Regarding the first part of your question about Lincoln County records, Lincoln was created in 1779 out of Tryon County. In 1811, you should not be needing to worry about the confusion that once occurred about the NC/SC border. I believe that was settled long before 1811. Lincoln did originally border SC, before Gaston County was created. But I believe most of the land grant confusion occurred in the 1700's. As you move back in time, you may need to keep that in mind. Brent Holcomb published a book on those land grants, if you need to track it down at some point. Other counties were created out of Lincoln later on, so you may have to go to a different set of county records after those dates, when you are working forward in time and not backwards. For example: Cleveland County was created out of part of Rutherford and part of Lincoln in 1841. Catawba County was created out of Lincoln in 1842. Gaston County was created out of Lincoln in 1846. I would suggest that you bookmark this site for future reference. It is very helpful in keeping track of counties in NC. It has a list, and it also has illustrations at certain periods of time. _http://www.rootsweb.com/~nccatawb/countyfm.htm_ (http://www.rootsweb.com/~nccatawb/countyfm.htm) Surry gave up land to other counties, too, including Wilkes in 1777 (part of Wilkes came from the District of Washington), Stokes in 1789, and Yadkin in 1850. Katherine **************The year's hottest artists on the red carpet at the Grammy Awards. Go to AOL Music. (http://music.aol.com/grammys?NCID=aolcmp00300000002565)