Houston County Researchers: How many of you are taking advantage of all of the excellent genealogical information that is contained in the Tax Digests for the counties that you are researching? In Georgia, taxes were levied on free white males over age 21, and slaves aged 21 to 60. These people were referred to as "polls". The tax records in each county are divided by Militia District. There are a variety of published Tax Digests for various Georgia counties, but primarily they are for the early years. For example, SOME EARLY TAX DIGESTS OF GEORGIA (1790-1818) by Ruth Blair, 1926, is available via LDS Microfiche # 6046883. Another excellent publication is AN INDEX TO GEORGIA TAX DIGEST (5 volumes) by The Reprint Co., 1986. If you haven't taken a look at the types of info that is contained on an *actual* Tax Digest for the county that you are researching, you are in for a real treat! It's not just a listing of a bunch of names, polls, and the amounts to be paid to the Tax Receiver. Far from it! I'll just give you an example of what can be found on the 1829 Houston Co., GA Tax Digest: 1. Captain's District (Militia District). 2. Name of person taxed. 3. Acres of pine land. 4. Acres of oak & hickory land. 5. Quality # of acreage. 6. County where the land resides. 7. Land District number. 8. Land Lot number. 9. Stock & Trade. 10. Town Lots & value. 11. Gigs & carriages. 12. Stallions. 13. Polls. 14. Slaves. 15. Dollars & cents due for tax. In cases where there may be two people with the same name in a particular county, during the same time period, the Tax Digest could be a major help to you. Since you have probably already checked out the Land Records (Deeds, etc.) you can usually match up the person from the Tax Digest, since it shows which land he owned. And the legal description of that land will show the County, Land District and Land Lot numbers. And that's not all. You may be surprised to find that your ancestor also owned land in *other* Georgia counties. This may give you just the clue that you need to find out *where* he came from, and where he later *went*. Since the Federal Census was taken only every 10 years since 1790, the Tax Digests can fill in a lot of blanks in between. It can help you determine when a person either died, or left the county. Unless the Tax Digest has been abstracted and published, generally speaking, they are not indexed. This means that you will have to search thru them "page by page", to find the name(s) you are looking for. That is really not as hard as it seems. Since you are probably used to scanning for names on Census Records, it usually doesn't take more than an hour or so to perform. The 1829 Houston Co., GA Tax Digest is 103 pages long, but 2 pages are utilized to contain all of the data for the tax payers. And since there are 44 lines per page, that means that there were about 2,300 tax payers listed on that Tax Digest. The amount of Tax Digests that are available for your particular county of interest, may vary. In Houston Co., GA, there are the following extant Tax Digests at the courthouse in Perry, GA: 1829, 1831-1835, 1837-1839, 1841-44, 1845-48, 1848-50, 1853, 1856-60, 1863, 1864 & 1869. These Tax Digests have all been microfilmed by the Georgia Archives. Also, a lot of them have been microfilmed by the LDS. To ascertain which Tax Digests have been microfilmed by the LDS, for your county of interest, you can access the LDS Family History Catalog (FHLC) Locality Catalog. If you access it via microfiche at an LDS Family History Center (FHC), it is color coded with a yellow strip at the top of the microfiche. If you access it thru the www.familysearch.org LDS website, you may or may not be able to locate it. It is there, but there are several steps necessary to locate it. If the LDS has not microfilmed the Tax Digests for the years that you are interested in, it has probably been microfilmed by the Georgia Archives. This microfilm is available for purchase, once you obtain the permission of the Probate Judge or other steward of those records, from that particular county. In 1998, the cost was $20 per microfilm reel. More info may be obtained at: http://www.state.ga.us/sos/archives Many of the major genealogy libraries throughout the U.S. have microfilm collections of Tax Digests, especially the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, UT. Once you see how valuable the info is that is contained on the Tax Digests, and if you really feel ambitious and energetic, perhaps you will consider this: If you abstract, index and compile a Tax Digest for a Georgia County, The R. J. Taylor, Jr. Foundation of Atlanta, GA *may* approve a grant for you to have this compilation published. For more information about the Taylor Foundation, please check this website: http://www.taylorfoundation.org The plain fact of the matter is, that most people hardly ever utilize the original Tax Digests, and in most cases, that is all that is available for now. Until and *if ever*, the Tax Digests are published for your particular county of interest, I highly recommend that you access these valuable genealogical records *somehow*. Your time and efforts will very likely yield you excellent results in your genealogical endeavors. Take care & happy hunting! _______________________________________ William A. Mills Perry, GA [email protected] Houston Co., GA Publications & Research Webpage: http://www.geocities.com/ResearchTriangle/Forum/8795 ________________________________________________________________ YOU'RE PAYING TOO MUCH FOR THE INTERNET! Juno now offers FREE Internet Access! Try it today - there's no risk! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj.