[=* TOWN RECORDS and BOOKS do HAVE ERRORS *=] Lila C. Hubbard Historical Genealogist and Research Historian The individual that coined the phrase, "It 'taint necessarily so.", must have been a frustrated genealogist! Information found in both primary and secondary sources has errors! As an example, recently researching the John Hall family of Walling- ford, CT, for an ancestor by the name of David Hall this misinforma- tion came to light: According to three different books David Hall married Alice Hale, Allis Case and Alice Bate, yet two showed he only married once! Two of them listed nine children but each list the child born on the 5th of December 1736 differently. One says it was Bate a male and the other stated that it was Kate a female. His wife most obviously was an Alice and all three surnames have four letters and end in an e. In the writing of the colonial era an H and a B could easily be confused as could both an l and t. However, Case doesn't bear phonetic or letter formation likeness to either of the other two surnames. So whom did David marry? Of course, many surnames were not included in publications but the three books (eight volumes) Families of Ancient New Haven by Donald Lines Jacobus covers a multitude of surnames. So here we shall com- mence our research with the surnames: Hale, Case, and Bate. The HALE Family is listed on pages 692 and 693 but there is no Alice listed. The Halls of New England, written in 1893, by the Rev. David B. Hall on page 99 is the book which named her as a Hale. Research once again returns to Jacobus' volumes but page 388 jumps from Carter to Castle; alas no CASE! Perhaps we should check the cross-index in volume VIII, there is an Anna listed on page 25 but no Alice in any volume! A small monograph. written in 1902, titled "John Hall of Wallingford, Conn., written by James Shephard, does indicate on page 52 that David married Allis Case. Jacobus does list a variation of Bate, BATES, on page 147 under Miscellaneous and Alice married David Hall. Perhaps a minor victory but the question still remains: Whom did he really marry? David could possibly have been involved in the French and Indian Wars thus war service records are the next item to research. At last we've struck pay dirt - a David Hall was a Company Clerk in Captain Street Hall's NY Regiment in 1755. Indeed he did have an Alice Bate listed as his wife and had nine children, but no individual names mentioned. The question still remains did they have a Kate or a Bate? The same war service records solved this mystery with ease. A Bate Hall born in 1736, son of David and Alice (Bate) Hall was in the same regiment as his father. If this research could have been done directly from the Vital Statis- tics of Wallingford, CT it would not have been a genealogical mystery in the first place as some of the needed information is in their records. Jacobus did give the marriage date of David and Alice from this source. Handwriting, clerical error and carelessness can cause mistakes in primary records, too. One individual was baptized before his birth and another was given the wrong father. Both errors that can be corrected by researching and comparing information! CAREFUL RESEARCH IS THE KEY TO ACCURATE GENEALOGY! *--------------------------------------*----------------------------* | ___ ___ __________ | ==> ONLINE 24 HRS <== | | /__/| /__/| /_________/| |A PC BULLETIN BOARD SERVICE| | |::| | |::| | |:::::::::| | |GENEALOGY--GENERAL COMPUTING| | |::| |__|::| | |::| |_|::| | *----------------------------* | |:::/ :::| | THE |::|/ |::| | | 1200/2400 BAUD | | |::::::::::| | |:::::::::|/ | C (714) - 849 - 1732 C | | |::| | |::| | |::| | | A A | | |::| | |::| | HOME |::| | PLACE | L 300/1200/2400 BAUD L | | |::|/ |::|/ |::|/ | L (714) - 849 - 8232 L | | *----------------------------* |--------------------------------------| P.O. Box 3261 | |INTER CHAT available BETWEEN two USERS| Beaumont, CA 92223 | *--------------------------------------*----------------------------*