Pennsylvania County Court, Probate, Tax and Other Miscellaneous Records

See Also Research In State Court Records

Even today, few people escape mention in court records at some time during their lives as witnesses, litigants, jurors, appointees to office, or as petition signatories. However, Americans of a few generations ago also expected to attend local court proceedings when they were in session. It was a civic duty-and they could be fined if they did not attend......

The prothonotary has been the clerk of court of common pleas since 1707. Court records here include divorces, naturalizations, peddlers' licenses, registration of attorneys, oaths of county officers, equity, sheriff's sales, juror lists, some tax records, and some civil court records. Other court records are with the clerk of courts.

Courts of Common Pleas are Pennsylvania's courts of general trial jurisdiction. They have existed in Pennsylvania at least since the Constitution of 1776, under which they were given constitutional status.

Prior to the Commonwealth's Constitution of 1968 there existed in addition to Courts of Common Pleas -- Courts of Oyer and Terminer and General Jail Delivery, Quarter Sessions of the Peace and Orphans' Courts. The new constitution abolished these latter separate courts and incorporated them into existing Common Pleas Courts.

The register of wills and clerk of orphans' court (for estate records) are often the same person, sometimes sharing the responsibility of the recorder of deeds and clerk of courts as well. Counties are classed by population, which determines the number of hats worn by one or more clerks.

Other courts exist in Pennsylvania, although their jurisdictions are less likely to have genealogical impact. These include supreme court (1722–present), superior court (1895–present), and commonwealth court (1970–present), with mostly appellate but some original jurisdiction.

Courts In Pennsylvania

History of Pennsylvania's Courts

Pennsylvania's judiciary began as a disparate collection of courts, some inherited from the reign of the Duke of York and some established by William Penn. They were mostly local, mostly part time, and mostly under control of the governor. All of them were run by non-lawyers. And although the Provincial Appellate Court was established in 1684, no court could be called the court of final appeal. Final appeals had to be taken to England.

Several attempts were made in the early years of the eighteenth century to establish a court of final appeal in Pennsylvania and to further improve and unify the colony's judicial system, but because the crown had final veto power over all colonial legislation, these attempts proved futile. Finally, in 1727 the crown sanctioned a bill that had been passed five years earlier.

The Judiciary Act of 1722 was the colony's first judicial bill with far-reaching impact. It established the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, providing for a chief justice and two justices who would sit twice yearly in Philadelphia and ride the circuit at other times; and it created the Court of Common Pleas in Philadelphia, Bucks and Chester counties.

The court system in Pennsylvania did not change again until the Pennsylvania Constitution of 1776. By establishing the Courts of Sessions, Courts of Common Pleas and Orphans' Courts in each county, the constitution allowed Pennsylvania to see the beginning of a statewide framework for the development of its judicial system.

A new constitution in 1790 encouraged further development in the Commonwealth's judicial system by grouping counties into judicial districts and placing president judges at the heads of the districts' Common Pleas Courts. This was meant to ease the Supreme Court's rapidly increasing workload. Constitutional changes in 1838 and 1874 and a constitutional amendment in 1850 made changes in the jurisdiction, tenure, and election or appointment of members of the judiciary. In 1895 the General Assembly created the Superior Court to further ease the work of the Supreme Court, giving each appellate court separate jurisdictions.

The Constitution of 1968 initiated the most sweeping changes in Pennsylvania's judiciary in nearly a century, creating the Commonwealth Court to reduce the workload of the Superior and Supreme courts by hearing cases brought against and by the Commonwealth; substantially altering the minor court system; and reorganizing the judiciary into the Unified Judicial System, consisting of the Supreme, Superior and Commonwealth courts; Common Pleas Courts; Philadelphia Municipal Court; Pittsburgh Magistrates Court; Philadelphia Traffic Court; and district justice courts, with provisions for any future courts the law might establish.

Both judicially and administratively, the Supreme Court is, by constitutional definition, Pennsylvania's highest court. In matters of law, it is the Commonwealth's court of last resort. In matters of administration, the Supreme Court is responsible for maintaining a single, integrated judicial system and thus has supervisory authority over all other state courts.

In 1980, the legislature approved a decrease in the Supreme Court's mandated jurisdiction by expanding that of the Superior Court. Consequently, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, like the United States Supreme Court, can now exercise discretion in accepting or rejecting most appeals, allowing it to devote greater attention to cases of far-reaching impact, as well as to its constitutional obligation to administer the entire judicial system.

• Order County Court, Civil or Criminal Records
• Pennsylvania Court Books at Amazon.com
• Court, Land, Wills & Financial - Court records are an often overlooked, yet very valuable tool for finding information to assist you in your research. Land records, such as deeds, allow you to tie an ancestor to a specific place at a point in time. Other court records like those dealing with finances and estates often list related family members or give interesting details like the total value of property owned by your ancestors to add interest to your family history.
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• Search County Criminal Records with a Criminal Background Check
• Search for Registered Sex Offenders in your local Area

See Also Research In State Probate Records

Probate records include a variety of documents created to support court proceedings in the settlement of an individuals' estates. The number and type of probate records created may vary over time in different jurisdictions and due to the amount of real and personal property involved. The various documents generated in the probate process are rarely filed together......

