| Who's been living in my house? |
|
|
|
Page 2 of 2 Look for cluesPrivacy was scarce for our forebears. Bedrooms opened out of each other, hence the curtained four-poster, and with only exterior sanitation many upstairs rooms lost space later to make room for an essential corridor and single bathroom. Odd floor or ceiling dimensions as well as cut-off cornices or skirting boards provide clues to alterations.Insurance coverFerry Cottage may ooze history, but think twice before buying any riverside property. Thatched property also has risks. Flood cover can be prohibitive and an underwriter for Norwich Union warns that for restoration after a fire, "the average cost for a thatched property is 20 times" that of a modern one. Rebuilding costs for listed buildings are equally alarming at around four times average costs.Hearth and window taxesDeath and taxes apply to houses as well as individuals, and in the past led to alterations in fireplaces and windows. In 1662 the Hearth Tax was imposed to pay for Restoration of the Monarchy. And over a century later Adam Smith wrote in The Wealth of Nations of "a tax of two shillings on every hearth. In order to ascertain how many hearths were in the house it was necessary that the tax-gatherer should enter every room in it. This odious visit rendered the tax odious. Soon after the revolution (1689), therefore, it was abolished as a badge of slavery."The Window Tax, imposed to pay for the interminable French wars, was also damned by Adam Smith in 1775 as " inequality of the worst kind as [the tax] frequently falls much heavier upon the poor than upon the rich... House tax - two shillings on every house inhabited... ten windows must pay four shillings more... twenty windows and upwards to pay eight shillings." Since windows could be counted from the outside, a visit from the tax-gatherer was deemed less offensive than for the hearth tax - a lesson here for inspectors in 2007 snooping for loft extensions, conservatories and double glazing in order to raise the council tax. Some Georgian houses had been designed with one or two upper storey windows not belonging to rooms at all but mere cupboards, installed to give desired symmetry from outside: to avoid the tax these were bricked with no inconvenience to the owners. Where to lookThere are countless yearbooks and handbooks that listed the owners of most large houses, the proprietors of shops and businesses and landlords of public houses. Clerical directories and diocesan archives provide detailed records of residential church properties. Naval and military directories may list housing belonging to dockyards and barracks that went with the job, and homes once owned by local doctors are not hard to trace.Back to the ConquerorMy mother's Normandy house is very old with a spiral staircase, but the foundations date back many more centuries. It is claimed to be the home of Arlette, the tanner's daughter who attracted the roving eye of the local duke and gave birth to a son - William the Conqueror. She later married a nobleman and is buried in the nearby Abbey. Arlette is a common village name in France.House history is addictive and time-consuming - unlike television programmes wrapping the subject up in a half-hour's entertainment, full of 'surprise' discoveries by the experts. Start with your local library, not the town or county records office. Archives can be daunting, full of acronyms and abbreviations such as PROCAT, CARN, CRES and TITH, although the staff are usually endlessly patient and helpful. The range of material is immense from Manorial Records and Exchequer Rolls to Town & Country Planning Acts and Road Widening Schemes. House history overlaps with genealogy and there are numerous books on the subject. Published in paperback by the National Archives, the definitive book Tracing the History of your House by Nick Barratt is comprehensive if somewhat learned. There is also the limitless scope of the Internet balanced by the intimate knowledge of your elderly neighbours. All houses have a history, even new ones, for the first owners are themselves making that history: we are all living archives for future generations. Pull Quotes
|
