By Mary Alice Dell - Genealogical Society of Kendall County
Published: Saturday, October 17, 2009 3:53 PM CDT
One should be grateful for all deeds of kindness
that come their way. However, the good deeds the title refers to are not
that kind of deeds, but rather those recorded land documents that are
filled with genealogical information about your ancestors.
If your
experience with deeds is limited to those of the past 50 years you may
have dismissed those documents as being of little value to family
historians. Modern deeds rarely contain anything more than the land
description, names of the parties involved, the terms of agreement and all
the legal words necessary to protect both parties.
Not so the deeds
of most of our forefathers. Take for example the deed that settled the
estate of Edmund Smart in 1840, transferring several tracts of land in
Missouri, his slaves, stock and household goods to his son David at the
death of Edmund and his wife.
Apparently Edmund was not willing to
pay a lawyer to draw up a will, but instead enumerated his instructions as
to what David should do with the land after he died.
He
commissioned David to sell what he needed to pay his debts, support his
family, pay for the education of two named grandchildren, and to give his
four older children $1 each as they had already been provided
for.
He then instructed David to divide the remainder among the
four younger children, which included David. All the children were named
including the married names of the daughters.
Not all deeds are
going to reveal this kind of genealogical information, but it is common to
find family details that will forge links between generations. Gifts of
land from parents to their children, or betweens siblings are common.
Richard and Catey Willis sold land in Sumner County, Tenn., in 1806. The
deed stated the land had been given to Catey when the estate of her
father, William Brigance had been divided.
Now, having the name of
her father, it was also possible to locate the earlier deed which had
created the division of William’s land ordered by the court and to trace
William back in time.
INTESTATE SALES MAY BEAT WILLS
Wills
do not always name all the children of a person, as they may have been
provided for earlier by gifts of money. This is particularly true of
daughters. However, land sold to settle the estate of a deceased person
who dies intestate (without a will) will name all the heirs as they each
must sign the deed conveying the property of the
deceased.
Be sure to search deed books for these
transactions when an ancestor has died intestate. They may be indexed
under the name of one sibling and et al. This means “and
others.”
That is why it is important to check all deeds concerning
members of your family surname in a community. The land may not be sold or
divided for several years after the death of the intestate
person.
A sale by the sheriff is a clue that there may have been a
civil suit between heirs and may have a case number in the index or margin
of the deed. Court cases are full of genealogical information often
revealing birth and death dates and relationships.
Most men came to
America because there was the opportunity to own land. The expression
“dirt cheap” had real meaning then as land was either free (as an
enticement for settlers to come to an area) or easily affordable for most
immigrants within a few years of working for others.
Because
ownership was so highly prized, it was protected by the recording of deeds
from the time an area was opened for settlement.
If the courthouse
burned, one of the first actions taken was the re-recording of deeds by
landowners. The local governing body was eager to do this as they wanted a
record of ownership in order to levy taxes.
The first exchange of a
piece of land was from a governing body, whether it was a tract given by a
king to an English Lord and later dispersed by him, or granted by a
Colonial, federal or state government to an individual. These first
transfers of property were usually not recorded in the county deed books.
Early surveys may be however.
Later transfers of that land were by
deeds that described the land and spelled out the terms between the buyers
and sellers. The name of the original grantee (or patentee) was often
mentioned.
A document (called an Indenture) was written and signed
by both parties. In early periods, this was then taken to a session of
court and the signatures sworn to by a witness. Then it was copied into a
Deed Book by the County Clerk.
The new owner kept the deed. When he
sold the land he gave that deed to the next owner and signed a new deed
conveying the land to him. In later periods, the deed and a witness, or
the buyer and seller, appeared at the County Clerk’s office and requested
the deed be recorded and copied into the Deed Book. Witnesses were
frequently family members.
USE DEED INDICES
To find these
recorded deeds, one needs to look at the Index to Deeds. Each deed is
indexed twice, once in a seller’s index (called a Grantor or Direct Index)
and again in a buyer’s index (called a Grantee or Indirect
index).
Although there are slight variations from state to state,
most indexes are alphabetical by surname, in chronological order as they
are recorded. A deed may have been made between two parties (often a
father and son) and not recorded for many years after it was
made.
Sometimes genealogists are stumped when they can’t find out
what happened to an ancestor’s land. They may have stopped looking at the
Index shortly after the ancestor’s death, yet his final transaction may
have been recorded 20 years or more later.
If there are many
transactions by people of the same surname, they may be listed on family
surname pages rather than intermingled with other surnames. I did not find
any Bentleys listed in Pike County, Ky., with the other “B”s. Instead the
family transactions filled several pages under the Bentley
surname.
The index will give basic information such as the buyer
and seller’s names, sale and recording dates, and book and page number
where the deed was recorded. Don’t stop with the index! Look at every
deed.
The one with the interesting information may be the last one
of 10 deeds you have checked. Look at every deed of every member of that
surname - a deed of a great-great uncle may have the family information
for which you have been looking about a direct line ancestor.
Or
you may luck into one like this one of George and Delilah Newsome of
Lawrence County, Ky. George died shortly after 1923 when he and Delilah
wrote the deed (yes, a deed) transferring their land to their seven
children at the death of both of them. Delilah did not die until
1939.
On June 2, 1952, a Deed of Conveyance of the 70 acres on
Morgan Creek was drawn up between Ped Newsome, the youngest son, as
grantee and the other heirs of George and Deliah as grantors for a
consideration of $1. By 1959 when all the heirs had been located and all
agreed to sell their interest to Ped, signatures from three generations
were required to transfer the land.
The deed was signed by three of
the original children and one spouse, 15 grandchildren and their spouses,
and four great-grandchildren. The place of residence of each was listed
and literally was from coast to coast - Baltimore, Md., to Santa Clara,
Calif.
This lengthy document was not recorded until 1994 when Ped
sold the land, 71 years after George and Delilah had deeded their land to
their children.