The petition printed below documents John Jay’s unsuccessful attempt to speculate in land in the disputed “Hampshire Grants” in what became the state of Vermont. Confusion over land titles in this area arose from a boundary dispute between New Hampshire and New York and was compounded by the eagerness of royal officials in the two provinces to grant patents, by which they earned fees and strengthened their colony’s claim to the lands. While the boundary dispute was under adjudication by the Crown, New Hampshire’s governor, Benning Wentworth,1 made grants of 3 million acres in the disputed area. After the Crown awarded jurisdiction over Vermont to New York in 1764, the latter’s governors made almost equally generous grants, as well as issuing “confirmatory patents” to settlers who had held title from New Hampshire. Each of the governors and the lieutenant governor who administered New York’s affairs in the period 1767–75 interpreted this order differently.2 The most generous interpretation was made by John Murray, Earl of Dunmore, during his tenure as governor, October 1770–July 1771. Although Dunmore’s instructions on land policy were more restrictive than those given to his predecessors, he issued grants for 450,000 acres during his nine-month regime.3

Early in 1771, John Jay and a group of other New Yorkers, including James Duane and Egbert Benson, were granted the patent of “Socialborough” in the modern towns of Pittsford and Rutland, Vermont;4 Jay probably expected equal success with his petition of 12 June. However, this petition was not submitted until the last month of Dunmore’s governorship, and as the endorsement shows, consideration of the petition was delayed when the council demanded a map of the grant sought by Jay and his unidentified associates.5 Governor William Tryon,6 who assumed office from Dunmore on 9 July 1771, less than four weeks after the council read Jay’s petition, reversed his predecessor’s policy of issuing grants in the Vermont area and ceased making grants altogether in the autumn of 1772.7 Thus it is not surprising that the Land Office records of provincial New York do not record a grant in the town of Eugene to John Jay.8