The Pennsylvania General Assembly passed an act in 1682 which required the recording of wills and letters of administration. The first place to seek a will or other type of estate record in the Keystone State is with the county register of wills. Here there will be files of original papers pertaining to an estate as well as the record books in which were copied wills, letters of administration, inventories, accounts, and so forth. In some counties the original papers may be arranged by type of document—will, bond, or account—and thereunder by date of filing. Most filming of estate records has concentrated on will books, but the files must not be passed up even where there is a will. The clerk of the orphans' court in each county (who is often the register of wills and in smaller counties the recorder of deeds as well) is responsible for keeping such records that concern the division of estates, guardians of minor children, and so forth. matters. Indexes to records in both the register of wills and clerk of the orphans' court offices should both be checked, as often there will be action on an estate in both places. Most county indexes will lead to a docket book which in turn will summarize the existing documents and record book entries.

Besides the availability of many Pennsylvania estate records on microfilm and some in abstract form in periodicals such as Publications of the Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania, Your Family Tree, and the Western Pennsylvania Genealogical Society Quarterly, or in separate publications, published indexes for many counties are widely available, usually up to about 1900. Some of these indexes cover both wills and letters of administration and provide the year of the first action on the estate, the volume and page for the will or letters of administration, and the file number of the original papers, if a number has been assigned.

In counties with large German populations, such as Berks, Lancaster, and York, it is common to find original wills written in German, with English translations.

• Pennsylvania Probate Books at Amazon.com
• Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania Wills, 1682-1819: This database includes abstracts from probated wills for the years 1682-1819.
• Berks County, Pennsylvania Estate Records, 1752-1914: The nearly 37,000 estate files indexed in this database contain original papers including wills, inventories, accounts, guardianship appointments, orphans' court real estate sales, etc.

See Also Research In State Immigration & Naturalization Records

Knowing the immigrant's birthplace or last place of residence before emigrating is essential to finding more information in the native land. Yet, unless the ancestors arrived relatively recently in the United States, family origins may have been forgotten. Because most foreign records are kept at the town level, discovering the name of a native town, county, or parish is an important goal. Without that information, it is impossible to know where to conduct research in the country of origin.......

Both immigration and naturalization records abound for Massachusetts since Boston was a major port of entry for hundreds of millions of people seeking refuge, food, land, and religious and political freedom from points across the Atlantic. Smaller ports existed in other towns both north and south of Boston's wharfs. The seventeenth and nineteenth century records are well-organized, but few of the eighteenth century records are as easily accessed.

1800-Present. The nineteenth century brought massive numbers of immigrants to Massachusetts, creating a much more heterogeneous population than a century earlier. Fortunately, many passenger lists have been indexed for the period.

Massachusetts State Archives has an alphabetical name index to the Port of Boston passenger lists from 1848-91, called the state list. The National Archives/New England Region has passenger lists from 1820-1925 and continues to receive later ones. The National Archives in Washington, D.C., has copies of the Boston lists for 1820-91 (Record Group 36, M277), though some gaps in coverage appear in the microfilm copy of the lists. The microfilm index to passenger lists made by the National Archives in Washington, D.C., for 1848-91 (Record Group 36, M265) used the state lists to create their index for arrivals at the port of Boston. Consequently, people might appear on the microfilmed federal index, but not on the federal lists while they do appear on the state list at the Massachusetts State Archives.

The National Archives in Washington, D.C., additionally has an index to passenger lists for arrivals at Boston from 1902-20 (Record Group 85, T521; T617), book indexes to the Boston passenger lists by date of arrival from 1899-1940 (Record Group 85, T790), and passenger lists themselves 1891-1943 (Record Group 85, T843).

Boston was only one port of entry open for immigrants to Massachusetts. There are lists for other ports in the state as well, generally covered by the National Archives index in Record Group 36 (M334) Atlantic, Gulf, and Great Lakes ports, 1820-91.
In the Boston area, the Boston Public Library has microfilm copies of all the federal passenger lists beginning in 1820, as well as other immigration material.

The WPA developed an index of naturalizations found in numerous city, county, state, and federal courts in New England for the period 1786-1906, which are soundexed, microfilmed and available through National Archives.

Massachusetts State Archives holds abstracts for state and local courts (1885-1931 with separate annual indexes), and also Essex County naturalization records (1901-1982). Current petitions and index cards for the federal courts are at Immigration and Naturalization Service, U.S. Department of Justice, JFK Federal Building, Government Center, Boston, MA 02203.

