A new book on Griffith's Valuation by Frances McGee (2018)
Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2018 4:34 pm
‘The Archives of the Valuation of Ireland, 1830-1865’, by Frances McGee (Four Courts Press, 2018), was given to me as a Christmas present – by someone who knows me well – and I’ve been reading through it very quickly to see what it’s all about - before going back and reading it more carefully. There are good reviews online, but they are brief. And they don’t mention some of the information that was new to me – and which may be of interest to others.
McGee explains that the Griffith’s Valuation that we see online is just the tip of the iceberg. What we don’t see is the huge amount of documentation, mostly in the form of series of books and maps, which went into the making of that Primary Valuation. These are held in the National Archives of Ireland, and McGee, having lived with these books (she was an archivist in the National Archives for 40 years), knows them well and is in a good position to explain to researchers what’s to be found in each series of books. One thing I’d known, but never appreciated, is the span of time involved in the making of the Valuation. There’s a span of a quarter of a century. So, while the end product is just a snapshot in time (1850s), the notes made by the valuators, in the years leading up to the 1850s, give an idea of what a locality was like in pre-famine times. McGee understands very well that most people looking at Griffith’s Valuation are not interested in the system of valuing land (the bit Richard Griffith himself was most proud of) but, rather, in genealogy, or in local history. She gives several instances of interesting notes made by the Valuators, sometimes about a locality – sometimes about people. She believes the books are an under-used resource and that they will repay investigation (Field Books, House Books, Mill Books, etc.). She stresses, again and again, that the Primary Valuation (the final product we see online) is shorn of much of the detail noted by the Valuators.
The Valuation was done by Barony, but the townland was the basic unit, and the books were made townland by townland and parish by parish, which is a comforting thought. However, accessing them is not as easy as accessing the Primary Valuation books in the Valuation office in Lr. Abbey Street. There you can just arrive and go to the desk and say what townland you are interested in and, when you get the books for that townland, you also get some help (from a real human being) on how the books work. But in the National Archives you must first apply for a reader’s ticket and then you need to know exactly what you are looking for. McGee gives a lot of guidance – she gives the various references for the different kinds of books (e.g. Tenement Valuation original field books (OL/4)), which is a good help. But some examples she gives, throughout the book, show that you need more than that. For instance, the reference for one example (p 85) from one of the Quarto* books (Thomas Sweeney, holding a public house, with a bad yard, but good situation, not paying rent) is, “Quarto book, Dunboyne, Co. Meath, OL/7/40 (1840)”.
*McGee explains what the Quarto books are and I quote her here just to show how clearly and how sincerely she goes about explaining and guiding:
"The Quarto books are manuscript notebooks relating to the valuation of houses in towns. The National Archives holds all the quarto books for towns in the Republic of Ireland and one book for Belfast. These books were made between 1838 and 1853 in conjunction wth the other valuation work in each county, under both the Townland Valuation and Tenement Valuation. Some quarto books are present for most counties, except Leitrim and Sligo, and there is only one book in Monaghan. There are books for the cities of Cork, Galway and Waterford but none for Dublin and Limerick. Several small towns may be grouped together in a single quarto book while large towns may take several books. The quarto books were made once for each town. In general the quarto books have a distinctive appearance. They are approximately square, which may explain the term ‘quarto’ and many have marbled paper covers".
McGee appends a useful chart, showing which books have survived for each county.
For County Clare, the books that have survived are Field books, House books, Quarto book, Mill book, List book, Tenure book, Appeal book (1846).
Now here is something that puzzles me: McGee says the Valuation we see online (called the Primary Valuation) was published and widely circulated (each barony had its own book) so that the people concerned could check it and appeal the decisions contained in it, if they so wished. In fact, a model appeal form was included in each book. An appeal system was set up in 1846, which proved unwieldy, as there were thousands of appeals. McGee says that the books of appeals are probably the most interesting of all the books. As you might expect, the most common complaint was that the tenement had been valued at too high a rate, but there were also complaints about the number of acres – many people still thought of their farms in terms of Irish acres, and did not realize that the acres in the book were statute acres. What makes the appeals interesting is that many of them were referred to the Assizes and the testimony given, by the various parties, was taken down as it was spoken. This system of appeal became impossible to manage, because of the numbers and length of time involved, so in 1852 a new, more straightforward system of addressing problems was introduced and less evidence was required. The post-1852 appeal books for Clare have not survived, but some 1846 appeal books have survived, and, luckily, they seem more interesting than the later ones. The appeals led to a revision of the Primary Valuation and the revised version was copied into what are known as the “Cancelled Books” – these are the books held in the Valuation Office in Lr. Abbey Street, Dublin. If I have understood McGee correctly, it would seem that the information in those books, in some instances, differs somewhat from the Primary Valuation that we see online on askaboutireland.ie. What puzzles me is that the date of publication given online is 1855 (for Co. Clare).
