Well, readers! This tidbit has been given First Act on the Bill after your editor had already set up the issue in rough draft. But it is my discovery and a present to the Valentine Hollingsworth descendancy, sort of another scoop. You mutter 'Big Deal?' Read further. Stewart's book, page 110, dealing with our present biographee, Jeptha4 Hollingsworth (Jacob3, Thomas2, Valentine1, HenryA Hollinworth) committed some errors, but not of his own making, being submitted by correspondents. 'Elizabeth' Chandler is given as Jeptha's mother, in place of the correct given name Rachel. The same error appears on p. 109 (owners of this book please note). But twice on p. 110 Stewart gives us a clue to the mysterious first wife of Jeptha. He states: "D-4. JEPTHA HOLLINGSWORTH... Son of Jacob3 and Elizabeth (see note above) (Chandler) Hollingsworth. Born 1745, New Castle Co., Del. Went South. Died 1816. First married 1768, Miss Ray, of Baltimore, Md. He then married, after the Revolutionary War, Nancy Gordon, a sister of Colonel Samuel Gordon, in whose regiment (Jeptha) served during the ... War. (Emphasis ours.) Issue 1st Marriage I. Rachel5. II. Lydia5." Your editor cannot boast of a 'tedious search over decades,' as he can honestly do for other Hollingsworths, in this case. Actually, it all came about casually, and I apologise for the ho-hum aspects. It always (well, over 20 years' time, at least) intrigued me, in looking over Stewart and comparing his work with the 1884 work, and with HR Sept 1969, our all-time best seller, the update on V.H. and his children and grandchildren etc., that nobody had come up with a clue to this "Miss Ray" of Baltimore. Again, years ago, I took notes in the endlessly informative records of the Prerogative Court of Maryland. Years ago (work notebook 23-1967!) we put down, on 29 June 1967, to be exact, maybe sitting at the same exact Recordak microfilm reader at which I now daily sit and "labour," "list of desperate debts due the estate of JOHN ORME of Frederick County, Maryland, 1773, in Vol. 113, p. 98, including JEPTHA HOLLINGSWORTH, 'Acct in Bar'" I went right on with the work of a client and, when finished on the little notebook, I tucked it into a drawer. I rediscovered it on March 7th of this year. Actually, the county was not there noted, but that was quickly remedied by consulting the General Index to Maryland Prerogative Inventories, a manuscript on microfilm. Why I noted the above was because I had a client interested in the famous Maryland families of Beall and Orme. Jeptha was incidental, a casual find. But the rediscovery of this little notation in l988 was immediately recognized for its true value. It supplied the clue to his former residence 'before the Revolutionary War,' as Stewart puts it. Naturally, a next project was to examine Frederick County records for more data. We hold the General Index to Land Records, and, upon a search, quick as the flick of the film reader switch, I located both a Grantee and a Grantor entry for Jeptha Hollingsworth. We now give extracts of both, with their references, the second of which gives us the first name of his first wife: