Paul, Thanks. That is about what I suspected. There is a book called "A Place in Time" about the area that eventually became Middlesex Co., VA (that county was created about 1673, as I recall). This book is probably available at the LOVA, though I have to admit that I have not looked for it there yet. This book was written by what appears to have been a respected college professor and his wife, and I understand that he died in Florida (I'm not sure about his wife's status). There are some posts on the Middlesex Co., VA RootsWeb message board (circa 2001, as I recall) where the "posters" were hoping that the "background information" accumulated by the couple for this book could be donated to the LOVA (I have no idea if that ever happened). In any case, the above book claims that a Francis Brown died "soon after" he co-owned land in 1652/1653 with a man named Oliver Seagar/Segar. The book claims that Oliver was then left as the sole owner. Some recent "internet research" on my part indicates that Oliver Segar died himself around 1658. Some researchers suspect, however, that the Francis Brown who was associated with Oliver Segar was actually the same Francis Brown who died in Essex Co., VA in 1691/1692 (no deeds were found, apparently, that ever transferred half of the land to Oliver (or anyone else) in that 1653+ time frame). We were hoping that those transportation/land patent records might shed some light on the possible existance of TWO adult Francis Browns (father and son, perhaps, or perhaps totally unrelated) in that general area of VA in the mid-1600s. I certainly would not think that a such a statement would have been made in the above book by a respected researcher and educator, without something substantial to "back it up." Bill Davidson To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe please see the instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-roots.html