There are times when reading a document that it is clear someone made a mistake. A place name is spelled incorrectly, a year of birth has the last two digits transposed, a maiden name for a mother is the last name of her third husband, etc. Despite the error (real or perceived), a document should be transcribed exactly as written. It may be helpful to put a “[sic]” (without the parenthesis) after such an error to indicate that the word was written that way on the actual record.
Never correct when transcribing a document. Transcriptions are always true to the original, at least as much as possible. We want to know what something actually said. Our correction may not be so correct after all.
If there are statements that you are reasonably certain are incorrect, indicate that in your commentary on the document–which should be placed in a set of brackets to separate it from the text of the document. This is best done and the very end of the transcription. Also include your sources and reasoning to explain the correction to the perceived error.
No responses yet