Three Cookie Fine

We are back digitizing marriage records for the City of Fredericksburg, and on Friday we did the years 1894 and 1893. Once we got into the 1800s we found the marriage certificates were too large for the scanning equipment owned by the Circuit Court. After a conversation with the archivist, it was decided that in order for us to complete this project we would have to use their photo copier at 64%, scanning one side, turning the document over to scan the second side before printing. He did not want us using the scan feature on the copy machine – he shuddered at the thought of having one or more of the documents caught somewhere in the copier, possibly shred to pieces. This hand copying process is slow and tedious work, but needs to be done in order to preserve these valuable documents.

When we got to August 1893 we noticed there were only a handful of marriages for the rest of the year. We looked at each other and said at the same time, “financial panic of 1893.” I first came across this when researching and writing a monograph on my grandfather, Harry Nunn. I learned from Edwin G. Burrow and Mike Wallace’s book, Gotham, A History of New York City to 1898 that by January 1894 over 70,000 New Yorkers were unemployed. Apparently the effects of the panic were felt in Virginia as well since only a few dared to get married in the second half of 1893.

Oh, and the three cookie fine … food is not allowed in the courthouse. We were thankful the policemen on duty yesterday knew us and let us through security with a container of homemade cookies we had made for the court staff. After threatening to hold onto the cookies, I agreed to pay a three cookie fine so that the three officers could enjoy a treat while on duty.

The cookies were a big hit!

Another Anomaly in Fredericksburg, VA Marriages

I love genealogy research because I am always learning something. Three years ago we volunteered to digitize Fredericksburg, VA marriages so the wealth of information on those documents would be available for genealogists tracing their ancestors in this part of the country.

We learned as we went along that marriages taking place in this town were not just local folks, but for couples coming from the northern states and states to the west. This made sense since Quantico Military base is close by, but then we ran into the anomaly in 1939-1940 when we learned the northern states started to impose wait periods and required blood tests.

Last week when we got to the 1916 and 1917 Fredericksburg marriages we ran into another anomaly. Working back, we did 1917 first. In that year there were no marriages performed during the month of May. Since the names were filed alphabetically, and we were refilling them by month, it wasn’t like we missed a folder or that one had been misfiled.

We went to the archivist and explained the “empty” month. He jumped on the Internet and brought us information that explained the U.S. Selective Service Act was enacted 17 May 1917. Those married and providing sole income and with dependents under the age of 16 were classified as “exempted, but available for military service.”

We didn’t go back through the first months of that year to see how many men married divorced or widowed women with children, but that might have been an interesting statistic to find. Being married before the month of May 1917 was definitely an advantage when it came to draft eligibility.

Then in 1916 we ran into the same thing, this time there were no marriages in the month of June. In a cursory search I learned the National Defense Act was enacted 3 June 1916, getting Americans prepared for entry into WW I. Why this affected marriages during that month, I can’t say, but it did make for an interesting day!

Fredericksburg VA Marriage Records for 1988

This morning we added 287 records to the restricted online database that includes scanned original images at the Fredericksburg, VA Circuit Court. Their index now covers 1988 – present. Contact the court clerk to find out how to access these records.

They are pulling us off the marriage index project because they want us to develop a database for wills.  So many people are researching wills the court clerk feels it would be helpful to have them indexed and digitized.  That project will be interesting, although we are concerned about our efficiency as we might be tempted to stop and read some of the more interesting ones.