Genealogy Chat

See next post for what I have gleaned. I am happy to correct any mistakes. I hope it's useful. Lin

1801 Tuesday 10th March 1811 Monday 27th May 1821 Monday 28th May 1831 Sunday 29th May In 1801 information was collected on a parish basis and there were no details on households; local officials were asked to provide information on the number of inhabited and uninhabited houses in the parish and how many families occupied them; the number of people in the parish and their employment; and numbers of baptisms, burials and marriages. A similar format was followed for the censuses of 1811, 1821 and 1831. 1841 Sunday 6th June 1851 Sunday 30th March 1861 Sunday 7th April 1871 Sunday 2nd April 1881 Sunday 3rd April 1891 Sunday 5th April 1901 Sunday 31st March The census of 1841 was the first to record more detailed information. It is thus the earliest census generally used by family historians. These censuses are readily available online; e.g. through Ancestry(.)co(.)uk 1911 Sunday 2nd April The National Archives were planning to make the 1911 census available in January 2012 but a ruling by the Information Commissioner in December 2006 means that the National Archives have been forced to make the information available now. However for practical reasons, all that is available at the moment is a paid for search by National Archives staff to give the details of people living at a nominated address. The records are incomplete due to water damage. This damage affected about 5% of the volumes and means that information is not retrievable from parts of these volumes. There is only one volume missing from the whole series in total. 1921 Sunday 19th June The 1921 census is closed until January 2022. The recent ruling by the Information Commissioner that resulted in the 1911 census being opened early does not apply to the 1921 census because, unlike the 1911 census, the 1921 census was conducted under the 1920 Census Act, which is still in force and which contains a statutory prohibition on disclosure. 1931 Sunday 26th April On the night of Saturday 19 December 1942, there was a fire at a store in Hayes, Middlesex. The store, the responsibility of the Office of Works, contained a large amount of furniture but in addition it contained the census records for England & Wales for 1931; that is the whole of the schedules, enumeration books and plans. They were all completely destroyed. The fire was not caused by enemy action and the civil servant from the General Register Office who visited the site a few days later was bemused as to how a fire 'achieved such dimensions in a store in which special hydrants had been fitted and was said to have been in charge of a fire guard of 6 paid firewatchers' and that it is 'a mystery which will need investigation'. 1941 No census was held in 1941 because of the Second World War but a 'mini-census' was held in 1939 so that everybody could be issued with a National Identity Card. This was held on Friday 29th September 1939 1951 Sunday 8th April 1961 Sunday 23rd April 1971 Sunday 25th April The original census returns have apparently been preserved and reports that these censuses have been lost seem to mean that the computerised records (punch cards and magnetic tape) have been destroyed. I hope this means that the original returns can be scanned to be of use to Family Historians. 1981 Sunday 5th April 1991 Sunday 21st April 2001 Sunday 29th April