Another thing that puzzles me is that the striping of land is mentioned only once – in connection with Mayo (p 182), where it led, understandably, to some appeals. Surely, these changes to farm boundaries happened all over Ireland and must have been a huge, huge social change, and very difficult for people to adapt to.
There are not many mentions of Clare, but, in the piece on House books, which McGee thinks are worth examining by genealogists because the occupiers are named, there is a mention of Ennistimon: “The book for Ennistimon, Co. Clare (1845) lists in Church Street a cart maker, several shoemakers, three dyers and Mr Curran who ‘carries on the salt manufactory’, in Parliament street a butcher, a grocer, a physician and an apothecary and in New Town ‘Mr Barry is a Nailor’. Public houses are found throughout the House books”.
There is also a mention of Scarriff (p 142), in the chapter on the Primary Valuation. In the course explaining that, from 1852, in the case of herdsmens’ houses, stewards’ houses, caretakers’ houses, etc., the policy was to name the immediate lessor, rather than the occupier, McGee goes on to say that other occupiers were edited out also, and she gives the example of Scarriff, where Revd Alex P. Hanlon is listed as the occupier of ‘nine labourers’ houses’. “And in Aughinish, Ogonnelloe, Simon G. Purdon … who was landlord of most of the parish, is listed as the occupier of a lot consisting of cottiers’ houses and woods. The persons who lived in these houses were not named in the Primary Valuation”.
There’s an interesting chapter on the Valuators, many of whom can be named because they signed their work. McGee says that one set of names not included anywhere are those of the labourers who were engaged locally to help with the work of digging soil samples, etc. They were all temporary workers, and were dismissed when the team moved to a new locality.
McGee explains that some of the complexity of the documentation in the archives arises from the introduction of Poor Law to Ireland in the late 1830s. This happened some years after Griffith's Valuation had been embarked upon. The Poor Law Unions (and Poor Houses) were to be financed by a property tax, known as the poor rate, which was based on the valuation of individual tenements. As Griffith’s Valuation was, at this stage, a townland valuation, which was to decide the rate of County Cess applicable to it, the Poor Law guardians proceeded to set up their own valuation. This led to confusion and complaints. A report by a select committee “found that Townland Valuation could not be used for poor rates and Poor Law Valuation could not be used for county cess”. Eventually, after some caving in by Richard Griffith, who did not cave in easily, the problems were ironed out and work on tenement valuation was begun by Griffith. This meant that work already done needed to be revised – and so there is documentation for both original and revised work.
Indeed, throughout the period of valuation there were several changes made to the requirements by central Government. All the maps used by the Valuators were copies of the 6 inch Ordnance Survey map (1842), but, for economy, some were used over and over. The Valuators did not date the changes they made to maps, but used different coloured ink to denote changes. McGee says that if they are consulted in conjunction with the books, they make sense, but I don’t think that I, myself, will ever put that to the test.
I was really surprised at the pains that were taken in deciding the value of a farm. The value did not rest simply on the quality of the soil, but on the proximity to the road and to the market, along with various other factors. In the Appeals, one farmer pleaded that he could not put his horned cattle, but only sheep, on his mountain land and this was taken into consideration and the rate reduced. As for the valuation of Mills, the instructions to Valuators required them to note “the number of days worked in the year in the mill, the length of the working day, along with measurements of water wheels, the number of float boards and the velocity of the water, the number and type of millstones and other machinery, as these affected commercial operation”. No wonder the Valuation took so long to complete.
Here’s another interesting bit: the books and maps are in very good preservation order, having been kept in the original office in Ely Place right up to 1998, where there was a specially fitted out room with shelves made just the right height for the books (arranged by county) and drawers wide enough for the maps. Very little, therefore, was destroyed in the fire in the Public Records Office in 1922. But I was amazed to read that large fires were kept lighting in Ely Place. This was to keep mould and damp from destroying the books, but surely a great hazard in itself!
