Source:Allred, Marilyn. Town of Warwick, Franklin County, Massachusetts, Genealogical Records 1739-1900, Births, Marriages,

Source The town of Warwick, Franklin County, Massachusetts, genealogical records 1739-1900, births, marriages, deaths
of the inhabitants that lived in Warwick, MA. Taken from the handwritten chronological records and cemetary [sic] records of the town of Warwick, MA
Author Allred, Marilyn
Coverage
Place Warwick, Franklin, Massachusetts, United States
Subject Family tree, Vital records
Publication information
Type Book
Date issued 2000
Citation
Allred, Marilyn. The town of Warwick, Franklin County, Massachusetts, genealogical records 1739-1900, births, marriages, deaths: of the inhabitants that lived in Warwick, MA. Taken from the handwritten chronological records and cemetary [sic] records of the town of Warwick, MA. (2000).
Repositories
Family History Libraryhttp://www.familysearch.org/eng/library/fhlcatal..Other

[Note: a direct study of the handwritten vital records of Warwick has been completed, and used to input data into WeRelate. See Vital Records of Warwick for more information.]

As a person with ancestors from Warwick, I have seen this book mentioned a lot, and finally discovered you can download a PDF copy from the website of the Warwick Historical Society: [1] and from the town of Warwick website: [2]! This is great, because apparently (according to this post) only 5 copies were made and 3 were lost.

Alternately, one can order the FHL film of Warwick vital records, film 1888692, to see the original records [Note: the records are now online, see here.]. Otherwise, Warwick records were not always easily accessible, so this source was used a lot by early researchers.

From the introduction:

I have spent three years in reading and compiling the Vital Statistics of the Town of Warwick, Franklin County, Massachusetts, from 1739-1900, into families in alphabetical order. This has been a labor of love, and began with my desire to search out my own ancestors who lived in Warwick, Ma., ...

With all possible respect for the unselfishness of such an effort, I must comment that I am disappointed. Hopefully, I am just being overly critical. Time will tell, as I have re-ordered the film to find out.

The biggest problem is the style of writing. The records are not just copied and alphabetized, or even abstracted and alphabetized. Rather, you get a genealogy-style write-up that has lost all wording and context that may have once been in the original records. Clearly other inputs have entered into the data presented (she states in the subtitle "handwritten chronological records and cemetary records"), but facts coming from the town's vital records are not distinguished, so you can't tell which information is based on town records, and which may have been inserted by the author, and if so, from what source. Probably most of the time, she is correct, but for all practical purposes, this must be treated as a secondary source due to these failings.

The first family I investigated I found an obvious error, and also a discrepancy with Warwick VRs as indexed from film 1888692 on familysearch.org. So, we're not off to a good start. Indexing on familysearch.org is far from reliable, so I have ordered the film of the original records. To be continued... --Jrich 03:29, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

A spot check turned up a few Jan/Jun errors (e.g., Lydia Morss, born "January 7. 1764", reported in Allred as "7 Jun 1764"). But on the other hand, Allred records the name of "Icibind" as Icybrinda when it does not appear to be spelled that way in any record (other records show "Isabinda", "Icibinda"). So people that are interested in preciseness will have to bypass Allred. (These comparisons refer to the FHL film 1888692. Since Allred lived in Cloverdale, California, and did her work in 2000, one must assume she used the FHL film as her source. Book 1 on the film is actually a copy made by the town, and not the original records. So extreme preciseness may actually require a trip to Massachusetts.)
In the case mentioned above, it turns out Allred was wrong in regards to both the obvious error and the discrepancy with familysearch indexing. It appears that she adjusted a date from what the records says (int. "June" spelled out, marriage "July" spelled out, Allred says intention in January with no marriage date specified) possibly to make the birth of the first child be more proper. One issue is that Allred has made an obvious mistake. A second issue is that this is done with no discussion or indication that a deviation from the records has been made. The net effect is that the records have been misrepresented. This is exactly why Allred's format is so disturbing: because it tries to serves other purposes, to the possible detriment of accurately transmitting the content of the records. --Jrich 16:01, 27 October 2013 (UTC)
Since the postings above, I have worked with this source extensively, comparing it to the town records that it is supposed to be based on. I have found hundreds, if not thousands, of errors. Like many researchers, Allred wants to provide answers. She often identifies people as those with the same name that she knows about because they were born in Warwick when the correct identification is a birth elsewhere with they or their family moving to Warwick. This source shows little sign that reference was made to wills, deeds, and even census records. I have found even it to be full of errors that can't be explained by the narrowness of its focus: errors simply transmitting data correctly (e.g., here, here), discrepancies between two pages talking about the same person, errors are which are obvious based on age considerations. For example, see the notes on:
I often check Allred for hints when I am starting a family, but I never trust her, nor am I surprised when I find a new error. --Jrich 22:46, 28 December 2019 (UTC)