http://search.ancestry.com/search/db.aspx?dbid=2793

Source Information:
Ancestry.com. New Jersey, Abstract of Wills, 1670-1817 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: 
Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.
Original data: New Jersey State Archives. New Jersey, Published Archives Series, First Series. Trenton, 
New Jersey: John L Murphy Publishing Company.
 
About New Jersey, Abstract of Wills, 1670-1817:
This database contains 13 volumes of details abstracted from early New Jersey 
wills.

Historical Background:
In 1846, the New Jersey Historical Society urged the state legislature to gather 
copies of documents relating to the history of the state, both in the country and 
those in London that dealt with the colony's early days. The Society got the 
support it was looking for in 1872 and began assembling and editing the 
materials that would be printed as the New Jersey Archives: Documents Relating 
to the Colonial History of the State of New Jersey. The Archives include copies of 
records from a wide variety of documents from the state's early history, with 
some predating the earliest permanent European settlement of Bergen in 1660.
The abstracts in this database are summaries of original wills and associated 
documents deposited with provincial secretaries, the secretary of state (until 
about 1804), and eventually county clerks in early New Jersey. The 13 volumes 
contain abstracts for thousands of wills (more than 3,000 in one volume alone), 
which, along with valuable genealogical details, offer a glimpse into the times and 
lives of the testators. The preface in the first volume of wills offers this 
description:
For an intimate revelation of social conditions in New Jersey during the first sixty-
five years of English supremacy it would be difficult to imagine a volume richer in 
material than this. From about 1680 it was the general practice to deposit wills 
with the Provincial Secretaries, by whom they were filed or recorded—usually 
both,—together with inventories of estates, accounts of executors and 
administrators, and other papers pertaining to such matters, and many odd 
documents having no apparent relation thereto—as ante-nuptial contracts, 
marriage licenses, and the like. These records were brought together in 1790 or 
shortly thereafter, in the office of the Secretary of State at Trenton, where they 
are now carefully arranged and preserved.

What You Can Find in These Records:
Abstracts capture and summarize the main points of a will and can include 
details such as dates, names, place of residence, spouse, family members, date 
proved, executors, the value of an inventory made of the estate, and descriptions 
of real estate and bequests. Documents abstracted may also include inventories 
and records related to administrations and guardianships.
Entries are arranged alphabetically by name of the testator. Some volumes also 
provide an index of names in the back. These indexes do not include the names 
of the testators, but they list names found within the entries, which can be a 
valuable research tool. Also, if you find an entry that you want to trace back to 
the original source, it can be helpful to refer to the preface for the volume. Not all 
volumes have a preface, but most do, and these typically explain to some degree 
where the original came from as well as abbreviations and other particulars of the 
abstracts.
Some of the older wills include double-year dating to correct for the change to the 
Gregorian calendar; however, this has not been supplied on all the relevant 
entries.