Problems with items and places on "England and Wales, National Index of Wills and Administrations, 1

LegacyUser

Adrian Bruce said: Posted in the hope that this catches Emily Oldroyd's eye.

There are a couple of issues with the indexing of England and Wales, National Index of Wills and Administrations, 1858-1957, one of which has been raised before, some not (so far as I know). Take this example of a hinted index record (URL https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/619...) for my GG-GF:



Problem number 1 (which has been raised before) - the item "Beneficiary's Name". The text of the original reads "Probate to .... William Orlando Salter". The post-1858 probate calendars for England & Wales do not, and never have, recorded beneficiaries. They show the executors - who may or may not be beneficiaries. I recommend that the collection is adjusted so that the item "Beneficiary's Name" is replaced by "Executor's Name". I have no idea what appears in Source Linker for William Orlando Salter - that may need adjusting.

For the record I have never seen any probate calendars in England & Wales of any vintage that list beneficiaries - however, I haven't seem them all, of course - I've no idea if other UK probate collections have similar errors.

Problem 2: "Event Place (Original)". This is a concatenation of Chester and Crewe and incorrect. He lived in Crewe ("of Crewe" it says) and died there (it's not obvious from the calendar entry but the death place is only stated if different from the residence). Chester is only involved because that's where the grant of probate was made ("Probate Chester 22 March ..." it says). I recommend that firstly FS decides what the "Event Place (Original)" and "Event Place" in this collection are supposed to represent. Place of Probate, place of residence or place of death? (I don't advise the latter because, as I said, it's not explicitly listed). Then FS needs to correct the items in question (gulp!)

(The Event Date is a date of probate, therefore it would make sense if the Event Place is the place of probate, which is Chester)

Problem 3: "Event Place: Crewe by Farndon..." This is incorrect no matter what the choice for Event Place is! Part of the problem is that there are three places in Cheshire called Crewe - I have requests in the Place-name Community to fix two of them.

I'm assuming that the choice of Event Place from Event Place (Original) is automatic. But why Crewe by Farndon has been chosen I've no idea as it isn't even the first in the list of Crewe choices in the Place-name standards. However, it is the first in the list if the date is taken into account.

So could FS please tell me if the choice of Event Place from Event Place (Original) is automatic and is influenced by the date?

Mind you, I'm still not clear on what should happen then - I suspect that lots of Crewe probate index records will be assigned to Crewe by Farndon in error but how that can be fixed, I've no idea. If I got a better match in the Place-name standards for the event place (original) of Crewe (no idea how!), would they get fixed automatically?

LegacyUser

David Newton said: There are only a very few probate registries in the England and Wales, and therefore there are only a very places where probate can be granted.

There are actually three potential events associated with a probate record from this database. Those are grant of probate (or grant of administration, the distinction of which we'll ignore for the purposes of this post), death of the originator of the estate and residence of the originator of the estate. It is actually comparatively rare for the exact place of death to be named in the probate calendars, but it does happen. The date of death is always recorded. When the calendar refers to xxx of yyy, the yyy is where they lived, NOT where the probate was granted.

So in the specific case of the entry referred to above (actually a pretty sparse entry in the calendar itself), the death date is correct and the date of granting of probate is correct. However everything else about the entry is wrong.

The "event place" is NOT Crewe, and it is NOT Chester, Crewe, United Kingdom in the original record. If "event place" refers to the probate registry then the correct event place is Chester, Cheshire, England, United Kingdom. As for the residence place, well that would be Crewe, Staffordshire, England, United Kingdom. As has already been mentioned by the OP William Orlando Salter is NOT the beneficiary of the will, he is the executor of the estate.

Unfortunately the data in this entire collection has been badly interpreted.

Further down the same page of the probate calendar is an example of a fuller entry. For Benjamin Richard Saltmarsh his full address of 56, Goldborne Road, North Kensington, Middlesex is recorded, his place of death of Blackadon Asylum, Ivybridge, Devon is recorded and the relationship of the executor is also recorded. Place of probate grant, date of probate grant and date of death are recorded as always.

LegacyUser

Adrian Bruce said: Ahem. I'm sure David really meant to type "As for the residence place, well that would be Crewe, Cheshire, England, United Kingdom".

Staffordshire's not far away from us, but it's a crucial few miles as it's the difference between being in the Midlands and being in the North!! (to be read with tongue in cheek!)

LegacyUser

David Newton said: Oops. I was thinking level with Stoke and Newcastle, both in Staffordshire. Always thought of the Cheshire border as a little north of there. Guess it must be pretty much the southernmost part of Cheshire there. More used to thinking about places like Lymm or Stockport or Ellesmere Port in Cheshire.