England Voting Records: Difference between revisions

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== Online Resources ==

*Those receiving public alms, their spouses and children until 1918.  

*Those whose names have been omitted from the register.  

=== Early Electoral Records  ===

Freeholders lists provide at least the names of qualifying persons, and from 1832 their addresses and the qualifying property was specified, as shown below.  

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'''Chart: Freeholders and Freemen'''<br>  

Aldous (''The Archives of the Freedom of the City of London 1681-1915''. Genealogists’ Magazine Vol. 23 #4, page 128-133, 1989, and My Ancestors were Freemen of the City of London, 1999) and Medlycott (''The City of London Freedom Registers''. Genealogists’ Magazine Vol. 19 #2, page 45-47, 1977) give more details, and Aldous’ 2003 article (''Records of King’s Freemen in the City of London in the 18th and 19th Centuries''. Genealogists’ Magazine Vol. 27 #9, page 415-421) describes another group called ''King’s Freemen'' who were discharged soldiers and sailors. Many freeman lists are filmed for example:  

:*On the Thomson-Gale website of old documents City of London liverymen were listed by company and then letter of the alphabet in a ''Canvassing Book'', that is a list of eligible men (see chart below) with their address, trade and company name. Note that even in 1776 not all men were members of the company indicated by their trade.

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=== Poll Books 1694-1872  ===

Returning Officers were required from 1696 to compile ''a list of voters'' and ''how they voted''. This was to prevent irregularities in parliamentary elections by biased returning officers. The electorate was limited to freeholders so was quite small at this time. Soon after, the poll books were produced commercially so many copies were available up until 1872 when the free vote came in. The parliamentary poll books for boroughs often contained only a dozen or so names, and may have been published in the local newspaper instead of a booklet. Most poll books are for parliamentary elections but some were published for elections of county coroners.  

Other examples include:  

*''Bath Poll Book 1855, Banbury Poll 1859 and 1865'', were published inexpensively by the Open University (Drake).

An 1841 poll book for Westminster confirms that there were, indeed, two men called Thomas Abbott who lived in Silver Street at that time (Chart below).  

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Extensive bribery and corruption attended elections until 1872; votes were literally bought, and since your affiliation was in print for all to see, many pressures were brought to bear on electors. The last General Election where who you voted for was noted was in 1868, secret ballots (the free vote) being introduced from 1872. County and borough rate books were compiled from the latter part of the 19th century and were used as the basis for the right to vote in municipal and county elections (see section on ''rates''). Since these were wider than the parliamentary franchise there are more people included, an example is given below.  

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=== Recent Electoral Registers  ===

*Those present at meetings.

== References  ==

[[Category:England Electoral Records]]