* Find Census Information to enter into Ancestral Sources

[Simonides]

The excellent material at Census Information (Ancestral Sources Tutorial ~ Enter Census ~ (1) Enter Census Information) shows a fictitious transcript of the UK 1901 Census Return and how to enter it, specifically

RG Number: RG13 Piece: 603 Folio: 52 Page: 10 Schedule: 79
Registration District Guildford, Surrey, England
Address 28, Park Road, Stoke Within, Guildford

Looking at a 1901 Census form downloaded from Ancestry, I can see the Reference (RG13/3433) which I take to be RG Number = RG13 and Piece = 3433 on the PRO information strip at the bottom. I can also see the Page number (10) at top right corner, but wonder where can I find the Folio and Schedule numbers?

Is the Registration District described on the Census form as
Civil Parish (eg. Toxteth Park) or
County Borough (eg. Liverpool) or
Parliamentary Borough (eg. East Toxteth)?

Can anyone clarify what are the differences between these three entities or point me to a description?

I'd attach my downloaded census record but as it's clearly labelled crown copyright I wasn't sure if that was allowed here.

thanks,
Simonides

[mjashby]

Simonides,

Try this for some introductory guidance on UK Census Forms etc. http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help ... the-census

Interpreting Census Places can sometimes be problematic, but less so in the example you quote, i.e I would interpret that Census Place: Liverpool, Lancashire, Toxteth Park being as part of the person's address, as it is a District of Liverpool. Other's may differ here, depending on how they record places, and if they want to use more precise geocoding. Google/Bing/Wikipedia, or whatever search engine you prefer, can be invaluable aids to narrowing down on place names when in doubt. However, a Census Areas/District/Parish such as "Ossett-cum-Gawthorpe" can be problematic as it refers to two distinct geographic Places and you have to determine the actual location from the person's address/locality, or from the detailed Census Descripton page at the start of the specific Census Piece Number (which gives a detailed description of the route covered by the Enumerator).

Mervyn

[tatewise]

The National Archives explanation suggested by Mervyn is quite good, but I emphasise that the Folio numbers are only stamped on alternate pages. So if the image has no Folio number, check the previous page.
I'm not sure about Ancestry but FindMyPast and FreeCEN clearly indicate the Folio and Page in their transcription details.

The No of Schedule is given in column 1 of the Census image, and explicitly by FreeCEN.

FindMyPast clearly identifies the Registration District in the transcription.

FreeCEN gives the Place in terms of Reg. District & County.

For a full index of all Registration Districts see https://www.ukbmd.org.uk/reg/.
They are administrative regions only loosely associated with other local place names.
The Reg. County may differ from the County Borough and change over time.

The Civil Parish is associated with the local churches and pre-dates Registration Districts.
The County Borough is the administrative county and its boundaries may change over time.
The Parliamentary Borough is associated with electoral constituencies.

In your example the Registration District is Toxteth Park, Lancashire as per https://www.ukbmd.org.uk/reg/lan.html.
It existed from 1.1.1881 to 1.9.1922 as explained in https://www.ukbmd.org.uk/reg/districts/ ... 0park.html which explains it was previously in West Derby and subsequently in Liverpool districts.

[davidm_uk]

On Ancestry they show the Reference, Folio etc numbers on the index/transcription page, down towards the bottom eg:
"Source Citation
The National Archives of the UK (TNA); Kew, Surrey, England; Class: RG12; Piece: 157; Folio: 69; Page: 37"
I just copy the section Class.......37 and paste it into Ancestral Sources.

[Mark1834]

Couple of other points to consider as well -

Always use the original image alongside the transcript - commercial sites create their transcripts in parts of the world where labour is cheap, and the transcribers’ knowledge of UK geography can leave a lot to be desired! Names also get mashed up, particularly where handwriting can be difficult to read.

Also, always download the image to your local system so you are not dependent on a continuous subscription that you may not want to renew in the future. You can use the National Archives citation as a basis for your naming system so files remain logically organised. In the example you quote, I would use “Census - 1901 - Guildford SRY (RG13_0603 folio 52 p10).jpg” - note you have to avoid use of characters that are not acceptable in Windows file names. But you can use whatever convention best suits how to organise your records of course.

