i'm doing 1840...finally

After Samantha's death, and Quentin was cleared of the witchcraft charge, he found a letter from her, telling him she had lied, and that Tad, indeed was his son.

Well, that was handy, wasn't it?   Did Q #1 prove this?    We may just not know, but Tad could have been made heir anyway.   

Well, they didn't have DNA tests back then. I don't know how they went about establishing paternity in those days.

Prior to DNA, paternity would have been determined by blood type, as in given a child's blood type (and possibly the mother's?), a man's blood type could include or exclude him as potentially being the father. But I don't believe that was very advanced in 1840. Actually, it might not have even been available at all because I *think* the major discoveries pertaining to blood types didn't come until at least a few decades later.

I took Samantha's letter to mean that she lied about the whole affair, and that Quentin was the only possible father. Besides, we know that Tad is obviously Quentin's son, due to those persistent Collins' genes!!

For the record, I thought this admission by Samantha was not very believable and very out of character for her. Aside from that, why and when did she possibly write that?? When she died, it was still understood that Quentin would be executed within days, so I don't see why she would even expect this letter to ever be read. A minor blunder by the writers IMO, they would have been better off never mentioning it again ...

The announcement of that letter seemed like the equivalent of ... I don't know... a telegram arriving from God saying that it's always going to be sunny from now on and there will never be any trouble in the world ever again, hurrah!     You know, something thrown in there to make the happy ending even happier.

Yes, come to think of it, I might add that letter to the list of dumbest things that ever were made to happen on the show.

LOL Magnus! I could use a letter like that.

LOL Magnus! I could use a letter like that.

Sort of a Get-Out-of-Misery-Free Card....