FFHS-NEWS 1911 Census goes live

Tue Jan 13 01:00:48 CET 2009

You can find this posting and a copy in PDF Format on the FFHS Website at
http://www.ffhs.org.uk/archives/census1911.php

1911 Census goes live

Today the 1911 Census has gone live on the Internet at
http://www.1911census.co.uk/.  The site is a pay per view site in
partnership between FindMyPast and The National Archives.  The site will not
be part of the FindMyPast system and will not be available for viewing as
part of their subscription services, although log-in details and pay per
view credits will work on either site.  

The census will go live on the FindMyPast subscription site later in 2009.

The Federation of Family History Societies hopes that you will be able to
further your research and carry it forward into a key period of the 20th
Century, which included the build up to the First World War and Suffrage for
Women.  There will only be one more census that we can use in the first half
of the 20th Century and that is the one for 1921 as the Census for 1931 was
burnt during the Second World War and there was no census taken in 1941 due
to the war, although a National Register was made for the issue of identity
cards.

The release is ahead of the usual release date of the first working day of
the year following the 100th anniversary of the taking of the census; for
the 1911 this would have been the 3rd of January 2012.

The Information Commissioner has made a RULING
<http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documents/13dec2006.pdf>  .in 2006 about
the availability of the 1911 Censes and the early release is explained in
this ruling.

The 1911 Census also differs from the previous censuses in that it is the
original householder's schedules that have survived and not the enumerators'
books we are used to.  As a consequence of this the amount of data is
greatly increased and the paper copies are stored on 2 kilometres of
shelving, approximately 8 times larger than previous censuses.

This increase has meant that it has taken much longer to prepare them for
public access and much credit goes to the teams at the TNA and FindMyPast
for getting this done.

>From today there will be a staggered release of the information in the 1911
census.  This will include images and transcription data, but with sensitive
data held back, in line with the Information Commissioner's recent ruling
<http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documents/13dec2006.pdf> .  From 3
January 2012 the public will have full access to the entire 1911 census,
including the information not accessible in 2009. Researchers anywhere in
the world will be able to search across the fields of the census by name,
address or The National Archives catalogue reference, and download
high-resolution digital images.

Natalie Ceeney, Chief Executive of The National Archives said:

"The 1911 census holds more information than the 1901 census.  It is also
the first census where the householder's schedule has remained the master
entry, rather than the enumerator's notes, so researchers are actually able,
in most cases, to view their actual ancestors' handwriting when looking at
1911 census entries.  This will be an invaluable resource for anyone who is
working hard to trace their family's history." 

Also available are the enumerators' summary sheets which give information
and statistics on their locality. These will be added to the site when all
the household schedules are complete.

The following counties are online now and the others will follow as soon as
possible, with Nottinghamshire and the West Riding of Yorkshire going live
very soon.

Bedfordshire

Berkshire

Buckinghamshire

Cambridgeshire

Cheshire

Cornwall

Derbyshire

Devonshire

Dorsetshire

Essex

Gloucestershire

Hampshire

Herefordshire

Hertfordshire

Huntingdonshire

Kent

Lancashire

Leicestershire

Lincolnshire

London

Middlesex

Nottinghamshire 

Norfolk

Northamptonshire

Oxfordshire

Rutlandshire

Shropshire

Somersetshire

Staffordshire

Suffolk

Surrey

Sussex

Warwickshire

Wiltshire

Worcestershire

Yorkshire (West Riding)

Counties not available for launch:

England:

Durham

Cumberland 

Northumberland

Westmorland

Wales:

Anglesey

Brecknockshire

Caernarvonshire

Cardiganshire

Carmarthenshire

Denbighshire

Flintshire

Glamorgan

Merionethshire

Montgomeryshire

Monmouthshire

Pembrokeshire

Radnorshire

Other

Isle of Man

Channel Islands

Royal Navy overseas

Military Establishments overseas

For those of you like me who were there during the release of the 1901
Census you will remember the 'Great Crash' and the subsequent wait for some
months before it finally got up and running.  For the 1911 Census this
should not happen for a number of reasons.  

Firstly there will be 24 Computer servers providing the resources to keep it
running under normal access levels.  It is however expected that in the
initial roll-out there will be a higher demand and to ensure that this does
not fall down like the 1901 Census certain steps have been taken.  These
include the staged addition of some 'server hungry' features and therefore
initially there will be no wildcard searches.  This feature and others will
be enabled once the initial rush has died down so at this stage you will
need a surname or a street address to find an individual or family.

An additional safeguard is the ability to redirect visitors that exceed the
capacity of the site to a page that informs them that the site is busy.
This will be an irritation to those who read it but will ensure that
overload cannot happen.

Basic facts about the 1911 census

The 1911 census of England and Wales was taken on the night of Sunday 2
April 1911.  Over 8 million schedules were delivered to householders around
the country.

The completed forms provide us with personal details of the 36 million
people who were living in England and Wales at the time, offering a
fascinating insight into the state of the nation nearly 100 years ago.

The census shows the name, age, sex and marital status of each person, as
well as giving details of their occupation, birth place and nationality.
The 1911 census also asks for additional information about married women:
how long they have been married and how many children have been born to that
marriage.

The 1911 census has been called 'the fertility census' as it lists the total
number of children that a woman had given birth to; this information is
especially valuable to family historians as it accounts for children no
longer living at home as well as those who had died before 1911.

Census returns are a key source for people tracing their family history, as
well as those studying local, social and political history.  For family
historians, one of the main attractions of the 1911 census is that, for the
first time, it is the original householder schedules that have survived so
we can see our ancestors' own handwriting, complete with any unsolicited
additional comments that they might have made.

Information recorded for each person: 

.        Name and Surname

.        Relationship to head of family 

.        Age and Sex 

.        Marital condition 

.        Profession or Occupation 

.        Birthplace 

.        Nationality 

.        Infirmity (eg deaf, dumb, blind, lunatic, imbecile etc.) Note: this
information will not be available to view until the census is officially
opened in January 2012. At the request of the Information Commissioner these
details have been obscured in the images that are made available prior to
that date.

 Additionally, details recorded for married women:

.        Years married

.        Children born to present marriage, living or deceased

Some interesting entries found by the transcription team include:

.        A mother of five children whose occupation is listed as 'slave to
family' 

.        An opinionated household head, evidently affronted by the invasive
nature of the census, who writes: 

'Put some charge on goods coming from abroad... Could you not find something
better to do than ask about children that have been dead over 56 years?' 

.        The return for one household lists the family cat as a domestic
servant, giving the feline's nationality as 'Persian'. We hope the
enumerator appreciated the joke. 

.        One householder, apparently objecting to the intrusive nature of
the census, writes on the return: 

'Would you like to know what our income is, what each had for breakfast and
how long we expect to live on anything else?'

.        We've found a disparaging comment made by the head of a household
about a woman in his service. Scrawled on the bottom of the census return
is: 

'This woman calls herself "about forty" and refuses to say more. She looks
60. She leaves my service tomorrow.'

I hope that this release will enhance the research experience for those of
you who probably thought that they would need to wait another three years
for the information.

Best wishes for successful research in 2009

David HOLMAN

Chairman

Federation of Family History Societies (FFHS)

Registered Charity (England & Wales) Number 1038721

Chairman at FFHS.org.UK

Skype: David_C_Holman

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