Hearth less than 20 shillings a year and those who paid neither church nor poor rates. Also exempt were charitable institutions such as schools and almshouses, and industrial hearths with the exception of smiths' forges and bakers' ovens. The returns were lodged with the Clerk of the Peace between 1662 and 1688. A revision of the Act in 1664 made the tax payable by all who had more than two chimneys. The tax was abolished by William III in 1689 and the last collection was for Lady Day of that year. It was abolished in Scotland in 1690. Hearth tax records
Thomas Lane (17th-century MP) Thomas Lane (17th-century MP) Thomas Lane (1582 – 31 December 1652) was an English lawyer and politician who sat in the House of Commons variously between 1625 and 1648. Lane was educated at Clifford's Inn and was a bencher of the Inner Temple and lord of the manor of Greenford Parva. In 1625 Lane was elected Member of Parliament for Wycombe and was re-elected in 1628. After an eleven-year period during which King Charles I ruled without parliaments, Lane was re-elected for Wycombe in April 1640 for the Short Parliament. He was re-elected in November 1640 to the Long Parliament