Catalogue description Trustees for Crown Lands and Fee Farm Rents: Parliamentary Surveys

In 1649 trustees were appointed by Parliament to sell the estates previously belonging to Charles I, Queen Henrietta Maria and Prince Charles. The trustees commissioned local surveyors to carry out surveys of the Crown lands prior to sale. Two copies of each local survey were made, and returned to the surveyor general, who retained one copy and forwarded the other to the trustees and registrar. The former constitute the records in this series.

The surveys are of four main types: surveys of manors and other properties to be sold under the 1649 act; surveys of hundreds to identify fee-farm rents to be sold; surveys of forest land; and certificates relating to title and other matters. Some of the surveys give information about buildings.

The registrar's books of particulars are in CRES 39

Copies of some of these surveys may be found in DL 32

For certain other records of Parliamentary sales of Crown lands see SP 26

Further copies are in Subseries within LR 2

Trustees for Crown Lands and Fee Farm Rents, 1649-1660

Brief entries for the surveys are given at the end of the county sections in the List of Rentals and Surveys, PRO Lists & Indexes, XXV

An eleven volume typescript calendar by S J Madge, 'Parliamentary surveys of Crown lands during the Commonwealth' (1927), is available.