Manuscript

Pelham Tax List

Date:	1784
Creator:	Town of Pelham
Publisher:	Microfilmed image

About this artifact

The 1784 tax list for the town of Pelham, indicates 221 polls, 140 dwelling houses, and 113 barns. Pelham farmers were independent sorts, used to dealing with scarcity, and somewhat set apart from valley merchants, other farmers in the valley with rich soil spread by the flooding of the Connecticut River Valley, and the commerce of the Eastern part of the state. Pelham farmers led a meager existence and struggled to produce enough for their families due to poor soil conditions and longer winters. Most neighbors bartered with each other and used resources at hand to provide necessities. Many of them had also been fierce patriots during the Revolution; their hatred of the British ran deep and support for the king was almost non-existent in Pelham.