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1801 and 1811 censuses of Ealing

John Gauss has transcribed these two early censuses and also provided analyses. Thanks to him for his generosity in sharing his work and also to Dr Oates, Borough Archivist for Ealing, for agreeing to its publication.

Original schedules

The original schedules of the 1801 and 1811 census of the parish of Ealing (Archive nos. 85/15 and 85/16 respectively) are currently held at the Ealing Local History Library. They both consist of bound volumes, approx. 49cm (high) by 37cm, the pages of which are printed with columns and headings. The entries are hand-written in ink and are generally neat and clear. However some words appear rather faint, which makes it hard to read certain letters accurately, especially given the rather unconventional spellings of some names.

Census dates

1801 10th March
1811 27th May

Area covered

Both censuses are divided into two sections, which in 1801 (but not 1811) are prefaced 'Ealing Upperside' and 'Ealing Lowerside'. From a comparison of the names in the census with those marked on An historical map of the parish of Ealing by William Nicholls, 1822, it seems that Upperside was the part of the parish to the north of what are now Little Ealing Lane and Popes Lane. Lowerside, therefore, was the part south of this down to the Thames, including Old Brentford.

Order of Entries

The order of the entries in the 1801 schedules mostly follows that of the Poor Rate book (Archive no. 85/11) in which many of the same names appear. In this, however, they are subdivided into about twenty roads or localities, and so by comparing it with the census one could narrow down where people lived. Except for starting with the vicar, the 1811 schedules do not seem to follow any order, which would make any comparison much more difficult.

Transcriptions

1801 census of Old Brentford 'Ealing Lowerside'.

1811 census of Old Brentford 'Ealing Lowerside'.

Statistics

In the following tables U = Upperside, L = Lowerside.

1. Population by Family, Sex and Occupation
2. Single sex households
3. Female tenants
4. Named families
5. Number of families per house
6. Number of people per house
7. Number of people per single-family house
8. Most popular names

1 Population by Family, Sex and Occupation

These are the figures which are summarised at the end of the original schedules, but shown here also with percentages, and percentage change over the ten year period.

	Inhab.Hos.	Families	Males	Females	TOTAL	Agric	Trade etc	Other
U 1801	271	485	1039	965	2004	106	960	938
%			51.8	48.2	100.0	5.3	47.9	46.8
U 1811	298	337	973	1038	2011	252	496	1263
%			48.4	51.6	100.0	12.5	24.7	62.8
% change	10.0	-30.5	-6.4	7.6	0.3	137.7	-48.3	34.6
L 1801	578	897	1406	1625	3031	14	1316	1701
%			46.4	53.6	100.0	0.5	43.4	56.1
L 1811	626	947	1536	1814	3350	157	1455	1738
%			45.9	54.1	100.0	4.7	43.4	51.9
% change	8.3	5.6	9.2	11.6	10.5	1021.4	10.6	2.2

Comments

The big drop in the number of families in Upperside is puzzling. However the question as to what counted as a family was open to varying interpretations.

The huge percentage swings towards agriculture, though not involving many people, were probably caused by the 1811 census being held at the end of May -2½ months later than in 1801.

The Lowerside, which included Old Brentford, was clearly less agricultural.

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2 Single sex households

The numbers and percentages of houses shown as occupied by one sex only are shown below

	Inhab.Hos.	Zero Males	Zero Females	Single Sex	%
U 1801	271	21	5	26	9.6
U 1811	298	13	2	15	5.0
L 1801	578	34	13	47	8.1
L 1811	626	39	6	45	7.2

Comments

Curiously, of all the houses with zero males, five have a male tenant's name, and of those with zero females, two have a female tenant's name. In these cases one can only suppose that either the named tenant was absent on census night, or that the occupant mistakenly gave the owner's rather than the tenant's name.

3 Female tenants

The number of houses with a named tenant, and the numbers and percentages of those with a female tenant's name are shown below.

	Named tenants	Female	%
U 1801	270	51	18.9
U 1811	297	41	13.8
L 1801	578	92	15.9
L 1811	625	95	15.2
		Average:	15.8

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4 Named families

The numbers and proportions of all families represented by the named tenants are shown below. This would suggest that the surnames of about a third of the families are not listed.

	Families	Named tenants	%
U 1801	485	270	55.7
U 1811	337	297	88.1
L 1801	897	578	64.4
L1811	947	625	66.0
		Average:	66.4

5 Number of families per house

The number of houses with a given number of families present in them is shown below.

