Electoral Registers

The Records

For most of Fife we have electoral registers for the years: 1914, 1918-1939, and 1950-2009.

The 1918 registers have the letter ‘a’ beside absent voters away from home on service with the armed forces. But we do not have the absent voters rolls with additional information about their unit or army no,. etc.

For the following burghs we have electoral registers for only part of the period 1914-2009:

*Until 1957 Dunfermline Burgh and Kirkcaldy Burgh each had their own Assessor who was responsible for land valuation and electoral registration within the burgh. This changed after the Valuation and Rating (Scotland) Act of 1956, which made the County Assessor responsible for Kirkcaldy and Dunfermline. 

Parliamentary Constituencies in Fife since 1707  

1) 1707-1831

1.1) County of Fife 1.2) Dysart Burghs (Royal Burghs of Burntisland Dysart, Kinghorn and Kirkcaldy) 1.3) Anstruther Burghs (Royal Burghs of Anstruther Easter, Anstruther Wester, Crail, Kilrenny, Pittenweem) 1.4) For Royal Burghs of Cupar and St Andrews see Perth Burghs (Cupar, Dundee, Forfar, Perth St Andrews) 1.5) For Inverkeithing, Dunfermline and Queensferry see Stirling Burghs (Culross, Dunfermline, Inverkeithing, Queensferry, Stirling) 

2) 1832-1918 

2.1) County of Fife 2.2) Dysart Burghs (Royal Burghs of Burntisland Dysart, Kinghorn and Kirkcaldy) 2.3) 1832 Reform act added Cupar and St Andrews to Anstruther Burghs to create St Andrews Burghs (Royal Burghs of Anstruther Easter, Anstruther Wester, Crail, Cupar, Kilrenny, Pittenweem, St Andrews) 2.4) For Inverkeithing, Dunfermline and Queensferry see Stirling Burghs (Culross, Dunfermline, Inverkeithing, Queensferry, Stirling) 2.5) Parliament of 10th December 1868 St Andrews University and Edinburgh University had an MP 

3) 1885 -1917 

Redistribution of Seats Act divided County into 2 East Fife and West Fife 3.1) East Fife 3.2) West Fife 3.3) Dysart Burghs (Royal Burghs of Burntisland Dysart, Kinghorn and Kirkcaldy) 3.4) St Andrews Burghs (Royal Burghs of Anstruther Easter, Anstruther Wester, Crail, Cupar, Kilrenny, Pittenweem, St Andrews) 3.5) St Andrews and Edinburgh Universities 3.6) For Inverkeithing, Dunfermline and Queensferry see Stirling Burghs (Culross, Dunfermline, Inverkeithing, Queensferry, Stirling)

4) 1918-1973 

4.1) East Fife 4.2) West Fife 4.3) Dunfermline District of Burghs (Burghs of Cowdenbeath, Dunfermline, Inverkeithing and Lochgelly) 4.4) Kirkcaldy District of Burghs (Buckhaven and Methil and Innerleven, Burntisland, Dysart, Kinghorn, Kirkcaldy) 4.5) Combined Scottish Universities electing 3 MPs (Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Glasgow, St Andrews) abolished by 1950  

5) 1974-1982 

5.1) Central Fife 5.2) Dunfermline 5.3) East Fife 5.4) Kirkcaldy  

6) 1983-2004 

6.1) Central Fife Council 6.2) Dunfermline East 6.3) Dunfermline West 6.4) Kirkcaldy 6.5) North East Fife Council  

7) 2005- 

7.1) Dunfermline and West Fife 7.2) Glenrothes 7.3) Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath 7.4) North East Fife  

Access

Anyone is welcome to come to the Archive Centre and search the electoral registers free of charge. Please phone Susan Goodfellow or Andrew Dowsey on 01592 583 352 to arrange an appointment. We are not able to photocopy the registers. If you need a certified copy of an entry from an electoral register or would like someone to carry out paid research of the registers for you, please ask a member of staff.  

Further resources

Dunfermline Central Library have electoral registers for Dunfermline Burgh from 1952 onwards (and earlier registers for 1832, 1852, 1856, 1868-1869, and 1870-1871.)

Kirkcaldy Central Library have electoral registers for the County of Fife, 1832, Burntisland Burgh, 1864 and Kinghorn Burgh, 1832 and 1867-1892.

The National Archives of Scotland have registers of voters for Culross Burgh, 1832-1851; Dunfermline Burgh, 1868; Earlsferry Burgh, 1902-1904; and Newburgh, 1833-1870.

The National Library of Scotland holds the electoral register for the Burghs of Dunfermline and Kirkcaldy, Fife, from 1947/8 onwards. They also have an 1833 Register of electors for the burgh of Dunfermline, in their special collections [NLS Shelfmark: L.C.1447(2)].

The British Library have a complete set of electoral registers for Scottish constituencies from 1948 onwards.

If electoral registers are not available for the place or period you need, you could check if the valuation roll is available.

The valuation rolls list the owner and tenant of properties in each parish or burgh. Only the head of household will be listed. See our leaflet on valuation rolls  

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