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: