Page:The History of Oregon Bancroft 1888.djvu/299

Rh reported in favor of the mission's right to the land so far only as to amend the bill so as to enable all the adverse claimants to assert their rights before the courts; and recommended that in order to bring the matter into the courts, a patent should be issued to the mission, with an amendment saving the rights of adverse claimants and of the United States to any buildings or fixtures on the land.

After long delays the title was finally settled in November 1874 by the issuance of a patent to Abel G. Tripp, mayor of Vancouver, in trust for the several use and benefit of the inhabitants according to their respective interests. Under an act of the legislature the mayor then proceeded to convey to the occupants of lots and blocks the land in their possession, according to the congressional law before adverted to in reference to town sites.

That a number of land cases should grow out of misunderstandings and misconstructions of the land law was inevitable. Among the more important of the unsettled titles was that to the site of Portland. The reader already knows that in 1843 Overton claimed on the west bank of the Willamette 640 acres, of which soon after he sold half to Lovejoy, and in 1845 the other half to Pettygrove; and that these two jointly improved the claim, laying it off into lots and blocks, some of which they sold to other settlers in the town, who in their turn made improvements.

In 1845, also, Lovejoy sold his half of the claim to Benjamin Stark, who came to Portland this year as supercargo of a vessel, Pettygrove and Stark continuing to hold it together, and to sell lots. In 1848 Pettygrove, Stark being absent, sold his remaining interest to Daniel H. Lownsdale. The land being