1911 Census is up!

[LesleyB]

Hi all
I can save a fortune on this...er, no family in England at all - all my lot are in Scotland or Ireland in 1911!!

Best wishes
Lesley

[Tracey]

Thinking outloud and jumping ahead somewhat

1921 census and Northern Ireland.......depending on when in 1921 it became NI will it become part of the England and Wales census

Google

[Montrose Budie]

Hi MB
So far, that has saved me a few pounds If I put off the northern counties and Wales until next month, it will look more reasonable

Cheers,
Sarah

Hi Sarah

My pleasure!

The availability for Wales is quoted as 'Spring 2009' ..........

There's also some problem with some of the outstanding Yorkshire info, with references on the www.1911census.co.uk site to material having to be sent away for conservation procedures before indexing and digitisation is possible...............

Orraverybest

mb

[Currie]

THE 1911 CENSUS OF SOUTHERN ENGLAND.

All this sounds horribly familiar, incomplete releases, rubbery promises and misleading information. I don’t remember any of this sort of thing happening when the 1901 England – Wales census was released. Granted the site did break down because of overloading but they did fix it and it worked like a charm after that.

This site is being widely advertised and publicised as the 1911 Census of England and Wales, whereas at the moment it is only a Census of Southern England. That is not only grossly misleading but I feel is an insult to the Welsh, but perhaps they are just a casualty of the business plan. Are there not laws against this sort of thing or is this just another example of Internet Business Ethics.

The search has been hog-tied in many ways, not just wildcards, but first name searching, range of years and in other ways so that the site doesn’t break down in the opening rush. Maybe it’s a bit like a shop advertising and selling toys that turn out to have lots of missing bits and square wheels so all the use over Christmas won’t break them.

The fields in the search results are less than they were for 1901 in that they do not include place of birth and occupation. This creates more uncertainty, and will force many people into purchasing the transcription or running the risk of purchasing the wrong image. This is a paid search via the back door but I guess the increased revenue from people buying wrong images is just another part of the business plan. Try the 1901 Census search as it has always been at http://www.1901censusonline.com/search. ... ith_locale

They are making much of all the paperwork you get for your money, the household return, the enumerators book, and the transcription you pay extra for. All I’m really interested in is the household return, that’s the source document, the others are transcriptions and I can make a better job of that myself.

The retention of information on their database in a section called “My Records“, for me is quite useless as I am quite capable of handling such matters myself. This type of setup is designed for one purpose only and that’s to make people “site dependent” and no doubt that thought is behind this part of the business plan.

They say that ” For 10 credits (which cost between 83p and £1.16, depending on the package you buy) you can view a full transcript of everyone in the household, or a whole page of an institution. This compares with £1 to view a whole household on the official 1901 site, which was launched seven years ago.”

That also seems to be intended to mislead because if I remember correctly the cost for 1901 was actually 75p and that was for the actual census image and I never needed a transcription and I would say very few people did. Isn’t that comparing apples to oranges?

For 1901 there was none of this credits malarky, no ending up with unusable numbers of credits and being forced to buy more or being invited to spend them on another site in which you have no interest at all. You paid for what you wanted and that was that. Here’s the evidence http://www.qinetiq.com/home/newsroom/ne ... /1901.html

The real pricing per image on the 1911 site is likely to average around 4 to 6 times the 1901 price. This sort of pricing is monopoly pricing, and will remain that way until the 1911 census of England and Wales becomes available from some other source. The pricing on this site shuts the door in my face as I am sure it does for many others. I’m quite prepared to wait for better days even if that’s forever.

Pity the less privileged genealogists trying to make ends meet in a world sliding into recession who were looking forward to the release of this census in the hope that they might be able to continue their research and who may have been under the illusion that they were as much entitled to access government records of their ancestors as the wealthy find it so easy to do.

If I have any of the above upside down please enlighten me.

All the best,
Alan

[garibaldired]

Hi Alan,

I think you have been a little harsh here.
Yes it is expensive but the images are excellent.
Yes Wales is absent as yet and the northern counties of Durham, Cumberland, Northumberland, Westmoreland and Yorkshire East & North Ridings. HOWEVER Lancashire is there and Cheshire and the West Riding of Yorkshire and all the midland counties across to East Anglia as well as the south.
Searching facilities have been restricted and this has meant no crashing! You just wait until the full searching facility is introduced for those tricky ones. And as I understand it spring was the time it was going to be released and so it's ahead of schedule?
Personally I think most if not all genealogy researching is expensive, certainly it is on line. We are lucky with ScotlandsPeople.
A bmd certificate in England costs £7.00; the 1911 census return costs about £3.20. So perhaps not such a bad deal after all?

Best wishes,
Meg

[Montrose Budie]

Thinking outloud and jumping ahead somewhat

1921 census and Northern Ireland.......depending on when in 1921 it became NI will it become part of the England and Wales census

Google

The simple answer is that no census was taken in 1921 in Ireland due to the Civil War.

The first Census for the Irish Free State was taken in 1926.


The following background from Wikipedia............

The Irish Free State (Irish: Saorstát Éireann) (1922–1937) was the state established as a Dominion on 6 December 1922 under the Anglo-Irish Treaty, signed by the British government and Irish representatives exactly twelve months beforehand.[1]

On the day the Irish Free State was established, it comprised the entire island of Ireland but Northern Ireland almost immediately exercised its right under the Treaty to opt out of the new state. The Irish Free State replaced Southern Ireland (itself established on 3 May 1921 by the British Government under the Government of Ireland Act 1920), a de jure autonomous region of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.[2] The Irish Free State also effectively replaced the self-proclaimed but in many respects de facto Irish Republic (itself established on 21 January 1919). Similarly, the new government of the Irish Free State replaced both the Provisional Government of Southern Ireland and the Government of the Irish Republic although W. T. Cosgrave, the first President of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State had, in any event, led both governments since August 1922.

mb

[Montrose Budie]

....much snipped........

