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Archiver > NYALBANY > 2004-03 > 1079369680


From: Leslie Potter <>
Subject: Re: [NYALBANY] deed records
Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2004 12:00:50 -0800
References: <001901c40aa4$2c0d4d00$34208bd0@hppav>
In-Reply-To: <001901c40aa4$2c0d4d00$34208bd0@hppav>


Betty,

Betty Kinzie wrote:

>I do not know how Albany County kept track of Dower Rights (the widow's rights), but if John's wife survived him, she would have had land reserved for her under New York State law. It is the reason for the wife being questioned before a sale was recorded with the county. In David's situation, the son may have taken years to getting around to filing a deed.
>
Dower rights are extinguished when the wife predeceases the husband or
the widow remarries. Dower rights attach when the real estate is held
in FEE SIMPLE title by the deceased husband of a living wife. No one in
New York gets fee simple title to their land until after 1841. Most of
the early Albany County settlers were tenants farmers of Dutch Patroons,
who merely held freehold leases. The lease was not up until the last
named person in it had died. The wife of the farmer was usually named
in the lease as one of the three lives, so the law pertaining to English
Common Law Dower rights does not apply to the holders of freehold leases.

Even when the New York Dutch used English Common Law terms of art and
the instruments looked like deeds, the instruments still functioned as
Medieval Dutch Freehold Leases. That is one of the things that drives
me up a wall when I do title searches for land in present day Washington
and Saratoga Counties.

>New York State did include descriptions of land, but I don't know what they required and when. Early it could be vague and improved with time. Some deeds use for land marks rocks, posts, trees, stumps, posts, brooks, and anything else, between measurements. The measurements varied, but I am familiar with "chains and links" and "rods" and [almost] always acres or morgans. Often other land holders names were mentioned.
>
What you have just described is called the "Metes and Bounds". The
Metes and Bounds are and always have been required in deeds. The Metes
and Bounds always start out with the phrase, "ALL THAT CERTAIN tract,
piece or parcel of land, [and messuage] situate in (name of municipality
or land patent) BEGINNING at [then the actual compass directions, and
perches for the courses of the boundary follow]... to the place of
Beginning Containing X acres and Y square perches.

> And often the proceeding deed was mentioned. You are more likely to find in subsequent deeds terms giving the feel of "same premises as conveyed by John Doe on 00/00/00".
>
What you have described in the above two sentences is called the
"Premises Description Clause". In title searcher slang it is sometimes
called the "Being Clause" because it always starts out "Being the same
premise which (the present grantor bought from his grantor) on [date]
and is recorded in Deed Book [whatever the Book number and page are]."

>There are copies of the indexes of early Albany County Deeds and Mortgages outside of Albany County that I have used before. I do not know if Barbara Jeffries' [NYALBANY] Albany records with LDS by barbara jeffries would have covered those ledgers http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/index/NYALBANY/2004-03 , but they go back quite a ways, and covered at least to the mid 19th century.
>
The Albany County Grantor and the Albany County Grantee Indexes and
Mortgagor and Mortgagee Indexes are kept in the County Clerk's Office of
those Counties which were carved out of Albany County. These Indexes go
back to the beginning of Albany County.

>I looked up some online references using Cindi's List, not that Leslie is incorrect, just for some clarity.
>
>A Typical Deed http://users.rcn.com/deeds/anatomy.htm ; is closer to deeds I have seen in New York.
>
PLEASE NOTE THAT THERE IS NO "BEING CLAUSE" (properly known as a
Premises Description Clause) IN THE DEED ON THE ABOVE LISTED WEB PAGE.
Thank you for making my point.

It is always nice to find a "premises description clause" or "Being
clause" in a deed, but in my research in New York State I have found
them to be few and far between, forcing the title searcher to go back to
the Grantee Indexes after each transaction to find the citation for the
preceding deed.

In Pennsylvania, premises description clauses are standard operating
procedure. I can take you to the Chester County Courthouse and run the
title of a present day property back to 1682 without having to go to the
Grantee Index unless I hit a sheriff's sale. I have NEVER had that
experience in the 15 years that I have been doing title work in New York
State. The legal system for and the history of these two jurisdictions
are different. I find New York much harder to run titles in. I prefer
deeds that are deeds and that have premises description (i.e. Being)
clauses thank you.

Once a year I go to the Saratoga County Clerk's Office to run titles for
the colonial tenant farms in the Saratoga and Kayadrossera Patents. It
takes me a while before I start sputtering in sheer unadulterated
frustration. When I start sputtering the title clerks start giggling.
I am beginning to suspect that some of them rather look forward to my
arrival. After all how often is it that you have a Pennsylvania lawyer
doing standup comedy in your work place and saying things that you wish
that you could say, but can not?

There are about 8 different kinds of deeds, and more variations in the
standard boiler plate language used in convincing instruments. The
bottom line is that because of the medieval Dutch legal conventions
17th, 18th and 19th New York State deeds are not nearly informative as
the English Common Law deeds in the other colonies during the same time.

Leslie








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