Analysis of hearth tax assessments

ANALYSIS OF CAMBRIDGESHIRE HEARTH TAX ASSESSMENTS, ARMINGFORD AND THRIPLOW HUNDREDS, 1662, 1666, 1674

Introductory Note

The following analyses have been prepared from the Cambridgeshire Hearth Tax Assessments preserved in the Public Record Office for 1662 Michaelmas [E 179/84/436], 1666 Lady Day [E 179/244/22], and 1674 Lady Day [E 179/244/23]. The Assessments have been full described, and the nature of the tax and value of its records have been briefly discussed, in V.C.H. Cambs. iii. 500 and iv. 272. The 1662 lists were prepared by petty constables in June and early July 1662 and were designed to be simply lists of taxpayers, although during the next eighteen months many persons in the lists secured exemption. The 1666 lists were made out in the summer of 1666, after collection had taken place, by the officers of George Wilmot, the sub-farmer, and are drawn up under the headings of 'Paid' and 'Unpaid'; many of the persons with one or two hearths included under the latter heading may have been entitled to exemption, but the lists do not indicate them since they were included as taxpayers in default. The lists for 1674 were made out by the sub-collectors of Edward Miller, the receiver, with the assistance of parish officials, during the spring and summer of 1674, after collection had been made. They are divided into taxpayers and those legally exempt by certificate. Among the taxpayers the owners of empty or recently destroyed houses or hearths and the occupiers of houses recently built or with new hearths in them are distinguished. The exempt may include paupers, even though they did not need to be certified. The exemption certificates themselves survive incompletely and are heavily damaged [E 179/326/10].

The three documents have been analysed on the same principle. Against each place is given, in separate columns, the total of entries recording persons as occupiers of from one to ten hearths and a further column give the occupiers of houses with 11 or more hearths: final columns give the total number of entries and hearths in each place. For 1662 only one line is needed for each place. For 1666 three lines are needed: for those recorded as 'Paid'; for the 'Unpaid'; and for the combined total of the two categories. For 1674 up to four lines may be needed: for the taxpayers; for those among the taxpayers who owned empty houses, etc.; for the exempt; and for the combined total of those categories. For eight of the twenty-three places in the two hundreds no exempt are recorded. That may be due to three reasons. There may have been no exempt to certify; the certified from neighbouring places may have been included in a single certificate; the certificate may have reached the clerk of the peace too late for enrolment. Among the 1674 certificates which survive there are none for places which are without exempt in the roll. Certificates also survive which were made out in 1672, or early in 1673, apparently for the three collections from Lady Day 1672 to Lady Day 1673 [E 179/84/440]. They include certificates, or lists for two places on a single certificate, for three places which are without exempt in 1674. There are none for the other five places (Croydon, East Hatley, Foxton, Thriplow, Stapleford); that suggests that those places may have had none needing certification, though all may have had paupers who did not need certificates. It has therefore been thought useful to give the number of persons in the certificates of 1672 as footnotes to each hundred in the table for 1674. The number is in some cases less than the number of names originally entered on the certificate because in a few certificates some names were cancelled before, or when, the justices of the peace countersigned them. In general, attention is also drawn in footnotes to a few special entries, chiefly of almshouses or town houses; and to differences, through faulty addition, between the total number of hearths in the recorded entries and the total given in the documents.

In conclusion, a word may be said about the relative comprehensiveness of the assessments. It may be understood that in all lists a person may occur more than once when as a landlord he or she is entered for the hearths in a tenant's house; but in general the number of entries represents households. There is very little difference between the totals of entries for 1666 and 1674. Each is within six or fewer of the other with one exception, Melbourn, where that for 1674 is greater by 14. In Armingford hundred the 1674 lists give the highest number of entries for 6 places; the 1666 lists give the highest number for 4 places; the 1662 lists give the highest number for 2 places; in the remaining place the numbers in 1662 and 1674 are equal. In Thriplow hundred the 1674 lists give the highest number of entries for 5 places, the 1666 lists for 3 places, a 1662 list for one place, and in one place the 1674 and 1662 lists have the same highest number. In the hundreds as a whole the 1674 lists have slightly the highest number of entries for both Armingford and Thriplow hundreds. Since the 1662 lists were intended to include only taxpayers their number of entries is naturally the lowest of the three assessments for most places and, in total, for both hundreds. But since far more details of the 1662 assessments survive for the country as a whole than from any other date, those lists are the most useful for comparative studies of England and Wales generally.

1662 Michaelmas

1666 Lady Day

1674 Lady Day