When I was young a map was part of everyday life. It was an essential component of every holiday. My father drove his little Renault 4 with an expression of grim determination. Next to him my mother clutched the map, knuckles whitening, regrettably unaware of how to relate its patterned surface to the scenery around her. The atmosphere was tense. My introduction to maps was unlikely to engender a lifelong love of them.

And yet. The History Hour on “National Mapping in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries” with presentations by Emma Down and Dave Annal reminded me, and a large, fascinated and well-informed audience, how glorious maps are and how they can be used to enhance our experience of the past. Emma explained the context and content of three national mapping surveys, whilst Dave showed how the surveys may be used with other maps, and online sources such as the census and photographs to build a detailed and evocative picture of a property through time.

Emma dealt with three important mapping exercises which substantially affected the lives of people in England and Wales over the course of a century. These were the National Farm Survey of England and Wales 1941-43, the Valuation Office Survey of 1910-1915 and the mid-nineteenth century Tithe Survey which followed the Tithe Commutation Act of 1836.

She examined the features which the three exercises had in common. Because of their coverage and scope, all three were compared to the original Domesday Book, that amazing production of 1086 in which King William sought to discover exactly what he’d acquired when he won the battle of Hastings and became King of England. Remind yourself of the glory that is Domesday here https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/domesday/discover-domesday/ .

The surveys were made for different purposes but using them singly or together provides information on community change over time including the transition from a nation dominated by agriculture to one where industrialisation and urbanisation altered the landscape forever. 

The National Farm Survey was undertaken during World War 2 by the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries (MAF), to maximise the production of home grown food rendering the nation more self-reliant, and cutting down on transport problems (sounds familiar doesn’t it!). MAF appointed County War Agricultural Executive Committees in each county. These “War Ag Committees” wielded considerable power; they could tell farmers what to grow, decide to utilise hitherto dormant land, and even repossess land which was not being well-managed. They were often not popular.

The evidence of the Survey survives today at The National Archives. There is a research guide available here https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-with-your-research/research-guides/national-farm-survey-england-wales-1941-1943/ The records consist of forms completed by the farmers (and small-holders, poultry keepers, market gardeners and anybody responsible for more than 5 acres of land) , the Primary Farm Record of each site made by the members of the War Ag Committee, and the annotated large scale Ordnance Survey Maps.

The farmers’ forms record in great detail the quantities of fruit and vegetables produced, stocks of hay and straw, the extent of agricultural land, the labour and engines available, the rent paid and the length of occupancy of each farm. The maps show the boundaries of each farm, and are helpful in locating properties which may have been lost over the years to urbanisation – as an example Emma used a farm on the outskirts of Taunton, Somerset; Google Earth shows the fields transformed into housing estates and the old farmhouse now a pub within the new community.

The Primary Farm Record completed by the War Ag Committee Inspectors was in four sections dealing with ‘tenure’ (whether the farmer was a tenant or owner) the ‘conditions of farm’ which examined layout, soil type, the condition of buildings and pest control, water and electricity provision to the farm and finally ‘management’ in which the inspector classified the farm as “A” “B” or “C” grade on the basis of how well the farmer was managing his resources. When a bad rating was not due to age or infirmity but blamed on perceived lack of initiative or ability the object was to introduce improvements, but the process was controversial and some of its conclusions deeply unpopular. Emma noted that the most interesting inspectors’ comments are often on the “C” graded farms!

The talk moved next to the Valuation Office Survey of 1910-1915.  The 1910 Finance Act introduced the possibility of a new tax (hurrah!) based on the increased value of land as a result of public money spent on communal infrastructure and known as “increment value duty”.  It was therefore necessary to discover who owned land, and this necessitated a survey of all property in England and Wales (and from 1911 in Scotland as well).

The Inland Revenue set up the Valuation Office, and using large scale (1: 25,000) Ordnance Survey maps it created a set of records which give significant information on thousands of properties. The National Archives holds the Field Books which contain the most detail whilst local archives around the country hold the “Valuation Books” which contain more basic information.  It can be very useful to the local or family historian to see whether a property existed at the time these records were created, but to know how many rooms it contained, the date of erection, the state of repair, and details of the tenancy is a real bonus. The survey also included public buildings such as churches, schools and police stations, and large business premises such as hotels and factories in addition to the small businesses found on the high street. Once again, The National Archives who hold the most significant of these records has produced a handy research guide https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-with-your-research/research-guides/valuation-office-survey-land-value-ownership-1910-1915/ The 1920 Finance Act repealed Increment Value Duty; the survey had cost over £2m to deliver, had not succeeded in maintaining the detail of its original ambitions and produced very little reward for the Treasury. But what a great gift it left to the historians!

Emma then took us back in time to the Tithe Survey. Historically tithes were one tenth of a farmer’s produce which went for the upkeep of the Church of England and its clergy. Places like Bradford on Avon and Abbotsbury in Dorset (thank you Dave!) have surviving and amazing tithe barns where this produce was stored. Tithes were “farmed” over time which meant they were paid not to the Church but to people who had inherited or bought the right from the Church to collect the money for themselves. Tithes themselves became increasingly unpopular as non-conformists objected to paying money into a Church whose theology they did not endorse, whilst the farming fraternity resented paying a tax to which the manufacturing classes were not subject - manufactured goods were not “tithable”.  In 1836 the Tithe Commutation Act was passed which replaced “tithes in kind” (e.g. cabbages or lambs or corn) by a more convenient monetary payment called the “tithe rentcharge”. As a result the Tithe Survey was created to discover who should be paying, and how much they should pay, based on the value of their land and holdings.