There’s loads more of interest in this book.
Sheila
McGee explains that the Griffith’s Valuation that we see online is just the tip of the iceberg. What we don’t see is the huge amount of documentation, mostly in the form of series of books and maps, which went into the making of that Primary Valuation. These are held in the National Archives of Ireland, and McGee, having lived with these books (she was an archivist in the National Archives for 40 years), knows them well and is in a good position to explain to researchers what’s to be found in each series of books. One thing I’d known, but never appreciated, is the span of time involved in the making of the Valuation. There’s a span of a quarter of a century. So, while the end product is just a snapshot in time (1850s), the notes made by the valuators, in the years leading up to the 1850s, give an idea of what a locality was like in pre-famine times. McGee understands very well that most people looking at Griffith’s Valuation are not interested in the system of valuing land (the bit Richard Griffith himself was most proud of) but, rather, in genealogy, or in local history. She gives several instances of interesting notes made by the Valuators, sometimes about a locality – sometimes about people. She believes the books are an under-used resource and that they will repay investigation (Field Books, House Books, Mill Books, etc.). She stresses, again and again, that the Primary Valuation (the final product we see online) is shorn of much of the detail noted by the Valuators.
The Valuation was done by Barony, but the townland was the basic unit, and the books were made townland by townland and parish by parish, which is a comforting thought. However, accessing them is not as easy as accessing the Primary Valuation books in the Valuation office in Lr. Abbey Street. There you can just arrive and go to the desk and say what townland you are interested in and, when you get the books for that townland, you also get some help (from a real human being) on how the books work. But in the National Archives you must first apply for a reader’s ticket and then you need to know exactly what you are looking for. McGee gives a lot of guidance – she gives the various references for the different kinds of books (e.g. Tenement Valuation original field books (OL/4)), which is a good help. But some examples she gives, throughout the book, show that you need more than that. For instance, the reference for one example (p 85) from one of the Quarto* books (Thomas Sweeney, holding a public house, with a bad yard, but good situation, not paying rent) is, “Quarto book, Dunboyne, Co. Meath, OL/7/40 (1840)”.
*McGee explains what the Quarto books are and I quote her here just to show how clearly and how sincerely she goes about explaining and guiding:
"The Quarto books are manuscript notebooks relating to the valuation of houses in towns. The National Archives holds all the quarto books for towns in the Republic of Ireland and one book for Belfast. These books were made between 1838 and 1853 in conjunction wth the other valuation work in each county, under both the Townland Valuation and Tenement Valuation. Some quarto books are present for most counties, except Leitrim and Sligo, and there is only one book in Monaghan. There are books for the cities of Cork, Galway and Waterford but none for Dublin and Limerick. Several small towns may be grouped together in a single quarto book while large towns may take several books. The quarto books were made once for each town. In general the quarto books have a distinctive appearance. They are approximately square, which may explain the term ‘quarto’ and many have marbled paper covers".
McGee appends a useful chart, showing which books have survived for each county.
For County Clare, the books that have survived are Field books, House books, Quarto book, Mill book, List book, Tenure book, Appeal book (1846).
Now here is something that puzzles me: McGee says the Valuation we see online (called the Primary Valuation) was published and widely circulated (each barony had its own book) so that the people concerned could check it and appeal the decisions contained in it, if they so wished. In fact, a model appeal form was included in each book. An appeal system was set up in 1846, which proved unwieldy, as there were thousands of appeals. McGee says that the books of appeals are probably the most interesting of all the books. As you might expect, the most common complaint was that the tenement had been valued at too high a rate, but there were also complaints about the number of acres – many people still thought of their farms in terms of Irish acres, and did not realize that the acres in the book were statute acres. What makes the appeals interesting is that many of them were referred to the Assizes and the testimony given, by the various parties, was taken down as it was spoken. This system of appeal became impossible to manage, because of the numbers and length of time involved, so in 1852 a new, more straightforward system of addressing problems was introduced and less evidence was required. The post-1852 appeal books for Clare have not survived, but some 1846 appeal books have survived, and, luckily, they seem more interesting than the later ones. The appeals led to a revision of the Primary Valuation and the revised version was copied into what are known as the “Cancelled Books” – these are the books held in the Valuation Office in Lr. Abbey Street, Dublin. If I have understood McGee correctly, it would seem that the information in those books, in some instances, differs somewhat from the Primary Valuation that we see online on askaboutireland.ie. What puzzles me is that the date of publication given online is 1855 (for Co. Clare).