[Gowermick]

Further to Mark Drapers comments about naming of files, a lot of information shown in Mark’s example is redundant, so I don’t use it when naming files, only when creating citations.

If one looks at a typical Citation for an 1841 census, we may see Census 1841 - HO107 Piece 0012 Book 06 Folio 29 Page 10,(or whatever suits your way of working) but by removing the redundant, and verbose information from the citation, the filename can be shortened to 1841 0012-06 F29 P10 without risk.

Likewise with 1911 census sheets, where a piece number is tied to a specific Sub District (SD) and Enumeration District (ED) combination, so again redundancy is avoided by leaving out the SD and ED portion of the citation for the filename. So my typcal 1911 image filename would be 1911 12345 SN254.jpg ( where SN is schedule number within the piece)

Using Mark’s example, I would save this image as a file called 1901 0603 F52 P10.jpg, and file it in a folder called Census 1901. One could argue that the 1901 is redundant, but it avoids risk of misfiling files into wrong folder.

[Mark1834]

Indeed - there are an infinite number of ways to do this. I prefer my image files to useful outside FH as well, so generally include sufficient information that it is easily found and unambiguous what it refers to, but if you only ever access them via FH citations, a minimalist approach has its benefits.

[tatewise]

Playing devil's advocate, if only accessed via FH the image filenames can be almost anything unique.
What really matters is the Source record and Media record names, although it makes sense to keep them similar.

The Media record name should identify to the Census page as suggested, although I prefer to include HO107, RG13, etc, with the year, to differentiate from Census records in the same year from other countries.

The Source record name should also identify the Schedule number, or the Name of head of family, to differentiate multiple households on the same page.

[Gowermick]

The Source record name should also identify the Schedule number, or the Name of head of family, to differentiate multiple households on the same page.

I don’t worry about that, as their address usually identifies the family, but where no address is used, I just rely on the fact that the individuals own name appears, and I can usually spot that out of only 20 names listed

[tatewise]

I think you are missing the point Mike.
If there are two household Schedules on the same Census page, and both involve family relations in your tree, how do you differentiate the two Source records?
Or do you lump them all on one Source record that is cited by both households?

[Gowermick]

I lump them, using one citation for each census sheet. Keeps it simple

[Simonides]

Try this for some introductory guidance on UK Census Forms etc. http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help ... the-census
Mervyn

Mervyn - thanks for the link and other tips.

... the Folio numbers are only stamped on alternate pages. So if the image has no Folio number, check the previous page.
I'm not sure about Ancestry but FindMyPast and FreeCEN clearly indicate the Folio and Page in their transcription details.

For a full index of all Registration Districts see https://www.ukbmd.org.uk/reg/.
.

Mike, yes I've found the Folio number thanks for that, and also for the link to the list or Registration Districts that I'd not seen before!

On Ancestry they show the Reference, Folio etc numbers on the index/transcription page, down towards the bottom eg:
"Source Citation
The National Archives of the UK (TNA); Kew, Surrey, England; Class: RG12; Piece: 157; Folio: 69; Page: 37"
I just copy the section Class.......37 and paste it into Ancestral Sources.

David - I see that now. I'd been relying on the version of Ancestry at my local library and I see that all this information is in the My Discoveries email they send after a research session.

Always use the original image alongside the transcript
Also, always download the image to your local system so you are not dependent on a continuous subscription that you may not want to renew in the future.

Mark - thanks - good advice!

If one looks at a typical Citation for an 1841 census, we may see Census 1841 - HO107 Piece 0012 Book 06 Folio 29 Page 10,(or whatever suits your way of working) but by removing the redundant, and verbose information from the citation, the filename can be shortened to 1841 0012-06 F29 P10 without risk.

