Genealogy Chat

Anyone had any experience of this? How complete is this census? Out of three families I'm looking for I have only managed to find one. I know where they were born, ages etc.and where they are likely to be, but no sign of them. Was 1841 a good year for being beamed up by aliens? or am I doing something wrong? Jackie

I haven't had any problems with it, but I have seen a lot of comments by people in various places that the transcriptions are fairly lousy for that one. Unfortunately the limitations of the census data itself also mean that it's much harder to work around a mistranscribed name... Oh, if you go to the Ancestry page for the '41 census and scroll down, I think that's where it tells you about what pages are missing or damaged, so it might not hurt to check. Someone has to draw the short straw, and perhaps you're the unlucky one!

Don't forget that the 1841 doesn't give birthplace (only in county or out of county, or Scotland, Ireland or 'Foreign Parts') and the ages of people over 15 were supposed to be rounded down to the nearest multiple of 5, and also relationship to head was not given. So it is bound to be more difficult to find people on there. But ancestry's transcription is not as good as on some other websites, or if you can get hold of a transcription done by a local family history society. But if ancestry had got experts to do it, they would have to charge more for subscriptions to pay for it, I suppose. Kate.

Hi There.... The 1841 census is notorious for it's mis-transcriptions . Also , the enumerators 'rounded' up or down peoples ages ....for what reason .I have no idea......... If you post the details of your ancestors , and the region where you expect them to be....I will gladly have a look...... Kind Regards Jean