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Old 04-05-22, 22:26
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Okay, having read back through the thread, and looked at the wills etc. I don't have an answer to 1 or 2, but to numbers 3 and 4 - Mrs didn't specifically mean a married woman or widow in those days, it just meant a woman of relatively high social status. So Mrs Donclere, spinster, does make sense in that context. Since she is called Seraphina Donclere in both her own will and Dunbar Hunter's will, and her will mentions William Slessor but does not call him her husband, and Dunbar Hunter's will mentions Seraphina but does not call her his wife, it seems pretty clear that she was not legally married to either of them and that is why it says "spinster".

The heading "Intestates" seems to be used as a general term for those deceased people whose estates were granted administration rather than probate. The grant for Seraphina's estate was administration with the will attached, because the person whom she named executor had died and so could not apply for probate.
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