"Why do some researchers show the marriage on one page number, another researcher shows a different page number?" is a frequent question about the early Talladega County, Alabama marriages.
Both Marriage Book A and Marriage Book A-1 are copies. They contain basically the same set of marriages. Whether they are copies of a copy, or copies of the original is unknown. There are no original signatures for these books, only the handwriting of the scribe. I'm assuming the original books fell apart and were destroyed.
Marriage
Book A is a handwritten copy. There are numerous transcription errors, even the index sometimes didn't know how to spell the name, or has the wrong name marked through and corrected. Sometimes the same marriage is on multiple pages. The verbage in this book is all run together, no white space, no indentions, and the black writing bleeds through a lot, so it is difficult to read and to spot where one marriage stops and the next begins. There is an index for Book A. The pages are hand-numbered.
Marriage Book A-1 is another copy of the same marriages shown in Marriage Book A. Apparently it was an attempt to make the marriage book "look nicer". A prettier handwriting, and there is white space between the licenses, large indentions, better formatting, etc. But again, a handwritten copy, so no original signatures. The pages are numbered with a stamper. I do not know if both scribes copied from the original document or from another copy. I will try to determine that at a later date, and also see if they are sequenced similarly. The marriages in Book A-1 are NOT on the same page numbers as in Book A, and there is no index for Book A-1, not in the front, nor in the back. I went page by page through this book looking for my surnames. Book A-1 appears to be a better quality, more accurately copied document.
Could Book A have been a "test", to see how well a new employee would do in copying the books? Or could the copy have been so inaccurate, that they hired someone new to do a better copy? Or, in some counties in other states, one will find "rough" minutes, and "finished" minutes. Perhaps that was happening in Talladega. Always, always, questions we may never know the answers to!
Because I was taking digital images of "my surnames" in the beginning,
and not making a clear distinction as to which book it came from
(little did I realize there were duplicate marriage records!), I had some of my image pages associated with the wrong book. I have now sorted it all out correctly, and
will be posting the images after I get them prepped and named properly. On a few pages I checked, the same marriages appear to be on the same page together, however, there is a huge numbering discrepancy in the books, so I'll have to look at some pages in the front of the books to see why. I know Book A has duplicates, so this may have gotten the numbering off.
Here is an example of discrepancies:
Book A page 224 -
Thomas Xollans and Maranda L. Smith or Thomas T Rollan and Meanda L Smith
George W. Phillips and Mary Jane McRight
Book A-1 page 188 -
George W. Phillips and Mary Jane McRight
Jesse Freeze and Margaret H. Gray
Jones to Coker
Book A page 361 -
Thomas Cabsman and Mannon T. Boaz
Joel Phips and Permelia Watts
"To any of the Judges of said state any Justice of the Peace of said or any other"
Book A-1 page 302 -
Thomas Coleman and M. T. Boaz
Joel Phillip and Miss Pomelia (or Pornelia) Watts
"To any of the Judges of said state any Justice of the Peace of said county or any other"
Book A - page 451 and Book A-1 page 379 both show these same marriages:
William Griffin and Martha Rayfield
Tolbert Gilbert and Lucinda Philips
Book A-1 page 379 says "rites of matrimony between Tolbert Gilbert and Miss Lucinda Philips".
Book A page 451 says " rites of matrimony between Tolbert Gilbert and and Lucinda Philips"
Well, there's your answer. If you see an image from a marriage record, and it doesn't look like the one you took, it's probably because it's from the "other" book.
