Assessment Rolls

Elgin County, Ontario, Canada

Historic Assessment Rolls, Collector’s Rolls & Voters’ Lists

Assessment rolls are a valuable source for tracing the movements of your ancestor or relative. They are especially important when tracing people who were tenants on a property, since Land Registry Office records generally do not record tenants. Assessment rolls are also valuable for determining the earliest date of location on a particular property since the date of registration of a deed occurred sometimes several years after the person had actually settled there.

Information for an assessment roll was gathered for municipal taxation purposes; therefore the statistics found in these records will have little genealogical content. Information you can expect to find are the person’s name, designation as owner or tenant; lot and concession (street address for urban areas), number of acres, value of property, and the amount of tax assessed. Occupations and ages are often also given. For women, marital status is often recorded.

Many of the Assessment Rolls also contain the accompanying Collectors Rolls. The Collectors Rolls were used by the tax collectors to record payment of taxes. They contain most of the same information from the Assessment roll. The collection of Collectors Rolls is not complete, and may be found on the same microfilm reel as the Assessment Rolls. Where an Assessment Roll does not exist, the Collectors Roll can be used as a replacement, since much of the same information is included.

The Elgin County Archives has an extensive collection of these assessment rolls on microfilm. Some original rolls are housed at the Elgin County Archives, and others at Municipal Offices.

Aldborough Township

1820 Assessment Roll

Dunwich Township

1844 Assessment Roll

Southwold Township

1841 Assessment Roll

1848 Assessment Roll

1873 Collectors Roll


Elgin County Assessment Films

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Townships

Aldborough

Aldborough Assessment rolls, 1859-1899

Aldborough Collector’s rolls, 1873-1893

Bayham

Bayham Township Assessment rolls, 1858-1912

Dunwich

Dunwich Township Assessment rolls, 1861-1898

Dunwich Township Collector’s rolls, 1880, 1889, 1899

Malahide

Malahide Township Assessment rolls, 1859-1912

(Includes Aylmer from 1859-1871)

Assessment rolls on microfilm for Malahide and Aylmer are available at the Aylmer Old Towne Hall Library up to 1929.

South Dorchester

South Dorchester Assessment rolls, 1858-1899

South Dorchester Collector’s rolls, 1877, 1890

Southwold

Southwold Assessment rolls, 1856-1899

Southwold Collector’s rolls, 1858, 1864, 1877, 1899

Yarmouth

Yarmouth Assessment rolls, 1857-1912

(Includes Port Stanley 1857-1874)

Yarmouth Collector’s roll, 1856

Towns

Aylmer

Aylmer Assessment rolls, 1872-1899

Aylmer Collector’s rolls, 1878, 1885

Port Stanley

Port Stanley Assessment rolls, 1875-1912

St. Thomas

St. Thomas Assessment rolls, 1856-1900

St. Thomas Collector’s rolls, 1856, 1857

Vienna

Vienna Assessment rolls, 1858-1912