Deed: Israel Cooper of Independence Twp, Warren Co., N.J. → Robert C. Shaw of Stillwater, Sussex Co., $135, one half acre in Independence Twp, executed 23 January 1835 / acknowledged 28 February 1835 / recorded 3 March 1835. Warren County Deeds Book 12, page 577.

What this document records

✅✅ its signature is now controlled and holds

CONTROL RUN 2026-09-27 — THE SUBSCRIPTION Israel Cooper IS NOT A CLERICAL ARTIFACT. The doubt, which was properly on the record: this is a register copy in the clerk's hand, not an autograph, so a written-out name might only mean that the clerk wrote names out. Israel Cooper lists "one clerk's practice differs from another" among the competing explanations for the signature-versus-mark problem. The control settles it for this register. [K.87] — the Parker × Howell deed, the same DGS 8355702, the same Kennedy Clerk — subscribes three grantors on one instrument as Henry Parker, Charlotte her X mark Parker and Susannah Parker. ⇒ This register preserves the signature/mark distinction faithfully. ⇒ So when it gives Israel Cooper with no mark, the original bore a signature — and the nineteen-week objection at Israel Cooper stands and is strengthened. Scope: this controls the WARREN register only. The Ohio marks at [K.98], [K.100] and [K.105] are other clerks in other registers; the symmetric test — do those registers ever render a signature? — is untried.

🔴 correction the middle initial is t not f

THIS ENTRY READ THE ADJOINING OWNER AS Jacob F Sharp. IT IS Jacob T Sharp. Corrected 2026-09-11 at [K.91] t2's prompting. What settled it is a SIGNATURE. [K.91] — Jacob T Sharp and Hannah Ann his wife to this same Robert C. Shaw, Warren Deeds bk 12 pp. 71-73 — writes Jacob T three times over: in the caption, in the body, and in his own hand at the foot of the deed. [K.85]'s grantee index reads T as well. A man's own signature is the best evidence of his own middle initial, and two further independent instances stand behind it. This deed's own frame was re-examined (DGS 8355702 image 318, the phrase “adjoining land purchased by the said Robert C Shaw of Jacob ? Sharp”, cropped at 6×). The glyph is a single-crossbar capital, consistent with T — but it does NOT by itself exclude F, because both letters carry a crossbar in this clerk's hand. So the correction rests on K.91 and K.85, not on a re-reading of this image; the image is recorded as consistent, not as decisive.

🎯 the headline he was alive and selling in 1835

Israel Cooper Israel Cooper was living in Independence Township, Warren County, and conveying land there on 23 January 1835 — thirty-three years after [K.83]'s 1802 purchase. Until 2026-09-08 this catalog treated him as a man who appears once in 1802 and vanishes.

🔑 the deed closes the identity loop itself

THE DOCUMENT STATES ITS OWN PROVENANCE, so this is not an inference: ⇒ "…containing one half of an acre of land being the same lots of land the present grantor purchased of Samuel Cooper…" (read at 4.5×). That identifies this grantor with the grantee of [K.55] — Samuel Cooper & Sally his wife → Israel Cooper, 2 May 1831, Warren Deeds Bk 9 p. 241. Same parcel, named as such by the clerk. It does NOT reach back to [K.83]'s 1802 buyer. That identification remains open — see the abutter note below, which is suggestive and nothing more.

🔴 he conveyed alone no wife no dower release

THE ACKNOWLEDGMENT NAMES ISRAEL COOPER AND NOBODY ELSE. "Personally appeared before the subscriber one of the Judges of the inferior court of Common Pleas in and for said County of Warren Israel Cooper … he did acknowledge that he signed sealed and delivered the same as his act and deed." AND THE REGISTER DEMONSTRABLY RECORDS DOWER RELEASES WHEN THEY EXIST. The deed immediately above this one on the very same page ends "…apart from her said husband did acknowledge that she signed sealed and delivered the same freely without any fear threats or compulsion from her said husband" — the standard married-grantor form, and [K.55] carries it too for Samuel's wife Sally. ⇒ Israel had no wife releasing dower in January 1835. Evidence, not proof — a conveyance could in principle be taken without it — but the contrast is on the same page, in the same clerk's hand. The natural readings are that he was a widower or unmarried.

✍️ he signed his own name

The deed is subscribed Israel Cooper with a seal — a signature, not a mark. ⇒ He was literate. And this is the first likeness-tier image the catalog holds of him — a signature is second in the Image-hunt preference order, and no portrait of a man of his generation is likely to exist.

The parcel

One half of an acre, in Independence Township, "adjoining land purchased by the said Robert C Shaw of Jacob T Sharp", and metes-and-bounds: "Beginning at a stone for a corner in the origin[al] line of Thomas Parkers land thence 1 along the old line South twenty two degrees east three chains to a stone in the aforesaid old line thence 2 North sixty eight degrees east one chain and sixty seven links to a stone corner thence 3 North twenty two degrees west three chains to another stone corner thence 4 South sixty eight degrees west one chain and sixty seven links to the place of Beginning." 3 chains × 1 chain 67 links = 0.50 acre, which matches the stated area exactly. [K.55] transcribed the same parcel's second call as one chain & thirty seven links — that would give 0.41 acre and contradict the stated half acre. sixty seven is almost certainly the correct reading and [K.55]'s thirty seven a slip. Re-check [K.55]'s image.

✅ and thomas parker turns out to be the source of title

Resolved 2026-09-09 by [K.86], the quitclaim recorded three pages later in this same volume: this half acre was "part of a lot of land that I inherited of my Father Thomas Parker", released by his daughter [name.548] Sarah Karr formerly Sarah Parker. ⇒ Thomas Parker is not merely a boundary that recurs — the lot came OUT of his land. This still does NOT identify [K.83]'s 1802 buyer with this grantor — see below, which stands unchanged. And [K.86] is an HEIR'S QUITCLAIM, not the dower release absent from this deed. The "he conveyed alone, no wife" finding above is untouched by it.

📌 thomas parker again the third time

Thomas Parker is the abutter named in ALL THREE Israel Cooper deeds: [K.83] (1802, 25 acres, "Thomas Parker's lot"), [K.55] (1831, "the original line of Thomas Parker's land") and this one (1835, the same words). This is a LOCATING fact, not an identity proof. A township neighbourhood keeps its landmarks for decades, and a single well-known abutter can bound many parcels. Do not convert three appearances of one neighbour into one man — the identity of [K.83]'s buyer with this grantor is argued at Israel Cooper and is not settled here.

⚠️ and a question this raises about the 25 acres

This is a HALF ACRE. [K.83]'s 1802 tract was TWENTY-FIVE ACRES. ⇒ Whatever became of the 25 acres, it is not this transaction. And [K.53]'s Warren grantor index (1825-1911) shows only ONE Israel Cooper sale — this one. [K.26] shows no Israel Cooper grantor in Sussex at any date. ⇒ The 25-acre tract was never conveyed away by an Israel Cooper in either county. Three ordinary explanations, none established: it passed to heirs by descent without a deed; it was conveyed by someone else (a widow, an heir, under another name); or the 1802 buyer and this grantor are two different men.