John Robinson obtained a 100,000 acre grant on the Greenbrier River in 1745, one year after the Treaty of Lancaster was signed. After the Ohio Company obtained its 500,000 acre grant, he partnered with nine other investors and petitioned King George II for a larger chunk of western land.1
The members of the Loyal Land Company were given 800,000 acres of land in Southwestern Virginia in 1749. That grant reflected the influence of the Virginia gentry in converting the land resources of the colony into private gain. The Ohio Company and the Loyal Land Company were competitors. The Loyal Land Company was composed of gentry who were from younger families located outside of the Northern Neck.
Other large grants west of the Blue Ridge, such as the Van Meter and Hite grants dating back to 1730 and 1731, had to meet Governor Gooch's formula of settling one family for each 1,000 acres that would be patented. In contrast, the Loyal Land Company did not have to recruit a single settler in order to obtain rights to its acreage.2
The Loyal Land Company was required to survey the tracts that it wanted to patent in just four years:3
Thomas Walker, one of the members of the company, took the lead in exploring the territory targeted by the company - Kentucky. The Ohio Company sent Christopher Gist to explore land in the northwestern part of the colony, near the start of the Ohio River. In the process, Walker discovered an easy path through the Appalachian Mountains into the rich soil of Kentucky - Cumberland Gap.
The French and Indian War, followed by the Proclamation of 1763, blocked sale of lands in the Mississippi River watershed. Like the other land speculators ad even veterans of the French and Indian War, the investors in the Loyal Land Company were unable to get clear title to lands west of the Proclamation Line of 1763:4