Search Dorset Hemp and Flax Growers

Each record includes a transcript of the original record. The information contained in the records varies however you may be able to find out a combination of the following:

• First name(s)
• Last name
• Event year
• Residence
• Fields
• Place
• Quarter sessions quarter
• Entry number
• Parish where grown
• Year crop grown
• Flax stones
• Bounty pounds
• Bounty shillings
• Bounty pence
• Churchwarden’s first name
• Church warden’s last name
• Overseer’s first name
• Overseer’s last name
• Recognisance 1’s first name
• Recognisance 1’s last name
• Recognisance 1’s parish
• Recognisance 2’s first name
• Recognisance 2’s last name
• Recognisance 2’s parish

The Dorset Hemp and Flax Growers is an alphabetical index of growers of flax and hemp compiled from bounty claim forms, newspapers, recognisances, pay lists and returns. The index contains 3,350 entries about bounties for hemp and flax growing between the years 1782 and 1793. Most of the entries are for Dorset, although a few are for Somerset and Devon.

All except the newspapers were documents involved in the implementation of the Government act providing for bounties for dressed fibre ready for market to be paid to encourage growing of hemp and flax.