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From: "Michael Hait" <>
Subject: Re: [TGF] GPS Discussion
Date: Thu, 30 Dec 2010 12:32:06 -0500
References: <9abb616ec5d6f31caac0f395c0ec2690.squirrel@emailmg.ipage.com>
In-Reply-To: <9abb616ec5d6f31caac0f395c0ec2690.squirrel@emailmg.ipage.com>


There are other factors to take into consideration concerning your evidence.

Most of the death certificates I have seen are actually signed by two
separate informants: the "informant" for the personal information about the
decedent, and the attending physician. Was the attending physician actually
in attendance? This can often be determined by the place of death, and on
many death certificates, the physician actually notes when he was last in
the presence of the patient, etc. This affects the reliability of your
source. Also it is true that the testimony of the obituary and grave marker
may have been created by the same source, but were the records of the
cemetery or church checked for the actual date of burial? Do funeral home
records exist? There are also other pieces of evidence that may directly or
indirectly bear on the date of death. Various probate records or court cases
respecting the distribution of the estate may specifically state the date of
death. Some probate files may include accounts exhibited against the estate,
including dated invoices from the doctor, undertaker, or even a carpenter
that built the coffin. In other words, before you come to your conclusion,
have you really exhausted all possible relevant sources? They won't always
be found, but they should at least be searched to a reasonable extent.

Again, with your second example, there are other considerations: have you
identified the property of the father in the later possession of the
daughter? Other probate records should be searched. Accounts of
administration, estate inventories, or chancery/equity cases concerning the
distribution of the estate might mention the son-in-law by name. Likewise,
depending on the time period, the daughter may have been under the legal
coverture of her husband, so he may actually have signed a receipt for the
property she inherited. Have other considerations such as physical proximity
of the alleged son-in-law to the daughter been investigated? And so on and
so on.

In response to your mention that certain records can be incorrect, this is
the most significant reason that multiple pieces of evidence must be
located, individually evaluated for both internal reliability and external
reliability by correlating the information with other sources.

My point is that the level to which you have researched, and the level to
which records are availably, directly affect the reliability of the
conclusion. If you have not located enough evidence to come to a conclusion,
then you should certainly qualify it. But if you have located several pieces
of evidence (both direct and indirect) across a broad timeframe, by various
sources, for various purposes, etc., without irreconcilable contradictions,
then you should feel comfortable enough with your conclusion to assert this
conclusion without qualification.

Michael Hait

http://www.haitfamilyresearch.com
-----Original Message-----
From:
Sent: Thursday, December 30, 2010 11:50 AM
To:
Subject: [TGF] GPS Discussion

I would like to jump into this discussion regarding Michael's comment
on skepticism as I find this challenging. Let's say all I have for proof
of date of death is a death registration and the informant is a son.
That's pretty good proof. Should I state that my person certainly died on
that day? Mistakes do occur. If I have other evidence ... obituary
(probably comes from same source), grave marker (often untrustworthy and
potentially from the same source), all of which agree on date, am I more
certain? Not necessarily. Do I note that mistakes have been made in such
documents but given the probable reliability of this primary information
in this original source? Do I state that only a trustworthy Family Bible
would enable me to draw a firm conclusion? That does seem like overdoing
it. In this case I would state that the person did die on this
date.
But, suppose I have a will leaving property to a daughter
whose surname differs from the decedent. I prove a woman with this
surname married and had a maiden name that is the same as the father's
surname. I prove the decedent had a daughter whose first name and surname
at birth are the same as this woman's first name and maiden name. Date of
birth for both women is the same. I have done a reasonably exhaustive
search, found no other evidence and none contradictory. Do I state that
these women are the same? Or do I state they are probably the same? I
would state "probably" because skepticism seems appropriate.
Would others state they are certainly the same? Yes. Would one of us be
incorrectly skeptical? No, I think this is where we can conclude there is
no one correct way to state a conclusion.
Comments?
Mara
Fein, PhD

www.ancestrywest.com
310-487-5150
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