BREAKING NEWS: New Major Databases to be released shortly

​DHAS has continued improving the usefulness and accessibility of the collection of over 600 pages of the town meeting records of Dartmouth which date from 1674 through the date of the first division (February 22, 1787) when “New Bedford” was carved off (consisting of present day New Bedford, Fairhaven and Acushnet), leaving “Dartmouth”, consisting of today’s Westport and Dartmouth until July 2, 1787 when Westport was established from what had been “Dartmouth” for a few months after New Bedford was incised.

Recall that in 1888, the Aldermen of New Bedford decided to examine the condition of the original old records of the town of Dartmouth and later moved to preserve the old records by hiring a scribe to transcribe (by handwritten rewrites faithful to the originals) all of the town meeting records as well as several other categories.

Still later the Mormon Church captured these transcriptions on film and created microfilm of the collected set, including a very thorough index of every name mentioned as well as a variety of topics covered which had been constructed by the scribe hired by the Aldermen of New Bedford.

DHAS, with permission from the Dartmouth Historical Commission and support from the New Bedford Free Public Library obtained a copy of this microfilm and proceeded to have it “digitized” so it could be posted (in segments) on our website DartmouthHAS.org. That was the latest step in improving the access to these important historical records of the early governance of our (collective) towns here on the South-coast. But, even with this availability, everything in the database, including the wonderfully rich index created by the scribe, Etta S. Martin, was handwritten and thus only searchable via the human eye and brain, not facile!

To improve this state of affairs DHAS has commenced transcribing the index created after 1888 by Etta S. Martin into a form the computer can read and manipulate. This has allowed us to design a “Navigational Console”, which allows a user, citing the index, to go directly to the page where the record referred to in the index has been identified. Thus, we have an every name index with the page numbers, in the >600 page document, where any given name is cited, including the context. This greatly betters the experience of utilizing these records for research and writing.

The digitizing of the index is still on-going but the name index is complete and identifies by name over 1,200 names from the ODTMRs. This means each of these is a verified Dartmouth resident at a documented date in time and additional information has likewise been provided, with cited page numbers from the ODTMRs. A very large percentage of these names are male, and thinking logically, if most of them were family men and had an average of, say 3 children, we have accounted for some four to five thousand people!

III. Bristol County Land Records Transcriptions Database (BCLRTdb)

All family history and genealogical researchers know of the great value of land records for discovering relevant facts and documenting their work. Even with the free availability of microfilm copies of most older land records via FamilySearch.com however, where digitized copies of the manuscript forms of the land records are readily available, they are not searchable via computer and hence require much slow browsing and searching even after you locate the right legal instrument to look at.

A recent fortuitous encounter has changed that for DHAS and its patrons. We recently have been granted total access to a collection of transcriptions of extracts from the land records of all the territory comprising Old Dartmouth as well as certain parts of Little Compton and Tiverton. This is the work of over twenty years of dedicated labor to faithfully capture and create these transcriptions of the essential information, along with all the reference numbers required to find and read the manuscripts themselves on FamilySearch.com

While the transcription work continues apace we have copies of the records for the first fifty (50) volumes of the Bristol County Land Records available in both “.doc” and “.PDF” formats which will be installed on our website along with an introduction explaining the collection and extraction protocol and the items covered and searchable for patrons. This covers a staggering amount of primary land transaction and ownership information about Old Dartmouth. It covers a time span beginning in 1668 and going on through 1767. With about 3,500 documents transcribed from volumes 1 through 50 and more to come this complements all of our primary data collections for researching Dartmouth from its beginning in Plymouth Colony onward.

As with our other important collections, a collection of indexes (lname, fname, BCLR volume# page#, Grantee, Grantor, FHL film# and Image#; etc) with specific page number references will be presented along with the BCLRTdb and a customized Navigational Console for facilitating getting to the target document(s) a patron might be researching with a sequence of clicks.

WATCH FOR THE POSTING OF THESE NEW SOURCES FOR ALL DHAS PATRONS RESEARCHERS AND HISTORY BUFFS