Hi, all, Here is an address to help deciphering old handwriting. www.firstct.com/fv/oldhand.html And below is a way to figure the birthdate of a person from information on the tombstone, etc. (I copied this from another list.) Faith Hutchings This is a calculation I recently printed in my newsletter, Tomb With A View, about how to figure out the death of someone when the gravestone shows the death date and length of life, but no birth date: Example using the 8879 formula: Death date is Feb. 10, 1885 and the person was 27 years, 4 months, 15 days old when they died. Died 18850210 (1885, 02, 10) subtract the Age at death - 270415 (27y., 4m., 15d.) __________ equals 18579795 minus the formula - 8870 ___________ Birth date 18570925 (Sept. 25, 1857) Try it out! It really works!!!!