OCR Text |
Show MILITARY BOUNTY LAND POLICIES 277 Population 1850 Illinois____________________851,470 Wisconsin_________________305,391 Iowa_____________________192,214 Minnesota_________________ 6,077 Missouri_________.________682,044 California_________________ 92,597 Arkansas__________________209,897 Texas_____________________212,592 U.S. Immigration 1840 1845 1850 1851 1852 1853 1854 84,066 114,371 369,980 379,466 371,603 368,645 427,833 1855 1856 1857 1358 1859 1860 1860 1,711,951 775,881 674,913 172,023 1,182,012 379,994 435,450 604,215 200,877 200,436 251,306 123,126 121,282 153,640 When the first of the bounty acts was passed in 1847 there were only 792 miles of railroad in all the public land states. This mileage grew to 5,403 by 1855 and to 13,467 by 1860. Congress contributed to this rapid economic growth by making liberal land grants to aid in the construction of canals and railroads. By means of these grants a series of canals connecting Lake Erie and Lake Michigan with the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers was carried to completion and the north-south Illinois Central Railroad, extending from Chicago and Galena to Cairo, and the east-west Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad, extending from the Mississippi to the Missouri River, were constructed. These with numerous other railroads, brought a considerable part of the Old Northwest and Missouri and Iowa much closer to eastern ports and markets. The extension of the railroads and canals and the prosperity which the world demand for wheat brought to the farm created a demand for land more solidly based on the needs of people intending to improve it than had been the case in the middle thirties. Land entries in the fifties with cash, scrip, and warrants rose to 92,030,719 acres as compared with 62,026,123 acres in the thirties and 17,536,951 in the forties. Most of these land entries were made with military bounty warrants or were for gradu Public Land Sales and Military Warrant Entries in Acres Military Warrant Year Sales at $1.25 Graduation Sales Entries 1847 2,521,306 239,880 1848 1,887,553 2,288,960 1849 1,329,903 3,405,520 1850 1,405,839 2,167,680 1851 1,846,847 2,454,000 1852 1,553,071 3,201,314 1853 1,083,495 6,142,360 1854 7,035,735 3,402,620 1855 7,011,049 8,720,373 1,395,580 1856 5,231,084 3,997,293 8,382,480 1857 1,622,729 2,530,014 6,283,920 1858 817,528 5,802,150 2,987,378 1859 511,476 3,450,103 2,914,700 1860 €01,158 2,860,044 2,782,780 1861 380,526 1,085,372 2,017,440 1862 68,816 76,032 611,827 Totals 1855-62 16,274,366 25,706,609 30,140,877 |