Electoral registers and poll books

Electoral registers are a useful resource for family and house history research.

They enable you to track who was resident at a particular property at a particular date.

However, the right to vote (or electoral franchise) was primarily based on a property qualification until the later part of the 19th century.

Voting was therefore restricted to a small proportion of the male population only.

The following provides a summary of developments in voting rights and the records we hold.