This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/DiB.2ACI/215 Message Board Post: The book TENNESSEE WILLS AND ADMINISTRATIONS lists all wills on record in Tennessee for the years 1779-1861. There was a fire in the Sevier County courthouse in 1856. The earliest surviving will in the county is dated 1849. The introduction to the book shows that while it lists the wills for Sevier County, it does not include items such as Sevier County estate records or estate inventories. If there was no dispute over the estate, then the county court would have been the most likely to rule on an estate; if there was a dispute over the property, then the chancery court would have ruled on it. The fire at the Sevier County courthouse destroyed county court minutes before 1856. The fire destroyed the chancery court minutes prior to 1854.