My husband and I spent the afternoon a couple of weeks ago at the Kingstree courthouse, looking up the history of our South Carolina property. We had to make an appointment and were shown into a room with vault-like doors, really impressive! There we were allowed to handle massive, beautifully-bound deed books--or should I say tomes--some of which were over a century old. They had the thickest, most durable paper.
In the course of things, I happened to see several of my ancestors in the deed indexes, and so I do think we will be returning, hopefully soon. Honestly, I could fall into this wormhole for quite some time. I've collected family stories and have done online and library research, but I've never researched my genealogical records via land records and such, not directly (though I've gathered a very few in family folders at historical societies). I tried once, but I was confused with no help, whereas the clerk gave us a tour of the basics this time.
Nonetheless, it takes me a while to learn! I was bemoaning to my husband how the lawyers had apparently signed for people, as again and again in the deed books, I could tell that the signatures were in the same hand as the handwritten deed records (in the days before typewriters, of course!), with that handwriting changing from deed to deed. He laughed and pointed out, "Honey, I don't think those were the originals. They just copied the deeds into the official records. The owners kept the original deeds." Um, right! I felt so silly! There were also no photocopy machines in those days...
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