An “official” government record isn’t automatically more reliable than a family Bible, letter, diary, or other family record.
The Myth
Government records carry an aura of authority. A birth certificate, death certificate, census record, marriage record, or other document created by a government agency looks official. It may contain signatures, certifications, official forms, or even a government seal.
A handwritten entry in a family Bible, a letter, diary, baby book, or note on the back of a photograph can seem much less authoritative.
When the two disagree, it is tempting to assume that the government record must be right.
Not necessarily.
Why the Myth Persists
The word official carries considerable weight.
We naturally assume that information placed in a government record was checked and verified before becoming part of the permanent record.
Sometimes it was.
But government officials frequently recorded information supplied by other people. The clerk, census enumerator, or registrar who created the document may have had no personal knowledge whatsoever of the facts being recorded.
The reliability of a particular piece of information therefore depends on more than the government agency whose name appears at the top of the page.
The Reality
Government records can contain excellent information. They can also contain errors.
Consider a death certificate.
A physician who attended the deceased may have firsthand knowledge of the date, time, and cause of death.
But information about the deceased person’s birth date, birthplace, or parents may have been supplied by a spouse, adult child, neighbor, or other informant.
Those facts all appear on the same official document, but they do not necessarily have the same reliability.
Now consider a family Bible.
Suppose a mother recorded the birth of her child shortly after the child was born. She personally knew when and where the birth occurred. Decades later, that child’s death certificate might contain a different birth date supplied by someone who wasn’t even alive when the birth occurred.
The handwritten Bible entry may be the better evidence.
Letters and diaries can present similar situations. A letter announcing a baby’s birth, written the following day by someone who was there, can contain exceptionally strong information despite never having passed through a government office.
Family records, of course, are not automatically reliable either.
A family Bible may have been purchased decades after the events recorded in it, with earlier births and marriages copied from memory. A relative writing years later may remember a date incorrectly. A name written on the back of an old photograph may have been added by a descendant who guessed at the person’s identity.
The important distinction is not simply government record versus family record.
It is who supplied the information, how that person knew it, and how close to the event the information was recorded.
Why It Matters
Automatically giving government records greater authority can cause a genealogist to discount excellent family evidence.
The reverse can be equally dangerous. A cherished family Bible or story isn’t correct merely because it has been passed down through generations.
Two pieces of information within the same government record can even have different levels of reliability because they came from different informants with different knowledge.
The label on the source does not determine the reliability of every fact contained within it.
A government record and a family record both deserve to be evaluated according to how the information was created and who was in a position to know the facts.
Key Takeaway
Government records are not automatically more reliable than family records.
An official seal cannot transform secondhand or incorrect information into fact, and an informal family record created by someone with firsthand knowledge can sometimes provide the better evidence.