• Naturalization Petitions for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, 1795-1930 (The National Archives): These are Naturalization Records of the US Circuit Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. They include petitions for naturalization, 1795-1930; and declarations of intent, 1793-1818, and 1825-1836. There are some years missing from this publication within those time periods.
• Naturalization Petitions of the U.S. Circuit and District Courts for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, 1906-1930 (The National Archives): These petitions are arranged by court then by year. Within each year, they are listed by the date of the record and then by petitioner's name. Typing a name in the search box directly below this title may bring the best results. Additional years prior to 1906 are also included in these naturalization records for Pennsylvania's middle district.
• Naturalization Petitions of the U.S. District Court, 1820-1930, and Circuit Court, 1820-1911, for the Western District of Pennsylvania (The National Archives): These files contain declarations of intent and petitions for naturalization for the Western District of Pennsylvania, arranged by date, October 1820 through September 26, 1906. They also include records of the US Circuit Court, July 1910-1911, listed by petition number, from 1 to 1,616; and records of the US District Court, October 1, 1906 through January 27, 1931, listed by petition number, from 1 to 91,300.
• Immigration of Irish Quakers to Pennsylvania, 1682-1750: This database contains the results of a study of the immigration of the Irish Quakers to Pennsylvania between 1682 and 1750.
• Pennsylvania Foreign Oaths of Allegiance: This database lists the names of immigrants who took the oath of allegiance to the province and state of Pennsylvania from 1727-1775.
• Pennsylvania Foreign Oaths of Allegiance, Vol. 2: This database lists the names of immigrants who took the oath of allegiance to the province and state of Pennsylvania from 1777-1789.
• Pennsylvania Naturalizations, 1740-73: This database is a listing of persons naturalized in the colony between 1740 and 1773.
• Philadelphia German Immigration, 1700-75: This volume gives a history of German immigration to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania from 1700 to 1775
• Philadelphia Passenger Lists, 1800-1945: This database is an index to the passenger lists of ships arriving from foreign ports at the port of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania from 1800-1945.
• Philadelphia, 1789-1880 Naturalization Records: It includes information on more than 113,000 immigrants from nearly 100 countries who applied for citizenship through the Philadelphia courts system from 1789 to 1880.
• Philadelphia, 1800-1850 Passenger and Immigration Lists: This data set contains alphabetical listings of approximately 180,000 individuals who arrived at Philadelphia from foreign ports between 1800 and 1850.
• Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Indentures, 1771-1773: This collection of indenture records was compiled by the city mayor's office between 1771 and 1773.
• Ship Passenger Lists to Pennsylvania: Miscellaneous Ships: The database is a partial record of Ships Passenger Lists to Pennsylvania. Most of these ships carried Palatine refugees.
• Immigration & Emigration - As our ancestors moved from one country to another, details about their lives were recorded on passenger lists and government documents. Immigration and emigration records can help you learn where your ancestors originally came from, where they went, when they left, who they traveled with, and more.

To conduct a naturalization search:

1. Determine where the individual was naturalized. If the immigrant was naturalized in Philadelphia, consult Philadelphia Naturalization Records . This index covers records from five courts: the Court of Common Pleas (CP), Court of Quarter Sessions (QS), United States Circuit Court (CC), United States District Court (DC), and the Pennsylvania State Supreme Court (SC). If the final date of naturalization includes a notation of SC, these records will be held by the State Archives.
2. If your ancestor was naturalized in a court other than the Supreme Court, such as the Court of Common Pleas (CP), Court of Quarter Sessions (QS), United States Circuit Court (CC), or United States District Court (DC), contact the following:
• * For City/County Court records (CP, QS) write: Philadelphia City Archives , 3101 Market Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103 The City Archives has naturalization records for the City and County of Philadelphia for 1794-1903 and 1914-1930. There are no records of the 1904-1913 period available from the City.
  * For Federal Court records (CC, DC) write: National Archives Mid-Atlantic Region, 9th & Market Streets, Room 1350, Philadelphia, PA 19107. The researcher is required to provide the following information: person's full name, date of declaration, court in which declaration was made, and the petition number.
3. Persons who wish information about citizenship granted elsewhere before 1906 should send their inquiries to the clerk of the federal, state, county or municipal court that issued the naturalization certificate. The Immigration and Naturalization service, Washington, D.C. 20536, has duplicate records of all naturalizations that occurred after September 26, 1906.

See Also Researching in Tax Records

Things taxed have included carriages and watches, windows and whiskey, land and slaves. Taxes on documents and tea helped start a war. Arkansas Territory’s sudden tax on bounty lands in the 1820s was enacted and due before the news had time to reach out-of-state owners, permitting the quick seizure and sale of “delinquent” lands. As this variety suggests, name lists of such taxes must be used with a cautious understanding of who should be on the list and who should not...

Late eighteenth-century tax records for various counties, 1765–1791, were published in Pennsylvania Archives, 3d series, vols. 11–32.

Among the few surviving 1798 U.S. Direct Tax lists are those for Pennsylvania. They were microfilmed by the National Archives and are available at the Mid-Atlantic Region in Philadelphia and at the Pennsylvania State Archives. Indexes have been published for Washington and Lancaster counties.

Tax records are typically found in the county tax assessment offices but may also be in the county commissioners' office or with the prothonotary. The state archives has microfilms for some of these records (1715–1930s). Some assessment records have found their way into manuscript collections of county historical societies and the Historical Society of Pennsylvania as well as at the Philadelphia City Archives.

• Pennsylvania Tax Books at Amazon.com