Copying Book: Secretary's Letters, 1860 (page 168)

Aug. 16 [186]4

Cha^s. F. Shimmin Esq.

Dear Sir,

Your deed had
not come to me when I saw you the other
day. Since then it was handed in for record
together with a very scaly looking deed from
Garder to Mrs Hood. -- As you executed
it as the Ex^orof Mrs Parkman, I feared
you had made an error therein and went to
the Probate office here to see if I could trace
the title. Not finding it, & remembering being
once shown a place in Brighton, when I was
a little boy, as that of David Parkman,
I thought I would refer to the records
in Middlesex county: and there found a
will of David Parkman, of Cambridge, in which
all his personal estate was given absolutely to his
widow, Mary George Parkman, and "all real
^ ^{& personal} estate in reversion or expectancy, to my wife Mary G.,
to be held and endorsed by her during her natural
life, and after her decease to be divided equally
between my two youngest children, Charles M.
& Mary H. Parkman," &c. -- In the inventory, to which
I turned, with a view if possible of further inden--
tification (for I had never heard of his living in Camb.)
I found returned "no real estate". & under
the head of personal, 2^nd item -- "Lot in Mt
Auburn $75." -- This I dare say was the
source of your error. The charter of our Corpⁿ
declares every lot to be real estate, and no inven--
tory or other process could change it to personal.
Real estate then goes directly to the heirs. If
the second clause above quoted "real estate
in reversion or expectancy" does not cover it --
by which it went to your wife & Mr Chas. M.
upon the decease of Mrs P., still it would
go as real estate in possession and not
referred to in the will, to his heirs general;
and I infer from the assent of C.M. & M.H. as
the only heirs of Mrs P. to the probate of her will,
that Edward B. has deceased, without
issue. If that is the case, then the
same persons are ^^now heirs general of

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