The Tithe Commissioners oversaw the local creation of three maps and apportionments for each parish – one was for the Tithe Commission itself, one for the Diocese and one for the parish. The National Archives now holds the Commissioner’s copies whilst others may often be found in local record offices. The maps show the parish at a large scale, whilst the apportionment, linked to the maps by identification numbers, list the land owner and occupier, the “state of cultivation” and the acreage. Many of these maps and apportionments have been digitised so that proper research can be conducted from the comfort of one’s sofa, with tea and biscuits to hand. All of Wales’ tithe maps are freely available here https://places.library.wales/ , and many of England’s maps are available via the Genealogist website here https://www.thegenealogist.co.uk/search/advanced/landowner/tithe-records/ and other local initiatives.

In terms of accuracy and quality we learned that Tithe maps had to be accepted by 2/3 of the landowners of the parish before submission to the Tithe Commissioners. First and Second Class maps were produced, the accuracy of the former being certified by the Commissioners. The maps were extremely variable in quality and details, often depending on the skills of local cartographers. The majority of maps were completed by the 1850s, providing a very important data set before the large scale Ordnance Survey series was created. The TNA research guide to Tithes is available here https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-with-your-research/research-guides/tithes/

Dave Annal’s talk concentrated on the use of multiple documentary – and in many cases online – resources in the creation of a family, house or area history. From his first observation that the Tithe Maps often coincide chronologically with the 1841 census, he took the audience through a research process which showed us how to juggle with sources to produce a very satisfactory outcome. As an example he traced the home of young William Harwood, an agricultural labourer, his wife Harriet and their toddlers Emelia and George, by using the tithe map to pinpoint what was so vaguely described on the census. From there it was a romp through the large scale Ordnance Survey maps available on the excellent National Library of Scotland site https://maps.nls.uk/os/ via some wonderful old photographs collected on a local history website (https://www.ayotstpeter.com/ayot-green/), into the 1913 Valuation Office Survey Book (which noted the E.C. in back garden – that’s an “earth closet” or particularly fragrant kind of lavatory to you and me) to the Google Streetview (https://www.google.co.uk/maps/) image of the very same house today – truly an elegant whistle-stop tour through 180 years. You can read a fuller account of this case study on Dave’s blog here: https://lifelinesresearch.co.uk/2020/01/12/the-joy-of-tithes/

It really was an evening to inspire the most map-phobic to get stuck in and explore the past! The two talks were beautifully complementary, and the audience was buzzing with questions and advice.

Our audience member Hazel asked; ‘how easy is it with the non-digitised surveys to visit the National Archives and record/photograph the information for a whole parish?’ This was kindly answered by another audience member Susan; ‘it took me a couple of hours to photograph the Valuation Survey Field Book for my parish. If you have got to travel some way, it may be worth employing a researcher to do it for you.’

Two more questions we received but didn’t have time to answer on the night were:

• Is there an alternative to searching on the Valuation Office map finder? When I put in my area (Dulwich) no maps come up for most of Dulwich though I know from another source that IR 58 covers some parts of Dulwich

It may be that the record copies of the maps for Dulwich don’t survive. This might be due to enemy bombing in WWII. You could see if any of the working plans or field books survive for the area at Southwark Archives or Lambeth Archives. Alternatively, you could look through the field books in IR 58 at TNA to see if the property or area you are interested in is listed, but that can be a very time-consuming process, especially if you are looking at a large area.

• Please, can you say something about areas for which there are no (or only partial) tithe maps. This is true of a large percentage of Lancashire. Are there any files for such areas in TNA that aren't in local archives?

There may not be tithe maps for some areas because the land wasn’t subject to tithe. This is often the case if the land had already been enclosed. Enclosure maps and awards can be found in local record offices while the Enclosure Acts themselves are held at the Parliamentary Archives. Some are also found in the collections at The National Archives. Unlike the tithe survey, there is no specific record series for enclosure map and awards at TNA. The records are scattered throughout the collection. There are more details on how to search for these records here: https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-with-your-research/research-guides/enclosure-awards/

Thanks to our knowledgeable viewers for sending in lots of further resources on the subject which we are sharing below:

County Series Map finder: http://labs.nationalarchives.gov.uk/maps/valuation.html

For Gloucestershire https://www.glos1909survey.org.uk/

VR maps for London are on the Layers of London website https://www.layersoflondon.org/

Cheshire Tithe Maps and apportionments are all digitised and searchable and maps of areas from other periods https://maps.cheshireeast.gov.uk/tithemaps/

For the West Country http://www.kypwest.org.uk/  

Cambridgeshire are in the University of Cambridge Library.

Warwickshire Tithe apportionment info has been digitised (not the maps yet) and can be accessed on the CRO website.

For public rights of way a whole range of records and maps can be used and the key guide is Sarah Bucks and Phil Wadey, Rights of Way: Restoring the Record.

In addition to the links provided throughout this piece our speakers have recommended the following as useful reading on the topic:

Geraldine Beech and Rose Mitchell (ed.), Maps for Family and Local History: The Records of the Tithe, Valuation Office, and National Farm Surveys of England and Wales, 1836-1943

O Finnegan and C Glover, British Farm Surveys 1941-1943: The National farm survey of England and Wales and the agricultural survey in Scotland, reports and statistical analysis (List & Index Society, 2014)

The views and opinions expressed in this blog are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the British Association for Local History (BALH). Any content provided by our contributors is of their own opinion and is not intended to malign any individual, group, organisation, or entity.