Signatures are often-overlooked scraps of information that yield not only obvious clues about literacy, but also subtleties like depth and quality of education and preferred names, spellings and pronunciations. They are also, in original documents, tangible traces of our forebears’ corporality — evidence that that they were once here.

This is the fourth in a series of posts featuring the signatures of men and women born before 1900, men and women who could not take even a basic education for granted.

• Amos Batts (1876-1937), 1917, Wilson County death certificate of Cain Artis.

• Clifton M. Wells (1894-1971), 1917, World War I draft registration card.

• Jacob Astor Tabron (1886-1917), 1917, World War I draft registration card.

• Lee A. Moore (1863-1948), top: 1898, inside leaf of book; bottom: 1905, Wilson County marriage license of Fannie McGowan and Henry Matt Daniel.

• Braswell R. Winstead (ca. 1860-1926), 1892, Wilson County marriage license of James J. Wilson and Susie Harriss.

• John Adam Wilson (1898-??), 1918, World War I draft registration card.

• Ellen Brodie, Ione Holden, Eddie McCullers, 1903, Wilson County marriage license of George Brodie and Gertrude Ennis.