Index to Hartford County, Connecticut, County Court Minutes, Volumes 3 and 4, 1663-1687, 1697

Hartford County court records begin in June 1663, first as a continuation of the Connecticut Colony court records but then in 1666 as a county court. These records deal mainly with debt and land disputes as well as probate matters, but many other items appear: theft, troubled marriages, illegitimate children, constables appointed, older men freed from training, young men disturbing the peace, sales of cider to the Indians, and so on. The record books have two sides. One side has probate documents such as wills and inventories, and the reverse side contains the minutes of the court.  Volumes 1 and 2 of the minutes are the old Connecticut Colony records.  In 1687 Governor Andros closed the court, and Volume 5 continues at a later date. However, a few documents generated in 1697 were left out of their proper place and copied onto the blank pages at the end of the curtailed Volume 4.

The Connecticut State Library granted permission to publish these records as a book (but not electronically). However, they did grant permission to electonically publish the index of these records. Our electonic index refers to the pages of the published book. It includes many subject headings as well as names. The original records appear on Family History Library microfilms 0,004,572 and 0,004,550, both available in the microtext department of the NEHGS research library.

The book of records is available from NEHGS as: Hartford County, Connecticut, County Court Minutes, Volumes 3 and 4, 1663-1687, 1697, transcribed and indexed by Helen Schatvet Ullmann, CG, FASG.

To Purchase the book:

Hartford County, Connecticut, County Court Minutes, Volumes 3 and 4, 1663-1687, 1697 (Softcover)

For more information, please see Helen Schatvet Ullmann’s article, “County Court Records, A Wealth of Colorful Detail,” in the Fall 2005 issue of New England Ancestors.

Tips for Searching This Database

• Names are searchable by first name and/or last name.
• Native and African-Americans are indexed under “Indian” and “Negro” as the surname.
• Subjects are searchable as if they were last names.
• Spelling of names has been standardized.
• Volume 4 begins on page 229 in the published book.