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Lea and Cleverton, Wiltshire - Land Tax

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Some years are missing from the records: 1781, 1832. After 1833, there are records for just a few years: 1854, 1856, 1860-61, 1862-, 1870-71.

Cautionary note: The spelling of a particular name is very variable - I tried to record most of the variations, but did not change every name every time it changed in the original record. If you try to "FIND" a particular name, use as many variations as you can think of.

Notes from "Dictionary of Genealogy" by Terrick FitzHugh:

Land tax was introduced in 1693 - a quota was assigned to a county, and local assessors assigned quotas to parishes, and then within the parish to individual property holders. Initially salaries and movable property were included in the tax, but that did not work out very well. Assessments were then confined to real estate, tithes, and some buildings. From 1780, duplicate tax records were lodged with the Clerk of the Peace, to be used to establish the qualifications of parliamentary voters. The records were kept intermittently after 1832.

From 1772 the tax was four shillings in a pound (20%). In 1798, the owners were allowed to buy themselves out of the liability by a lump sum purchase of 15 years tax. The amounts still appear on the records, with the tax in the "sums assessed and exonerated" column. By 1815 about one third of the land had thus been "redeemed".

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[Transcription by Megan Thompson, 10 Arcadia Road, Epsom, Auckland, NZ.]