Another thing that puzzles me is that the striping of land is mentioned only once – in connection with Mayo (p 182), where it led, understandably, to some appeals. Surely, these changes to farm boundaries happened all over Ireland and must have been a huge, huge social change, and very difficult for people to adapt to.
There are not many mentions of Clare, but, in the piece on House books, which McGee thinks are worth examining by genealogists because the occupiers are named, there is a mention of Ennistimon: “The book for Ennistimon, Co. Clare (1845) lists in Church Street a cart maker, several shoemakers, three dyers and Mr Curran who ‘carries on the salt manufactory’, in Parliament street a butcher, a grocer, a physician and an apothecary and in New Town ‘Mr Barry is a Nailor’. Public houses are found throughout the House books”.
There is also a mention of Scarriff (p 142), in the chapter on the Primary Valuation. In the course explaining that, from 1852, in the case of herdsmens’ houses, stewards’ houses, caretakers’ houses, etc., the policy was to name the immediate lessor, rather than the occupier, McGee goes on to say that other occupiers were edited out also, and she gives the example of Scarriff, where Revd Alex P. Hanlon is listed as the occupier of ‘nine labourers’ houses’. “And in Aughinish, Ogonnelloe, Simon G. Purdon … who was landlord of most of the parish, is listed as the occupier of a lot consisting of cottiers’ houses and woods. The persons who lived in these houses were not named in the Primary Valuation”.
There’s an interesting chapter on the Valuators, many of whom can be named because they signed their work. McGee says that one set of names not included anywhere are those of the labourers who were engaged locally to help with the work of digging soil samples, etc. They were all temporary workers, and were dismissed when the team moved to a new locality.
McGee explains that some of the complexity of the documentation in the archives arises from the introduction of Poor Law to Ireland in the late 1830s. This happened some years after Griffith's Valuation had been embarked upon. The Poor Law Unions (and Poor Houses) were to be financed by a property tax, known as the poor rate, which was based on the valuation of individual tenements. As Griffith’s Valuation was, at this stage, a townland valuation, which was to decide the rate of County Cess applicable to it, the Poor Law guardians proceeded to set up their own valuation. This led to confusion and complaints. A report by a select committee “found that Townland Valuation could not be used for poor rates and Poor Law Valuation could not be used for county cess”. Eventually, after some caving in by Richard Griffith, who did not cave in easily, the problems were ironed out and work on tenement valuation was begun by Griffith. This meant that work already done needed to be revised – and so there is documentation for both original and revised work.
Indeed, throughout the period of valuation there were several changes made to the requirements by central Government. All the maps used by the Valuators were copies of the 6 inch Ordnance Survey map (1842), but, for economy, some were used over and over. The Valuators did not date the changes they made to maps, but used different coloured ink to denote changes. McGee says that if they are consulted in conjunction with the books, they make sense, but I don’t think that I, myself, will ever put that to the test.
I was really surprised at the pains that were taken in deciding the value of a farm. The value did not rest simply on the quality of the soil, but on the proximity to the road and to the market, along with various other factors. In the Appeals, one farmer pleaded that he could not put his horned cattle, but only sheep, on his mountain land and this was taken into consideration and the rate reduced. As for the valuation of Mills, the instructions to Valuators required them to note “the number of days worked in the year in the mill, the length of the working day, along with measurements of water wheels, the number of float boards and the velocity of the water, the number and type of millstones and other machinery, as these affected commercial operation”. No wonder the Valuation took so long to complete.
Here’s another interesting bit: the books and maps are in very good preservation order, having been kept in the original office in Ely Place right up to 1998, where there was a specially fitted out room with shelves made just the right height for the books (arranged by county) and drawers wide enough for the maps. Very little, therefore, was destroyed in the fire in the Public Records Office in 1922. But I was amazed to read that large fires were kept lighting in Ely Place. This was to keep mould and damp from destroying the books, but surely a great hazard in itself!
There’s loads more of interest in this book.
Sheila