                 [=* TOWN RECORDS and BOOKS do HAVE ERRORS *=]

         Lila C. Hubbard Historical Genealogist and Research Historian

      The individual  that coined the phrase,  "It 'taint necessarily so.",
      must  have been a frustrated genealogist!  Information found in  both
      primary and secondary sources has errors!

      As an example, recently researching the John Hall family of Walling-
      ford, CT, for an ancestor by the name of David Hall this misinforma-
      tion came to light:

      According  to  three different books  David Hall married  Alice Hale,
      Allis  Case and Alice Bate,  yet two  showed   he only married  once!
      Two  of them listed nine children but each list the child born on the
      5th of December 1736 differently. One says it was Bate a male and the
      other stated that it was Kate a female.

      His  wife  most obviously was an Alice  and all three  surnames  have
      four letters and end in an e. In the writing of the colonial era an H
      and  a B could easily be confused as could both an l and t.  However,
      Case doesn't bear phonetic or letter formation likeness to either  of
      the other two surnames. So whom did David marry?

      Of  course, many surnames were not included in publications  but  the
      three  books (eight volumes) Families of Ancient New Haven by  Donald
      Lines Jacobus covers a multitude of surnames.  So here we shall  com-
      mence our research with the surnames:  Hale, Case, and Bate. The HALE
      Family  is listed on pages 692 and 693 but there is no Alice  listed.
      The Halls of New England,  written in 1893, by the Rev. David B. Hall
      on page 99 is the book which named her as a Hale.

      Research  once again returns to Jacobus' volumes but page  388  jumps
      from  Carter  to Castle;  alas no CASE!  Perhaps we should check  the
      cross-index in volume VIII, there is an Anna listed on page 25 but no
      Alice in any volume! A small monograph. written in 1902, titled "John
      Hall of Wallingford,  Conn., written by James Shephard, does indicate
      on page 52 that David married Allis Case.

      Jacobus  does  list  a variation of Bate, BATES, on  page  147  under
      Miscellaneous  and Alice married David Hall.  Perhaps a minor victory
      but the question still remains: Whom did he really marry?

      David could possibly have been involved in the French and Indian Wars
      thus war service records are the next item to research. At last we've
      struck pay dirt - a David Hall was a Company Clerk in Captain  Street
      Hall's  NY Regiment in 1755.  Indeed he did have an Alice Bate listed
      as his wife and had nine children, but no individual names mentioned.

      The question still remains did they have a Kate or a Bate?  The  same
      war  service records solved this mystery with ease.  A Bate Hall born
      in 1736,  son of David and Alice (Bate) Hall was in the same regiment
      as his father.

      If this research could have been done directly from the Vital Statis-
      tics of Wallingford, CT it would not have been a genealogical mystery
      in  the  first  place as some of the needed information is  in  their
      records.  Jacobus did give the marriage date of David and Alice  from
      this source.

      Handwriting,  clerical  error and carelessness can cause mistakes  in
      primary records,  too.   One individual was baptized before his birth
      and  another  was  given the wrong father.  Both errors that  can  be
      corrected by researching and comparing information!

                CAREFUL RESEARCH IS THE KEY TO ACCURATE GENEALOGY!

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