Thread: Census when living out of England

I have relatives who were living in Japan at the time of the census. How does the English census handle that? If they have it, where would it be located? I'm refering to 1891,1901,1911.

Thank you,

[quote name='usajan11']I have relatives who were living in Japan at the time of the census. How does the English census handle that? If they have it, where would it be located? I'm refering to 1891,1901,1911.

Thank you,[/quote]



Hello,

If they were not in the UK on the night of the censuses they would not have been counted at all.

Yurs

Victoria

How did England handle counting people in the Army etc, or those on ships when out of the country? Were they just ignored?

Jan

I believe that all the Armed Forces were accounted for with their own Vessels Book ( or something like that!) as, I suppose, if they were not on service, they would be in the UK.



UK citizens living abroad were not accounted for as they were not resident in the UK on census night.



Loz

[quote name='lozzie']I believe that all the Armed Forces were accounted for with their own Vessels Book ( or something like that!) as, I suppose, if they were not on service, they would be in the UK.



UK citizens living abroad were not accounted for as they were not resident in the UK on census night.



Loz [/quote]



Hello,

A British ship's complement, if in British territory, those Army (and later, Air Force) people in home barracks were counted. As Loz says, anyone living abroad was not. That is why so many men serving in South Africa in 1901 are missing from that census. Similarly, those serving in India, the Colonies, and theatres of war in previous censuses. I am not sure about those living in British Consulate Buildings abroad.



Censuses are just poll counting as a means to ascertain the present make-up of the population, how things have changed, and as an aid to providing future services etc. likely to be needed by the population. Enumerators were, and are, simply number crunchers employed under the auspices of the Civil Registrars.



Except in very few circumstances when the householder could afford to pay the fee, enumerators did not fill in the schedules themselves, although they were responsible for ensuring that everyone handed over a properly filled in form. Enumerators delivered the forms, collected them, and then transferred the information into their enumerator's schedules before doing their sums. These schedules are what we collect our family history information from. The householder's schedules were destroyed.



The difference with the 1911 release is that it a release of the actual householder's schedules which were kept, rather than the enumerator's schedules, so we can see our ancestor's handwriting. It was also the first time that information on length of marriage and numbers of children born and still living was collected which can be very useful to us.

Yours

Victoria