How to search SC Equity Court Records
I got to an Equity Court record by a link on a profile. I wanted to search those same records (not that same case) for other people I'm researching. But the links took me to the catalog which appears to be stored in a vault not the online ones. I know the records are online because I was just looking at one. But how can I search for other cases in this record set? There are other court records listed I would want to search if they are also online (see image below), as well as other counties. Typing the record title in the search box under Search / Records yields no results.
example I found: https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3Q9M-CSR8-JCNF?lang=en
Best Answer
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@CMichael7
Is it specifically Lancaster County Equity Court records you want to search?
https://www.familysearch.org/en/search/catalog/koha:467010
They are showing as freely available and full-text searchable for me:
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Answers
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Yes and no.:) Right now I'm working mostly on 2 families with a lot of interconnections in Lancaster and surrounding counties. But I have lots of SC ancestors in at least 5 other counties. While the latter are "mostly done", there are, as always, some unresolved relationships that Equity cases might have answers to.
I got to the same page you show, but I did not see any way to get to the records from there. I guess those icons on the right would take me to the records? One looks like a camera and the other I can't make out. The fact they are beside the vault threw me. I was expecting something obvious like "search" or "view" online, etc. But I'll go back and see if either of those works.
In general, this seems like a more complicated approach than how things are done in a library or state archives. There we typically go to the index first, which gives us the location on microfilm, etc. But maybe it's because I'm left-handed in a right-handed world.
I see Camera icon is to view (but it is all the images) ; and the other is full text search. Is there supposed to be an index or ability to search the images (accessed by camera icon) by name, county, etc. first rather than browse through them all? I do see full text finds some. so I can use that.
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A camera icon means you can view the images. Just click on it.
If the records are limited-access (not accessible from home), there will be a warning triangle on the camera. When you hover over one of those, you'll see a message showing where they can be accessed: FamilySearch Center, or Affiliate Library.
If the records are completely unavailable, then the camera will be grayed-out, and, on hover, you'll see a different message, that the records are currently digitally inaccessible.
The little page icon means you can use Full-Text Search to find names, dates, places, even when the records have not been indexed.2 -
Just to follow up, if one were looking for other counties, I assume it should be possible to find the collections by going to Search > Records > Browse all collections, and enter the appropriate title. But not only was I unable to get that to work before Aine's answer, I still can't get it to work by even copying and pasting the exact title into the search box. (I tried a bunch of other variations too.)
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Naming of record sets in the catalog is not consistent. Some counties/states use different names; sometimes FamilySearch titles are just different.
I tend to use the keyword search more often than any other to find what I need.
"Less is more" is generally a good concept when digging in the FS Catalog. Too specific a title = no results. A broader search can easily be filtered.
For example - here I searched only on the place: Lancaster, South Carolina. The results are separated by type, and those equity court records are under Court Records.
If I edit my search to Union, SC, where my ancestor was born, there are 2 "court" categories.
And the Equity records are a subset.
I could also use the filters on the left, for year, record type, or format.
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