During and after the American Revolution, many people in the American colonies remained loyal to the Crown. Unhappy in the U.S., many opted to immigrate to other parts of the British Empire. Over 70,000 American loyalists left the country, with nearly 50,000 moving into Quebec.
According to United Empire Loyalists' Association of Canada, the settlers first lived in refugee camps. They waited out the hardships until lands petitioned from the colonial government were granted for resettlement. Many of the loyalists settled in the lands along the St. Lawrence River and Lake Erie in what today is Ontario.
In the 1800s, the Canadian government had great desire to settle the Western frontier and establish railways into the West. By 1872, the government had purchased the lands belonging to the Hudson's Bay Company and founded the Province of Manitoba. To attract settlers to open up the country and make possible the building of railways, the government began advertising grants of free land in the West.
Under the Dominion Lands Policy, the western prairie lands were surveyed and divided into townships. According to the Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan, free homesteads of 160 acres were granted to farmers on the condition that they clear ten acres and build a house within three years of registering their intent to settle.
Preemption offered a way to acquire vacant Crown lands from the 1850s up until 1970, when the law was amended to end the practice. You could preempt Crown lands without living on them but they had to be under cultivation.
According to the Royal British Columbia Museum, both companies and individuals could preempt land. The preemptor would stake out a parcel of undeveloped and unsurveyed land owned by the Crown and file a written application for title to the land. After meeting residency and improvement requirements, the preemptor received a Crown Grant. Registering the grant with the Land Title Office resulted in issuance of title to the land.
