O. Henry's 1900 story, "Georgia's Ruling", http://classiclit.about.com/library/bl-etexts/ohenry/bl-ohenry-georgia.htm describes a dire social problem related to the USA land laws and the "land sharks":

> When the state was young, she felt the need of attract- ing newcomers,
> and of rewarding those pioneers already within her borders. Year after
> year she issued land scrip -- Headrights, Bounties, Veteran Donations,
> Confeder- ates; and to railroads, irrigation companies, colonies, and
> tillers of the soil galore. All required of the grantee was that he or
> it should have the scrip properly surveyed upon the public domain by
> the county or district surveyor, and the land thus appropriated became
> the property of him or it, or his or its heirs and assigns, forever.
> 
> In those days -- and here is where the trouble began - the state's
> domain was practically inexhaustible, and the old surveyors, with
> princely -- yea, even Western American -- liberality, gave good
> measure and over- flowing. Often the jovial man of metes and bounds
> would dispense altogether with the tripod and chain. Mounted on a pony
> that could cover something near a "vara" at a step, with a pocket
> compass to direct his course, he would trot out a survey by counting
> the beat of his pony's hoofs, mark his corners, and write out his
> field notes with the complacency produced by an act of duty well
> performed. Sometimes -- and who could blame the surveyor? -- when the
> pony was "feeling his oats," he might step a little higher and
> farther, and in that case the beneficiary of the scrip might get a
> thousand or two more acres in his survey than the scrip called for.
> But look at the boundless leagues the state had to spare! However, no
> one ever had to complain of the pony under- stepping. Nearly every old
> survey in the state con- tained an excess of land.
> 
> In later years, when the state became more populous, and land values
> increased, this careless work entailed incalculable trouble, endless
> litigation, a period of riotous land-grabbing, and no little
> bloodshed. The land- sharks voraciously attacked these excesses in the
> old surveys, and filed upon such portions with new scrip as
> unappropriated public domain. Wherever the identi- fications of the
> old tracts were vague, and the corners were not to be clearly
> established, the Land Office would recognize the newer locations as
> valid, and issue title to the locators. Here was the greatest hardship
> to be found. These old surveys, taken from the pick of the land, were
> already nearly all occupied by unsuspecting and peaceful settlers, and
> thus their titles were demolished, and the choice was placed before
> them either to buy their land over at a double price or to vacate it,
> with their families and personal belongings, immediately. Land
> locators sprang up by hundreds. The country was held up and searched
> for "vacancies" at the point of a compass. Hundreds of thousands of
> dollars' worth of splendid acres were wrested from their innocent
> purchasers and holders. There began a vast hegira of evicted settlers
> in tattered wagons; going nowhere, cursing injustice, stunned,
> purposeless, homeless, hopeless. Their children began to look up to
> them for bread, and cry.

Does this actually describe the historic reality?

On one hand, it is known that O. Henry worked as a draftsman in the general land office in Texas, so he probable had profound knowledge about the USA land laws.

On the other hand, the situation he describes is so absurd, that I find it hard to believe it really existed. 

Any information on this subject will be appreciated!