The United States claimed all 

 the territory within our limits, as having been conquered by 

 common exertions and common treasure, which congress wan- 

 ted with which to pay off the national debt. In the mean- 

 time, Virginia passed an act, forbidding any one to settle on 

 this territory, until this dispute should be settled. Congress 

 contended that all the territory which belonged to the Briti.^h 

 crown, had passed of right into the possession of the whole na- 

 tion, as a sovereign. Virginia contended, that to deprive any 

 one state of any portion of its territory, was to dissolve the 

 whole Union. Having thus had the best of the argument, with 

 true Virginia liberality, she consented to give away, the whole 

 sovereignty to the nation, of all the lands which lay northwest 

 of Ohio river, on condition, that Virginia should retain the 

 right of soil of all the country between the Scioto and Little 

 Miami rivers. With this land, Virginia intended to reward 

 her soldiers of the revolutionary war. But Virginia requir- 

 ed other states to do the same, by their soldiers. This sub- 

 ject at that day, greatly agitated the public mind, but, 

 finally Virginia by a formal deed, relinquished all her right 

 and title, to all the country northwest of the Ohio river, ex- 

 cept as before excepted. Thus congress became the peacea- 

 ble owner of all this vast region of country. 



Congress had an eye, to this country, as a fund with which, 

 to discharge the national debt of gratitude to our able defend- 

 ers, in the war of the revolution ; to those who were the na- 

 tional creditors, for money borrowed of them, or others claim- 



