We now have a good run of Land Tax records for the years 1780 – 1832, and we are beginning to transcribe them. They show the “proprietors” and “occupiers” of each property. There were 25 names in 1780, 20 in 1800, and 35 in 1832 – hardly an explosion in population or wealth! Surprisingly, the amount assessed remained at £277 over this fifty year period.

These records should show the movement of people into and out of the Old Town and new village, at least men of the “middling sort”. Probably not including the agricultural labourers on Lord Milton’s 8 000 acre estate, for which there is only the Overseers of the Poor Books, until the 1841 census.