1911 Census for England & Wales

[momat]

Oh dear.
Now that I have had time to study my Census finds, I have discovered an anomaly.
My Grandmother and her Sister ( both married )and living elsewhere are entered twice in the count.
Once on their parents census form ( because they have been asked how many children they have ) and secondly with their Husbands and family at different addresses.
So how accurate is this ?

[AndrewP]

My Grandmother and her Sister ( both married )and living elsewhere are entered twice in the count.
Once on their parents census form ( because they have been asked how many children they have ) and secondly with their Husbands and family at different addresses.
So how accurate is this ?

Hi Maureen,

At best, it's as accurate as the information your ancestors wrote on their household census forms and gave to the enumerator.

All the best,

AndrewP

[momat]

At best, it's as accurate as the information your ancestors wrote on their household census forms and gave to the enumerator.

Yes I agree, but how many times will this occur on this census as I imagine many of the populace will have read it as my lot did and surely the head count will be out simply because they have asked how many children there are and they have entered all of them by name along with the particulars to the marriage regarding numbers of children .
I think 1911 Census needs to know of this ,not that it can be changed ,but I can't find an area on their site to relate to this.

[Currie]

Hello Maureen,

I guess the parents, for whatever reason, have misread the form and have written down all their children rather than just the residents of the house on the night. Maybe they really were all staying with the parents on census night and the children, when they got home, filled out the form for their own house as well and they were the ones in error. Either way someone misread the questions or instructions and you could form your own conclusions about how clear they are if there’s a copy with the papers.

They would have been double counted and corrupted the statistics but it’s a bit late now for that to matter one iota.

If I understand the situation correctly I can’t see what the 1911 people can do about it except put something in the help pages if they think it likely to be a significant problem. The only danger for genealogists in this identical situation may be that they’ll only locate the parent’s record and believe that everyone lives there and be completely oblivious to the other address. Sometimes these dual entries may appear side by side in the search results, but not always, and they can be spotted there.

It’s just part of the game because you can’t change history. Does that make sense, how did you discover the problem?

All the best,
Alan

[momat]

Hi Alan,

I know the reason this has happened in my family is because my Great grandparents were from Europe and probably did not understand the question.
How I found this double entry is the fact that my grandmother is with my grandfather and 3 children at one address ,her sister and husband at another and she and her sister have been entered on their parents (my Great Grandparents) along with 2 other siblings who still lived at home on their census at another address
So I have 3 census transcripts with different surnames all in the same town.

I know it can't be changed, but I would like to bring it to the notice of the 1911 site (if I could find the right place to enter a comment on their site) so that they can make some sort of remark on site so that others can check this, as it being the first time these questions appear on census ,you have to wonder how many people were caught out this way !
Hope this makes sense.

[Currie]

Hello Maureen,

You could try this Contact page http://www.1911census.co.uk/Content/def ... px?r=79&29

If all else fails you could try posting on the 1911 Census Blog. There's a moderator there who has been answering questions and who sometimes, it seems, passes on suggestions or problems to the back office if he thinks they’re important. http://blog.1911census.co.uk/

Best of luck,
Alan

[momat]

Hi Alan,
I had previously searched the Contact site but there was nothing that related to my query.
I have posted on the Blog that you sent me ,so thanks for that .
Hopefully I will get a response.

Will post the outcome here.

Cheers,