The Society's seal and three photographs

Introduction to the 1780-84 Poll Book

Using the transcript

How the transcript is laid out

We have used the basic layout of the Poll Book, but with some changes. The columns and text in purple are interpolations, added to aid understanding and not included in the original document.

Lines in italics are the handwritten additional entries, and lines or phrases with a purple F in front of them are on the facing page. This can be seen by clicking on Scan on the sidebar, and then on Notes.

Where the original text is an abbreviation, then if the word is underlined like this: abbr,  hovering your cursor over the word will show its expansion. In addition, where a place name is not spelt in the modern way, there is a dotted line below it and if you place your cursor on that, the modern version will float above it.

What do the different columns mean?

We have made use of a number of documents and websites in our research. Perhaps the most useful was the Newcastle A-Z! This is because many now defunct hamlet or farm names live on in street names. For example, 'Hotch Pudding' on page 42 still exists as 'Hotch Pudding Place'  in West Denton. We have also used Northumberland Archives' index of farm names, the printed copy of the Northumberland 1780 Poll Book (also in Northumberland Archives), the Historical Gazetteer of England's Place Names, the AA's route planner, and internet searches more generally.

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In the future, don’t forget your past