Hearth Tax Payers 1672, Reighton and Speeton

REIGHTON:
Hearth Tax Payers 1672, Reighton and Speeton

Hearth tax was levied from 1662 to 1689 to cover a shortfall in the royal coffers caused by the Civil War. It was paid by the occupiers of a building rather than its owners and was charged at a rate of 2 shillings a year payable in two instalments due at Lady Day (25 March) and Michaelmas. In effect it gives an idea of the number of households in a settlement together with the names of the heads of household. There were, however, exemptions to the tax.