Find your ancestors in Cheshire Land Tax Assessments 1786-1832

Discover your ancestors through the Cheshire Land Tax Assessments. Search through over two million records by your ancestor’s name or town. Almost 450 towns are included in the land tax assessments. Further your family history search by exploring our range of Cheshire records. The majority of the records cover the years 1786-1832, but there are some earlier records dating as far back as 1700 and some more recent records dating to 1908 included.

The records include an image of the original land tax assessment and an individual transcript of the document. The details in each transcript can differ but usually will include:

• First name
• Last name
• Year
• Residence
• Proprietor or occupier

The record’s image will give you additional details. Through the years the records differ slightly, but for most will include:

• Who owns the property
• Name of the occupier
• Amount of tax money collected for that year

The tax amount is listed in pre-decimal amounts of pounds, shillings and pence.

Discover more about the Cheshire Land Tax Assessments

The Land Tax Assessments are important for those looking into their family history because they can give you a locality for your ancestors. It will also give you an understanding of their social standing as in whether or not your family were landowners.

Land Tax first started in England in 1692. The land tax assessments were administered by the Court of Quarter Sessions, these were local courts which were generally sat in the county’s town or seat. In Cheshire the county town is Chester. After 1780 the Land Tax Assessments were also used by the Clerks of the Peace as voter registration for parliamentary elections. For that reason most counties still have a large portion of their Land Tax records from 1780 until about 1832. The Land Tax was abolished in 1963.

While searching these records, keep in mind that not everyone within the town was recorded. Only those responsible for the property were listed. Often poorer sub-tenants or labourers were not listed on the assessments. In many of the Land Tax record images you will read at the top: ‘the rate of four shillings in the pound,’ which meant that for every pound (20s) earned in revenue on the land, the landowner was taxed four shillings. The records do not make clear whether the land being taxed includes shops, pastures, farmhouses, etc. This makes it hard to compare taxes paid across towns or parishes.

Understanding pre-decimal money

Prior to decimalisation in 1971, English money was written as pounds, shillings and pence or £,s,d. In some records you will find it written as L,s,d from the original Latin: libra, solidus and denarius. In the Cheshire Land Tax Assessments you will find that all the money is pre-decimal. The value for each currency unit is: 1£ equals 20s or 240d; 1s equals 12d.

Towns included in the Cheshire Land Tax Assessments

The Cheshire Land Tax includes about 450 towns. To assist with your research we have included a table of the towns included within the records.