Deed Book Wonky-ness

A recent failed search to find a deed record online in a particular record set supposedly imaged at FamilySearch (but apparently not) led me to contact the county register of deeds. An incredibly helpful individual there not only found the deed record, but also sent me images. The originals, it seems are housed elsewhere, but the county office had a book of "certified" transcriptions – or at least, transcriptions held in the register's office – duly copied into another volume using the exact same pagination. At the head of the transcription, it reads, "Transcribed from book B pages 197 & 8." So, in the spirit of a citation showing exactly what I'm looking at:

Benton County, Tennessee, Deed Book B : 197–8 (certified transcription), Wm Pearce to James K Nance, 16 November 1840; Register of Deeds, Camden; image, Pearce Family Papers, privately held by XXXX YYYYY, [ADDRESS WITHHELD FOR PRIVACY,] Town, State, 2022. The original deed book is housed at the Benton County Archives, Camden.

Submitted byEEon Fri, 05/20/2022 - 20:01

V P Stroeher, books such as those you describe are fairly common. Records deteriorate and conscientious clerks of the past have tried to preserve their information. Also, the WPA in the twentieth century adopted projects of this type—especially in Tennessee where they are typically typescripts rather than manuscript volumes. You did not indicate whether your "transcription" was a manuscript or a WPA typescript, so I'm treating it here as a manuscript volume that represents a "recopying" of a damaged original.

Evidence wise, I would certainly try to access the original volume. Assurances of a "faithful transcription" are no better than the care and skill of the individual who made the transcription. Some who were given these jobs did well. Others didn't.

Citation-wise, we might consider a couple of points:

  • If I had read your draft citation without your initial explanations, when I saw the phrase "(certified transcription)" after the page number, I would have assumed that someone had transcribed that individual record for you. It would not have occurred to me that you meant the whole volume had been transcribed.
  • Layer-wise, or punctuation-wise, there’s a lot going on that will leave most users of your citation confused.

A basic citation to a courthouse record book (QuickStart Guide > The Basics: Manuscripts & Online > Courthouse Record) is this

                Jurisdiction/Creator, “Title of Volume,” page, specific item; Agency, City where located.

An archived record uses that semicolon to indicate “layers” in the citation. With this simple citation, there are just two layers.   Layer 1 identifies the record book. Layer 2 identifies where the record book is located. A semicolon is used to separate those two layers because each has internal commas.

Any time we use punctuation in a citation, they follow the same rules as in regular writing. 

  • Items in a series are separated by commas, but each item in that series has to be in parallel form and sense.
  • When one or more item in a series has internal commas (a series inside a series), then semi-colons are used to separate each of the larger series.

In this case, you have three items in a series, separated by semicolons, but the third item sends us veering off onto a track. In other words, your citation tells us

I've used book, page, specific item; which is in the Register of Deeds Office, Camden; which is in Pearce Family Papers ...

Hunh? The Register of Deeds Office in Camden is in Pearce Family Papers?

What you are trying to do here, of course, is to say that you have a copy in your own files. But, then, you don't have a copy of the whole register. You have just an image of a couple of pages.

EE has numerous examples for privately held materials, starting with the QuickCheck Model on p. 105. Analyzing that, we see

Item ABC, which is in Scrapbook XYZ; which is in Private Collection, which is located in City, State.

Again, items in a series with internal commas and each series is parallel in form and sense. All are headed in the same direction, from small to large. That’s standard for all archived material in private or public possession, even when there are half-dozen items in the series, as with materials at, say, a National Archives.

Again, the QuickCheck Model on p. 107 (a published Bible in private hands) follows the same pattern.  The basic book is cited in standard form in layer 1, then the location of the Bible is in Layer 2.

Author, Title (Publication data), specific item; which is in Private Collection, which is located in City, State.

Now look back at your citation. It starts off following appropriate format, citing the courthouse register, then saying where the register is found. It’s the“added-on” citation to yourself and your private holdings that it complicating the citation.

So, why cite yourself?

EE discusses “recopied registers” at 7.30. The example is a church book, but the same principle holds for a courthouse book. Adapting it to your problem would give us this:

Benton County, Tennessee, Deed Book B (recopied): 197–8, Wm Pearce to James K Nance, 16 November 1840; Register of Deeds, Camden. According to the county clerk, the original deed book is housed at the Benton County Archives, Camden.

I might add that if the "transcription" you are referencing is a typescript, then parenthetical description "recopied" might be changed to "typescript" for clarity.

 

 

EE, 

Thank you for such a detailed answer. That makes perfect sense! I completely overthought this citation in some aspects and "under" thought it in others. I was indeed trying to show that I was using a copy that I had (now) in private papers while showing the creator and provenance, including reliability issues. What differences vocabulary and placement of a single word (recopied) make! I now get the importance of "recopied" vs. "transcription" vs. "typescript" (and I'll be revisiting a few citations of typescript marriage records from Georgia....have a chat with 7.3 now.......).

As soon as I hit "Save" on the above, I realized that "certified transcript" was going to be raise red flags because of differences in official, certified deed records and unofficial ones we might obtain for the purposes of genealogy.

The book housed in the Register of Deed's office is handwritten (a manuscript), so "recopied" is the apt description here. Getting to Camden to the archives to see the original is on my ever-growing list, but the new and improved citation is a good placeholder for the time being. So, my thanks!

EE, 

Thank you for such a detailed answer. That makes perfect sense! I completely overthought this citation in some aspects and "under" thought it in others. I was indeed trying to show that I was using a copy that I had (now) in private papers while showing the creator and provenance, including reliability issues. What differences vocabulary and placement of a single word (recopied) make! I now get the importance of "recopied" vs. "transcription" vs. "typescript" (and I'll be revisiting a few citations of typescript marriage records from Georgia....have a chat with 7.3 now.......).

As soon as I hit "Save" on the above, I realized that "certified transcript" was going to be raise red flags because of differences in official, certified deed records and unofficial ones we might obtain for the purposes of genealogy.

The book housed in the Register of Deed's office is handwritten (a manuscript), so "recopied" is the apt description here. Getting to Camden to the archives to see the original is on my ever-growing list, but the new and improved citation is a good placeholder for the time being. So, my thanks!