Evidence! Citation & Analysis for the Family Historian by Elizabeth Shown Mills (Baltimore: Genealogical Pub. Co., 1997) has something interesting to say on this topic: "Lew Wallace, famed as a Civil War general and author of Ben Hur, was a lackadaisical fifteen-year-old school dropout - and son of the state governor - when he was appointed assistant clerk of Marion County, Indiana. His assignment: copying deeds and judgments at ten cents per hundred words. Meticulously recorded documents from that time and place should not be expected (p. 53)." So, deeds in the bound volumes could not possibly contain the original signatures. However, there was a mechanical device (sorry, the name of this instrument escapes me) that allowed clerks to trace a signature with a stylus while duplicating the signature on another sheet of paper. I would estimate that only a small percentage of clerks would have had this equipment, but in those cases, an accurate representation of a person's penmanship would have been reproduced. By the same token, mistakes are possible every time a human being picks up a pen. Ms. Mills' book takes a very practical approach to analyzing evidence, and sets down some good rules for citation. It sells for around $16.95, and can be purchased from several genealogical book sources on the web. Brian Brian D. Core P.O. Box 1166 Brighton, CO 80601 [email protected] Web Page: http://pages.prodigy.net/greenhouseguy For attachments, use: [email protected] ________________________________________________________________ GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/web/.

At 10:09 PM 08/25/2002 -0600, you wrote: >"Lew Wallace, famed as a Civil War general and author of Ben Hur, was a >lackadaisical fifteen-year-old school dropout - and son of the state >governor - when he was appointed assistant clerk of Marion County, >Indiana. His assignment: copying deeds and judgments at ten cents per >hundred words. Meticulously recorded documents from that time and place >should not be expected (p. 53)." Funny you should mention Marion Co. Indiana. (g) I was at Ancestry's message boards t'other night and did a search for Greitzner (one of my troubling lines). Imagine my surprise when an 1853 marriage in Marion Co. IN popped up for John! I'd love to know if the record actually says Greitzner and if it does what other info is there. Only Greitzner entry on the 1850 is John in Hardy co WV who is aleady married and remains so until his death in 1876 in Romney. Cheryl *_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_* Cheryl Singhal ([email protected]) http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~cpafug/ http://www.rootsweb.com/~wvhampsh/ http://www.fortunecity.com/millennium/blyton/772/ (Bottony Cross DAR) http://www.rootsweb.com/~cresap/ http://members.fortunecity.com/csinghal1/ (Joanna Waddill UDC)