	0	1	2	3	4	5	6+	TOTAL
U 1801	1	147	72	31	10	4	6	271
%	0.4	54.2	26.6	11.4	3.7	1.5	2.2	100
U 1811	1	264	27	5	1	0	0	298
%	0.3	88.6	9.1	1.7	0.3	0.0	0.0	100
% change	0.0	79.6	-62.5	-83.9	-90.0	-100.0	-100.0	10.0
L 1801	1	391	114	41	16	8	7	578
%	0.2	67.6	19.7	7.1	2.8	1.4	1.2	100
L 1811	0	413	148	39	14	8	4	626
%	0.0	66.0	23.6	6.2	2.2	1.3	0.6	100
% change	-100.0	5.6	29.8	-4.9	-12.5	0.0	-42.9	8.3

Comments

It is clear from the responses to this question that many were unsure as to what constituted a family.

At one end of the spectrum, three houses had people but no families, and at the other end, the workhouse had one family of over 100 people! In between, some large houses with numerous servants were counted as having one family, while some smaller ones must have counted servants or lodgers as separate. There was one house with seven one-person families.

The huge increase in single-family houses in Upperside 1811 is probably due to a change of interpretation by the enumerator.

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6 Number of people per house

The number of houses with a given number of people present in them is shown below.

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10+	TOTAL
U 1801	8	33	26	35	29	31	28	18	17	46	271
%	3.0	12.2	9.6	12.9	10.7	11.4	10.3	6.6	6.3	17.0	100.0
U 1811	2	32	44	42	25	44	24	24	17	44	298
%	0.7	10.7	14.8	14.1	8.4	14.8	8.1	8.1	5.7	14.8	100.0
% change	-75.0	-3.0	69.2	20.0	-13.8	41.9	-14.3	33.3	0.0	-4.3	10.0
L 1801	13	67	107	91	82	72	55	30	17	44	578
%	2.2	11.6	18.5	15.7	14.2	12.5	9.5	5.2	2.9	7.6	100.0
L 1811	16	93	108	84	74	63	52	45	31	60	626
%	2.6	14.9	17.3	13.4	11.8	10.1	8.3	7.2	5.0	9.6	100.0
% change	23.1	38.8	0.9	-7.7	-9.8	-12.5	-5.5	50.0	82.4	36.4	8.3

Comments

From these figures it is clear that the Lowerside had a greater proportion of smaller houses than the Upperside. This was no doubt due to Old Brentford being more densely built up.

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7 Number of people per single-family house

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10 to 14	15 to 19	20 to 49	50+	TOTAL
U 1801	8	30	18	22	19	15	10	6	5	8	0	5	1	147
%	5.4	20.4	12.2	15.0	12.9	10.2	6.8	4.1	3.4	5.4	0.0	3.4	0.7	100
U 1811	2	32	43	39	22	39	19	20	14	24	5	3	2	264
%	0.8	12.1	16.3	14.8	8.3	14.8	7.2	7.6	5.3	9.1	1.9	1.1	0.8	100
% change	-75.0	6.7	138.9	77.3	15.8	160.0	90.0	233.3	180.0	200.0		-40.0	100.0	79.6
L 1801	13	63	92	61	58	43	30	15	4	8	2	2	0	391
%	3.3	16.1	23.5	15.6	14.8	11.0	7.7	3.8	1.0	2.0	0.5	0.5	0.0	100
L 1811	16	89	90	62	46	37	23	21	11	16	1	1	0	413
%	3.9	21.5	21.8	15.0	11.1	9.0	5.6	5.1	2.7	3.9	0.2	0.2	0.0	100
% change	23.1	41.3	-2.2	1.6	-20.7	-14.0	-23.3	40.0	175.0	100.0	-50.0	-50.0	0.0	5.6

Comments

The purpose of this table is to attempt to show the distribution of family size. Clearly with the multi-family houses it is usually impossible to know how many members each family had. Even with the single-family houses there is still the question as to what constituted a family (see the comments to 5 above).

The U 1811 figures are rather distorted by the fact that there was a big increase in the proportion of single-family houses (see the comments to 5 above).

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8 Most popular names

In both censuses combined, the Christian names are given for 1394 males and 271 females. The most popular names with their frequencies are:

	Number	%		Number	%
John	300	21.5	Mary	47	17.3
William	230	16.5	Elizabeth	42	15.5
Thomas	172	12.3	Ann	40	14.8
James	124	8.9	Sarah	32	11.8
Richard	93	6.7	Hannah	13	4.8
George	60	4.3	Susan(nah)	9	3.3
Joseph	54	3.9	Jane	8	3.0
Robert	51	3.7	Frances	8	3.0
Samuel	42	3.0

Similarly, surnames are listed for 1770 individuals. Although the most common is Smith, even this only occurs 24 times, representing 1.4%.

Published December 2018

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