Mississippi, Tippah County Marriages - FamilySearch Historical Records

What is in the Collection?
The collection consists of marriages recorded by the Probate Court and the Circuit Court in Tippah County, Mississippi for the years 1858 to 1979. The records were filmed at the county courthouse in Ripley, Mississippi. This collection is being published as images become available.

The earliest marriage bonds and licenses were usually handwritten on loose papers that were later bound into lettered volumes. Some marriage records had multiple entries on each page, while others had single records per page. The records are arranged by volume and year range. The records were generally well preserved, although fires, floods, or other disasters may have destroyed some records.

These records are segregated according to race from 1865 through part of the 20th century. Volumes are designated "colored" for marriages of blacks, "mixed," which includes both races (not necessarily intermarried) and "white." There are separate indexes for colored and white marriages.

Marriages were recorded by the clerk of the chancery court from the time the county was formed. Persons desiring to marry obtained a license that they presented to the minister or other person authorized to marry, such as a justice of the peace. Once the marriage was performed, the officiator sent a return to the clerk confirming that the marriage had occurred.

Civil marriage records were created to legalize marital relationships and to protect the interests of the wife and other heirs to legal claims on property. The marriage date, place, residence of the bride and groom, and occupations are relatively reliable. Other information, such as age or birthplace, is dependent on the knowledge, memory, and accuracy of the informants, usually the bride and groom.

What Can these Records Tell Me?
Information usually found in this collection includes:


 * Date and place of marriage
 * Names of the bride and groom
 * Names of witnesses
 * Name of officiator

Coverage Map
To see a coverage map of FamilySearch's holdings of Mississippi marriages click here.

How Do I Search the Collection?
You can search the index or view the images or both. To begin your search it is helpful to know:
 * The name of your ancestor
 * The name of a relative or date of the event

Search the Index
Search by Name by visiting the Collection Page then:
 * 1) Fill in the search boxes with the information you know.
 * 2) Click Search. This will provide possible a list of matches.

View the Images
View images in this collection by visiting the Browse Page then:
 * 1) Select County
 * 2) Select Record Type, Date Range and Volume

How Do I Analyze the Results?
Compare each result from your search with what you know to determine if there is a match. This may require viewing multiple records or images.

I Found Who I was Looking for, What Now?

 * Use the age to calculate a birth date and to find other records such as birth, christening, census, land and death records.
 * Use the information to find additional family members. Witnesses or bondsmen were usually relatives.
 * Repeat this process with additional family members found, to find more generations of the family.
 * Church Records often were kept years before government records were required and are a good source for finding ancestors before 1900.

I Can’t Find Who I’m Looking for, What Now?

 * Try viewing the original record to see if there were errors in the transcription of the name, age, residence, etc. Remember that there may be more than one person in the records with the same name.
 * Collect entries for every person who has the same surname. This list can help you identify possible relations that can be verified by records.
 * If you cannot locate your ancestor in the locality in which you believe they lived, then try searching records of a nearby locality in an area search.
 * Standard spelling of names typically did not exist during the periods our ancestors lived in. Try variations of your ancestor’s name while searching the index or browsing through images.
 * Remember that sometimes individuals went by nicknames or alternated between using first and middle names. Try searching for these names as well.
 * Search the indexes and records of Mississippi, United States Genealogy.
 * Search in the Mississippi Archives and Libraries.
 * Search in the FamilySearch Library Catalog

Citing this Collection
Citations help you keep track of places you have searched and sources you have found. Identifying your sources helps others find the records you used.


 * Collection Citation:

"Mississippi, Tippah County Marriages, 1858-1979" Database with Images. FamilySearch. http://FamilySearch.org : accessed 2017. Citing Tippah County Courthouse, Ripley.

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