US, Virginia—Marriage Records, 1853–1935. Batch M3WJ-T5M.

Richard Ward Cantrell

The dates of marriage are given as Month, date/date. Such as Jan. 2/2 or Jan. 13/16. This could be interpreted as the marriage application date and marriage date or the marriage date and certificate return date. I am inclined to think marriage date and certificate return date. Suggestions?

Melissa S Himes

It could also be license date and marriage date. The researcher will have to figure that out.

For indexing, you can fall back on the General Indexing Guidelines for date ranges:

• If multiple dates were given for a birth, type the earliest date.
• If multiple dates were given for other events, type the most recent or latest date.
• For events except births that include a date range, such as “between February 2 and March 9, 1937,” type the most recent or latest date in the range. For this example, type the month as Mar, the day as 9, and the year as 1937.