Alabama Land Surveyor’s Plats
There are a few steps to searching and accessing these original records, but it is a wonderful resource for Alabama land records.
You may search by Township and will need to include the number and whether it is north or south of the baseline (eg. 1S or 1N). If you do not include north or south you will not get any results. It is possible to search with just the township, but a search with just the range number returns no results.
The results are given 12 to a page with no indication of how many results or pages of results your search returned. You must click through one page at a time.
The results are presented in tabular form with the headings, Select, Meridian, Township, Range, Section, Volume, Page.
In the “Select” column is a small blue asterisk – click that when you have located the land patent you wish to see.
The next step is the disclaimer page – these images are for personal use and cannot be used as evidence in a court of law.
If you accept and check the box, you can select “view image” but there is still another page between you and the land patent.
This page tells you how many pages your record is, how large the document is and an estimate of the download time. If you click continue, your record will pop up in a new window.
Once you have your record, you may wish to check the surveyor’s field notes for the specific tract of land. The volume and page numbers you will need are on the plat, usually along the top edge of the map.
The patent records here are available in PDF format, so make sure you have the free Acrobat Reader installed before you start.