Claim Jumping

A matter which troubled us all for by this time I considered myself on a footing with any man in either town because of being Mr. Middleton's partner was the jumping of claims.

I have already tried to define what I mean by this term, and I will again strive to make the matter clear. When a man goes into a new country he stakes out his claim, that is to say, he locates himself upon land which no one owns, and drives down his stakes to mark out a farm, or a town lot, as the case may be.

After this has been done, he waits until the people have formed a government of some kind, and when land offices have been opened he "makes an entry," that is to say, he reports to the officials in the land office the boundary lines of his claim.

Until a claim has been properly recorded, the would-be owner must live on the land in order to hold possession, or at least that was the unwritten law in the country where we then were.

It often happens that a man, having entered a claim and put up a shanty to shelter him from the weather, goes off on business and leaves his claim unguarded for a time, as those people did who first laid out the settlement of the town then called St. Charles, but which is now known as Denver.

When the rightful owner is gone other men come, and, finding the shanty abandoned, even though it be for only a short time, settle down there, and this act is called "jumping "the claim. When the one who had originally laid out the boundary lines comes back, he finds others in possession, whereupon much trouble ensues.