Helpful Hints
Sunday, December 2nd, 2007A recent trip to the clerk’s office in Norwich, NY uncovered a section of deeds that people trying to find early evidence of their ancestors in the area should look for.
Two English gentlemen named John and William Hornby from Middlesex, in England sold a large portion of land to many individuals starting in 1806. There are ten and half pages of their land transactions in the 1798-1874 grantor book that indexes the deeds for the letter “H”. It is possible since the grantee books were transcribed that errors were entered into these records. The grantor book remains hand written and probably unchanged.
Anyone with ancestors that covers the period from 1806 on to 1874 would do well to check for Hornby deeds.
In other counties it would be advisable to identify if possible the active land agents for a given area and time frame, and look for their names as Grantors.
NYS Archives has loanable micorfilm rolls on tax rolls for the counites of record for the years 1799-1803. The series is B 0950 Web address is http://www.nyarchives.org/a/research/fa/B0950.shtml. You will need to know the current town name and county bondaries to select the right reel.