Mike L - thanks for the suggestion. At the moment, I'm naming the media file with the head of the household eg. "BLOGGS Joe 1841Census" for simplicity. Can you think of any disadvantage in doing that? I could include census details eg. "BLOGGS Joe 1841 0012-06 F29 P10" but I'm reluctant to have file names that are too long in case I hit limits in FH or Windows 10.

Simonides

[tatewise]

The biggest snag with BLOGGS Joe 1841Census as a filename is that sooner or later you will probably have more than one Joe BLOGGS in the same census year.

[Gowermick]

Mike L - thanks for the suggestion. At the moment, I'm naming the media file with the head of the household eg. "BLOGGS Joe 1841Census" for simplicity. Can you think of any disadvantage in doing that? I could include census details eg. "BLOGGS Joe 1841 0012-06 F29 P10" but I'm reluctant to have file names that are too long in case I hit limits in FH or Windows 10.
Simonides

The main disadvantages I can see, are
1) you may have more than one BLOGGS Joe in your tree so you end up adding more info to the file name in order to differentiate between them!
2) Females generally change their surnames on marriage, so Miss Bloggs, daughter of Joe, may then become Mrs Jones, so adding name of head of household to filename does not make it easier to find her census, when she’s still with her parents ( which you won’t realise until you see her census)

In my opinion, you need to be able to go from the individual’s citation to the correct image, that is all that is necessary. Adding anything else to the filename is redundant. Others may feel different
NB My reply crossed Mike Tates, who also mentions issue 1)

[victor]

I always save the census image in a census folder of the year.

As others have details the title of the image I add at theend the name of the person and the year he was born

Like an example above RG13-0603_Fo-52_Page-10 Joe Bloggs 1860

Victor

[jmurphy]

As well as the excellent guide to Reg Districts at UKBMD, I also use A Vision of Britain when I need to clarify a jurisdiction.

[gwilym'smum]

I suppose my way is a bit longer but they appear in order. I start with x for 1841-1891 and y for 1901, 1911 and 1939. In this way all the censuses appear at the end of the list and don't get mixed with other images or sources. So my name appears as:-
x4 Mayer census 1841 Cain
If there are more than one Cains, of which there are many! I put his date of birth.
For married women
x4 Pott census 1841 Hannah Cain Mayer I always record married women with their maiden names. If there is only one Hannah married to a Cain I leave out the Cain (in this case there are several)
Of course for each census year I change the number so 1851 is x5 etc. In this way they are organized by census year and then by family. Touch wood, up to now I have not had a problem with file length.
I usually manage to find my source or image immediately
Ann

[keith_r59]

I use the following naming convention for source records, linked media records and associated image files:

Individuals
{Surname}, {Forenames} ({Birth Year}-{Death Year}) - {Record Type}

E.G.
Blythe, Sarah (1849-1907) - 1861 Census
Robinson, Thomas (1845-1919) - 1861 Census

Families
{Husband Surname}+{Wife Surname} ({Year Marriage Started}-{Year Marriage Ended}) - {Record Type}

E.G. Robinson+Blythe (1867-1907) -1901 Census

In a tree of 3885 individuals and 1431 families I haven't encountered any duplicates thus far.

[Gowermick]

I know memory is cheaper these days, but the last three naming conventions, which use peoples names in the image title, rely on having a separate copy of the census image for each family member that appears, potentially 20 copies of each census image - the mind boggles

[tatewise]

I suspect they forgot to say that the chosen Name is just the head of the household and not everybody.

[keith_r59]

I know memory is cheaper these days, but the last three naming conventions, which use peoples names in the image title, rely on having a separate copy of the census image for each family member that appears, potentially 20 copies of each census image - the mind boggles

I suspect they forgot to say that the chosen Name is just the head of the household and not everybody.

Yes, I only keep one copy of the source record/media record/associated image named after the family it is related to and then link all relevant family members to it. Personally, I find this a lot easier to use than naming everything in code but then there is no right or wrong way to do these things.

[gwilym'smum]

I only use the one image for the household as Mike said. AS links it to all the people so if I am looking at one of the household the correct image is next to their census fact. I think
Ann