1804 Tax Assessment, Baltimore County, Maryland

Description

This publication is a proxy for the lost 1800 U.S. Federal Census schedules for Baltimore County, Maryland. Transcribed by Michael Ports from the “Baltimore County Assessed Persons List of 1804,” on file at the Maryland State Archives in Annapolis, these enumerations are arranged by “hundred” and alphabetically thereunder. (The “hundred” was the largest subdivision with defined boundaries of a Maryland county at this time.) The author has selected the assessment lists of the fourteen hundreds (e.g., Back River Lower Hundred) that most closely resemble the area of Baltimore County when it was separated from Baltimore City in 1851, plus that portion of Baltimore County that was taken to form Carroll County in 1837. Each assessment gives the full name of the taxpayer followed by the amount of his/her assessment in pounds, shillings, and pence. Folio numbers, as they appear in the original documents, are indicated throughout the volume. Mr. Ports has added a commentary at the end of each hundred’s assessment describing any oddities found in the original lists, and included a recapitulation summarizing the statistics for the county as a whole at the conclusion of the book. Two other noteworthy additions to the front of the publication are a historical essay on “The Hundreds of Baltimore County,” by distinguished genealogist Robert Barnes, and “Maps of Old Baltimore County,” drawn by George Wilkinson and reproduced with the permission of George J. Horvath, Jr.