Land Tax

The land tax was a national tax levied on landowners from the 1690s. Only one complete set of returns for 1798 survives for England and Wales (in the National Archives), but many returns are available in local record offices. The returns (or 'duplicates' as they are often known) were made for each township and record the names of owners and occupiers and the sum to which they were assessed.

Doncaster Archives has available the returns for Doncaster borough from 1775 to 1811 (and a few earlier years) and for 41 other places in the area at various dates between 1781 and 1926. Later returns are less useful as it was possible to buy out liability to the tax, and so be excluded from the return.

A complete series of returns for the whole of the West Riding from 1781 to 1832 is to be found amongst the quarter sessions records at the West Yorkshire Archive Service Headquarters at Wakefield.

Land Tax Returns

Gaps in the sequence are only shown when they are of ten years or more.