Cattle Plague

The following source list was originally available only on paper in one of the West Yorkshire Archive Service offices. It may have been compiled many years ago and could be out of date. It was designed to act as a signpost to records of interest on a particular historical subject, but may relate only to one West Yorkshire district, or be an incomplete list of sources available.

Cattle Plague was a recurring problem throughout the eighteenth century, with 3 major European outbreaks in 1709-1720, 1742-1760 and 1768-1786. Britain was hard hit by a major cattle plague outbreak in 1865/66, with many famers loosing entire herds to the disease. The West Riding Quarter Sessions set up a Cattle Plague Committee and provided some compensation to those that lost livestock.

Description	Dates	Reference	Repository
Order forbidding the importation of cattle into the West Riding from other counties to prevent the spread of Cattle Plague	April 1746	QS1/85/4	WYAS: Wakefield
Order preventing the movement of cattle	April 1749	QS1/88/4	WYAS: Wakefield
Orders to contain distemper among horned cattle	Oct 1749	QS1/88/10	WYAS: Wakefield
Accounts of Treasurer including report of the West Riding Cattle Plage Committee 1866	1865-1866	QD2/80	WYAS: Wakefield
Papers re Cattle Plague	1866	QT1/3/99	WYAS: Wakefield
Claim forms for remission of the Cattle Plague rate laid at Leeds QS 15 November 1866, with detail of losses	Nov-Dec 1866	QD1/414	WYAS: Wakefield
Account book of compensation paid under the Act of 1866	1866-1868	QD2/151	WYAS: Wakefield
Contagious Diseases (Animals) Act Executive Committee papers	1866-1889	QC/9	WYAS: Wakefield