Thought I'd share this information about the online Illinois Statewide Marriage Index, 17631900 accuracy. While this database has been a terrific aid in researching my Union County ancestors, this is yet one more reminder for me to document, document, document.... Calloway County, KY records show that John Bittle and Hanna Kits were married in Calloway County KY on 25 May 1826. When looking for Bittle marriages in the Illinois online database, I came across an entry for the marriage of John Bittle and Hannah Kitts. Surprised to see any Illinois marriage listed for them, I sent an email in hopes of finding out the source of this entry. Here is the reply I received. The statewide marriage index was the first Archives-sponsored database in which the data was entered by volunteers and managed by State Archives staff. In those early days marriages were entered from several sources, including publications listing Illinois marriages. Some of these published sources have proven to be unreliable or to contain data that was not documented. Some of the Union County marriages in our database were taken from "Marriages of Union County 1818-1880" compiled by Ernest Harding Jackson and published by Heritage House of Thomson, Illinois. In that volume Mr. Jackson indicates that several hundred marriages were included that "took place somewhere else"--meaning other than Union County. These were included because they were "important families in the county." Mr. Jackson further indicated that the source for most of these marriages was William Henry Perrin's "History of Alexander, Union and Pulaski Counties." A few marriages were based on "correspondence and census records." The Bittle-Kitts marriage, which occurred in Kentucky, is no doubt one of the marriages which Mr. Jackson found in one of his other sources. Our criteria for selecting sources for our marriage data have changed over the years, and we no longer use sources for which there is inadequate documentation. We try to avoid any marriage data that does not come from an official record which can be cited. The fact that such marriage data is in our database is regrettable, but it would be difficult and in some cases impossible to identify these records in our database. Currently, we do not have the capability of modifying data entered before a certain time. As problems appear, we are attempting to identify the weaknesses and quirks in the sources that were used to create the database. That way we can explain the problems even though we cannot currently remedy them. Your information certainly adds to our list of quirks and errors in the database. Thanks for pointing out the true source of this marriage. Sincerely, Karl Moore Illinois State Archives