All genealogical research depends on authentic vital and historical records. Researchers of Stamford, Connecticut, an important New England town founded in 1641, have long depended on flawed transcriptions and abstracts of early town records. This new book, an extensively annotated version of the Town of Stamford’s 1882 transcription, rectifies that situation. Paul R. Finch has consulted the original records (which are fragile and partly illegible) and other primary sources, and incorporated research by Donald Lines Jacobus and others. Finch’s extensive annotations fill gaps, correct errors, and offer helpful explanations—as well as refer the reader to reliable sources. The end result is a more complete and consistent view of Stamford’s past: a significant contribution to genealogical knowledge as well as to the historical record.

Finch’s meticulous transcription and annotation of the earliest Stamford Town Records will be invaluable to all researchers of early Connecticut history and will lead to improved insights into the history of this town and its first settlers.

—Robert Charles Anderson, FASG, director of the Great Migration Study Project

All early town records should be made available in this form . . . Mr. Finch deserves high praise for this volume.

—David L. Greene, FASG, editor of The American Genealogist

Transcribed and annotated by Paul R. Finch
Published: October 2011