If I have any of the above upside down please enlighten me.

All the best,
Alan

It's all obviously upside down because of your location! , but you are quite correct; in fact you understate the situation in that viewing an image of the original household schedule costs 30 credits, - between £2.49 and £3.48 per image !

1911 is the first census where the info that was supplied in the individual household schedules was retained, i.e. no transfer of the information into enumeration books.

Many people will want to see the image as this will most often be the handwriting of the Head of Household.

But the image is only that household, not a pageful of households in the street, amongst whom are often relatives. In the Scottish censuses for 30 credits at £6 I can not only look at the whole page, but a page before and a page after, and still have some credits left.

'Monopoly pricing' indeed, but the correct, weasel words are 'opportunity pricing', i.e. screw the public for as much as you think the market will bear!

As ever, the fact that 25m people live within 50 miles of Piccadilly Circus explains the initial geographical situation. (Or should that be 50 miles diameter?..... based on PC.)

Orraverybest

mb

[trish1]

I also agree with Alan and have yet to purchase an image. Using 10 credits belonging to a wealthy friend I discovered I received very little on a transcript that wasn't part of the original free search.

Consequently, I am finding some useful information by using the free search with the names of other household members as part of the search parameters. This seems to work for me if I know either where the folks were born, or where they are currently living.

It will need a much cheaper rate per image before I start looking at images. I spend quite alot on my research - and realise it will cost money, but I think these costs are overboard - very much looking for the newbe who enjoyed WDYTYA.

Trish

[Currie]

I’ll make this a triple decker.

Hello Meg,

I think they deserve all the flack they’re going to get and I’m quite obviously extremely annoyed because when I say I am shut out that is the truth. But I only want to read the images not admire them and it costs no more to scan them in colour and to tell you the truth I’ve never bought an English certificate.

To explain what I mean there are about 100 1911 Census images I would like to see and here’s the comparative pricing.

On the 1911 site those 100 images will probably cost in excess of £300.
(Where are the detailed price lists?)

For the 1901 site the price per unit is 75p, 100 would cost me £75.

On Ancestry I can join for one month and get the lot for £11

Now that’s quite a jump for someone on a limited budget. But probably if the 1911 price was doubled there would be the same mad scramble. English and Welsh Genealogy doesn’t have to be expensive, it only becomes expensive when the carpetbaggers move in.

All the best,
Alan


Hello David,

No, you’re wrong, I’m on top of the world, you’re down under, South is up.

All the best,
Alan


Thanks Trish,

All the best,
Alan

[Montrose Budie]

Hi Alan, or should that be 'G'day Mate' !

[for those not conversant with practices in Australia, 'mate' has a very particular connotation and meaning; or at least used to until a couple of government scandals some years ago!]

Two decks' snipped .................

Hello David,

No, you’re wrong, I’m on top of the world, you’re down under, South is up.

All the best,
Alan

Alan

Given all my business travel down your way in the 70s and 80s, I'm very conscious of the different view of the world from your angle.

Which recalls the tale of the Aussie MD of the subsidiary of a UK company, for which I worked, who arrived at UK immigration at Heathrow in the late 70s not long after whichever discriminatory legislation was introduced which affected him; was refused entry as he hadn't the correct visa, not knowing that he should have applied for such. He just turned round, and continued with the rest of his planned European trip.

When he arrived in Munich he phoned the group MD in the UK to inform him of the situation, saying, inter alia, that he was sorry that he now wouldn't be able to hand over the not insubstantial dividend cheque from the Australian subsidiary!

Given the government contacts that the UK company had (amongst other things they produced all the UK banknote paper!) words were had in the right quarters, and, as a very, very special concession, the Aussie MD was permitted to enter the UK two weeks later................


In my later genealogical lecturing trips to Oz and that other country across the Tasman who you like to thump at whichever sport is involved, I was always very, very careful to use the world map version centred on the Pacific Ocean; on which, incidentally, way up top left, there's a tiny wee country called Scotland !


Another wee story - I just can't resist it, - to illustrate what, in NZ, is termed the '12,000 mile gap'.

I still recall the evening in Auckland, when I knocked my pan out over several hours, after a long working day, forbye, writing a 20 page telefax, in the knowledge that my colleagues back in the UK would have a whole working day to answer all my questions.

Result, in terms of an urgently needed reply next morning?, - zilch !


On matters more relevant to this thread, before I get told off by the moderater, we're obviously on the same wavelength and very much of like mind.

As regards your 'list of 75', given that you probably have very high quality info re the references, have you explored the option of using a record agent (a researcher researches, but a record agent just looks up the required records) to obtain photocopies from Kew of your list?

That written in the context of not knowing just what is the situation in terms of accessing the 1911 census records at their home in Kew, nor knowledge of the cost per such photocopy...............

Given that you can supply the exact reference details required, and assuming that there is a reasonably efficient computer system, then I'd be disappointed if such a record agent couldn't access 30 records/hour and 'hit the button' to order a copy; this in the context where such a record agent might not charge much more than £12/hr..............

Forget the idea, however, if a form has to be filled out by hand to request a copy ........

Orraverybest

mb