On the hunt for a record

I have spent a fair amount of the past couple weeks talking on the phone to one of the researchers at the Probate Court of Hamilton County, Ohio.  We first talked because I discovered a memorandum stuck in a will indicating that the woman’s spouse’s (Sarah’s spouse Thomas) estate had been contested by some of the children and then the case had been settled in a very mysterious and as yet inexplicable way.  (I’d requested a copy of the will from the archives at the University of Cincinnati; quite opposite of the Probate Court, their will request is no-frills and straightforward – print out a form from their website, fill it in with the information for each person from the index on their site, and mail it in with a fee of $15 per will, which they will return to you if they can’t find what you request.  My request for Sarah’s and Thomas’s wills, as well as the will of an in-law of theirs, was one of the most promptly filled genealogical requests I’ve ever made.  Of course, a big part of why it’s so straightforward is because they have exactly one file for each person and simply copy the whole thing and send it to you.)

The memorandum really sharply reminded me of the benefit of not making assumptions; when I read in the will in question that the daughters had renounced their claim to the estate, I’d figured – with no substantiation at all beyond the fact that it’s the most common reason – that the daughters had quitclaimed on their rights to Thomas’ estate.  It was only when I got to the memorandum, stuck inbetween the codicils to Sarah’s will, that I realized that this was in absolutely no way the correct interpretation of events, and got my first real inkling into how the family had ended up embroiled in a murder case, with one of the sons (it was the 3 surviving sons who had contested the will) killing the husband of one of the daughters (the 2 surviving daughters and their husbands were the ones who’d given up the fight and settled the case).

The memorandum mentions a specific case number, so I was hopeful that I would be able to find documents about the case.  However, this has proved to be much more of a wild goose chase than I expected.  I first talked to the Probate Court, and they said that the number doesn’t really match up with their numbering system.  They looked anyway, but couldn’t find a copy of the case.  The researcher suggested that I try the Clerk of Courts, as she said that at the time period such a case might have been heard in either court.  The researcher at the Clerk of Courts also said that the number didn’t sound right because it wasn’t prefixed by an “A,” and additionally that she thought records from the time period had been destroyed anyway.  But she told me she’d check and call me back.  When she did, she said that all the records from that time had been destroyed in a fire and the earliest case they have (“A” issue notwithstanding) is a later number than the one on my document.  She then suggested that I call the Historical Society and see if they had made a copy of the case prior to the fire.  I’ve been waiting to receive documents from the Probate Court, so I haven’t followed up with the Historical Society yet.

The researcher at the Probate Court is very dedicated and she’s been calling me once or twice a week to check in about what kinds of documents I’m looking for (luckily for  me, the family I’m researching in this post left prolific amounts of documentation) and update me on the search for the MIA case. On Thursday (it’s now the Sunday of Labor Day weekend) she told me she was going to finish researching and copying records and call me back at the end with a total; I haven’t heard from her yet.  They’ll need to receive my money order before they’ll send the records they’ve copied.  Once I receive the records, I’ll review them and see whether contacting the Historical Society is warranted.  I remain so glad the memorandum about Thomas’ probate was stuck in with Sarah’s will; what with how elusive the case file has been, if not for that bit of fortune, I might never have found out that the case existed at all.