COMMISSIONS TO DIVIDE ESTATES (DIVISION OF ESTATES, COMMISSION
DOCKETS)

Record of the proceedings of commissioners appointed to evaluate and divide intestates'
estates in cases where the parties entitled to shares cannot agree on the division. If the estate
did not lend itself to equitable division, the commissioners could sell it and divide the proceeds.
(Chapter 45, 1786.)

TAX SALES

Record of proceedings in the sale of real estate to enforce the payment of taxes. Chapter
577 of the Acts of 1892 required that such proceedings be entered in a special book and indexed.

PLATS (PLAT BOOKS, PLAT RECORDS)

Record of plans or drawings of tracts of land, subdivisions, towns, rights-of-way, etc. filed
for recording usually in conjunction with conveyances. In most counties, the early plats were
recorded in the Land Records along with the deeds to which they related. More recently
plats have been recorded in various ways. The originals may be filed in cabinets or they may
be copied into special books either by hand or by photostat, blueprint or other duplicating
process.

PLATS (PLAT BOOKS, PLAT RECORDS) STATE ROADS COMMISSION

Record of plats filed by the State Roads Commission showing property or rights-of-way
acquired or conveyed by the Commission (See Chapter 458, Acts of 1933).

COURT MINUTES (MINUTE BOOKS)

Record of the proceedings of the court at each term of court. Typically, the record begins
with the style of court which states the date and place of meeting and lists the names of the
justices present and perhaps the county sheriff and clerk of court. Also listed are the members
of the grand jury and petit jury. This is followed by presentments and indictments, rules
and orders of the court, admissions of attorneys, qualifications of civil officers, naturalizations
and other routine business of the court.

During the colonial period and the few years thereafter when the court served as the
executive body of the county, the minutes also record the administrative actions of the court,
such as, expenditure of county funds, assessment of taxes, appointment of constables, coroners,
road overseers and other county officials, issuance of licenses to keep ordinaries and sell
liquors, establishment of tavern rates and so forth.

JUDGMENTS (COURT PROCEEDINGS, COURT RECORDS, SHORT ENTRIES OF
JUDGMENTS, SHORT JUDGMENTS)

In its simplest form, this is a record of criminal and civil cases tried before the county
court. The style of court usually appears at the beginning of each term of Court. In the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries this record was kept in considerable detail. Quite often
it also included the minutes of the court, as described above.

Early in the nineteenth century the number of cases tried by the county courts had in-
creased to such an extent that the clerks were having difficulty recording them all. By
Chapter 119 of the Acts of 1817, it was directed that for the future "No clerk shall record any
judgment or decree except those relating to the title of lands, or those under which lands have
been sold in virtue of an execution thereon." Other judgments were not to be recorded unless

10