Sunday, October 22, 2017

Certified is not all it's Cracked up to Be

What does certified really mean? I recently received a xerox copy of a 1916 marriage license from a former elopement hotspot. The certificate part of these marriage records is not photocopiable so the office sends a typed transcription of the marriage certificate that is certified with a gold foil stamp. The clerk certifies that she has viewed the original and certifies that her reproduction is a complete and accurate copy. This gold stamped document would be accepted without much fuss in any court of the land. Certified is just as good as original after all. Or is it?

My certificate had the oddest contradictions. This was an elopement where the teen bride was pregnant by her active duty sailor boyfriend. They probably skipped away to elope on a day when he was on leave. The license was applied for on 29 Mar 1916. The marriage ceremony was performed by a Reorganized LDS minister named Henry Carr. He purportedly performed the ceremony on 9 Sep 1916 according to my “certified” marriage record with a xerox copy of the license and a transcribed certificate.

I thought the timeline seemed off because why would a knocked up woman want to get a license out of state, go home, deliver her still illegitimate child and then three weeks later return to the elopement zone and finally marry and legitimize her child and her relationship?

I posed this question to the clerk via e-mail and she was very helpful and explained her colleague had made a transcription error and that the couple had indeed married the same day their license was issued, 29 Mar 1916. She immediately issued a second certified and gold stamped record for my records.

This is not the first time this has happened with this specific family. The groom was my grandmother’s first cousin. He had 5 younger siblings from 1892-1901. The brother born in 1901 was baptized six days after his birth. The first baptismal certificate sent to me identified the wrong father and only one sponsor. Fortunately, the dates were right. Years later I visited in person and a xerox copy of the page was made available to me. It showed the entry was hard to decipher but I was able to make out the correct two parents and two sponsors. 


Certified does not mean it is a perfect reflection of what the original says. Take everything with a grain of salt. Remember the original may have inaccuracies in it as well.

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