In the courthouse at Rosedale there is an old deed in the
original entry book given to Joseph McGuire in 1830 and ratified in 1831, the year
following, Dancing Rabbit Treaty. This deed was to the land upon which the
county seat of Bolivar County was to be established.
Among the earliest wills recorded is that of Jonathan C.
Lobdell, May 31, 1854.
In the 1860's the names of Joseph
Sillers, Thomas Shelby, J. V. Lobdell, M. E. Goza, William Pickett, J. C. Kirk,
and William Coleman appear in the records as presenters of petitions, as administrators, and as
appraisers.
The earliest appraisement found is the following:
Warrant to
appraisers.
To Joseph
Sillers, T. B. Lenoir, E. Bellamy, and Eugene Montgomery, Greeting:
This is to authorize you
jointly to appraise goods, chattels and personal estate of William Coleman,
late of Bolivar County, deceased, as far as the same shall come to your
knowledge, and suggest each of you having first taken the oath of affirmation
hereto annexed, a certificate whereof you are to return annexed to an inventory
of said goods and chattels and personal estate by you appraised in dollars and
cents, and in the same inventory you are to set down in a column or columns
opposite to each article the value thereof; having first set apart to Mrs. Edna
Coleman, the widow of said deceased, all of the personal estate of said husband
to which she is entitled by law, and the year's provision for herself and
children, to which you may deem her entitled; to be allotted upon and both
reduced in writing and returned to this court, with the appraisement.
Witness, Charles T. Miles,
Esquire, Judge of the Probate Court of Bolivar County, this the 10th day of
June, in the year of our Lord, 1861.
(Signed)
W. H. Wright, Clerk.
Then the oath of
appraisers, inventory, and appraisement. An example:
6 yoke of oxen - valuation $240.00
1 carriage
25.00
List of Negroes follows.
An example: Alex, Negro man $1,000.00
The total appraisement amounted to
79,480.00