Many distinguished soldiers had been rewarded by successive warrants for unoccupied land, which they entered wherever they chose, until they could claim thousands upon thousands of acres.

[Footnote: Thus Col.Wm.Christian, for his services in Braddock's and Dunmore's wars and against the Cherokees, received many warrants; he visited Kentucky to enter them, 9,000 acres in all.

See "Life of Caleb Wallace," by Wm.

H.Whitsitt, Louisville, 1888.] Sometimes they sold these warrants to outsiders; but whether they remained in the hands of the original holders or not, they served as a great stimulus to the westward movement, and drew many of the representatives of the wealthiest and most influential families in the parent States to the lands on the farther side of the mountains.
At the close of the Revolution, however, the men from the sea-coast region formed but an insignificant portion of the western pioneers.

The country beyond the Alleghanies was first won and settled by the backwoodsmen themselves, acting under their own leaders, obeying their own desires, and following their own methods.