Collins Tracing Your Family History. Anthony Adolph

children they had.

      The 1901 and 1911 censuses have started to appear online at www.census.nationalarchives.ie. Otherwise, if you know a general location, you can check the heads-of-households lists, which accompany the census forms, for a townland or street name. The other approach is to seek an address from a GRO certificate first. Some heritage centres have their own indexes, which can be searched for a fee.

      You can also check applications for old age pensions made between 1908 and 1921 where, as proof of age, extracts from the later-destroyed census returns could be submitted. The applications are indexed: copies are at TNA, PRONI and the SoG and www.pensear.org.

      NORTHERN IRELAND

       As Ireland. Copies of the relevant section of the Irish census are at the PRONI. An index to the 1901 census of Fermanagh is L. K. Kuchenbach Meehan’s 1901 Irish Census Index, Vol. 1, County Fermanagh (Largy Books, 1992).

      CHANNEL ISLANDS

       As England and Wales. Copies of the returns for Guernsey are held by Her Majesty’s Greffier at the General Register Office, and for Jersey at the St Helier Public Library and Société Jersiaise: all returns for 1841–91 have been indexed by Jersey Library. There are also (indexed) censuses for 1806 and 1815, called ‘General Don’s muster rolls’. Those for 1806 list some 4000 heads of households with the numbers of people in their families, whilst those for 1816 list all men aged 17–80, with the numbers of women, boys and girls in their households.

      ISLE OF MAN

       As England and Wales. Copies of returns for the island are at the Manx Museum. The 1851, 1881, 1891 and 1901 returns are fully indexed.

      QUICK REFERENCE

      See also Main Sources in Useful Addresses.

      REGISTRAR GENERAL OF SCOTLAND

      www.gro-scotland.gov.uk

      For the Channel Islands and Isle of Man addresses, see here

      A census enumerator collects a complete census form.

      EXAMPLES OF CENSUS RETURNS IN OTHER COUNTRIES

      AUSTRALIA

       Although musters were kept of men in Australia from 1788, proper Australian censuses kicked off with the 1828 census of New South Wales and Tasmania, giving ages, occupations, where people lived, and whether they were born in Australia or, if not, when they landed. There is a surname index at the SoG and a microfilm copy at TNA in class HO 10. The first national census was made in 1881, but few returns have survived.

      CARIBBEAN

       A guide to censuses in TNA is in G. Grannum’s Tracing your West Indian Ancestors; Sources at the PRO (PRO Publications, 1995). Most early ones focus on the white population. There are returns of Maroons of Mooretown, Charlestown, Scot’s Hall and Accompanying, giving name, age, colour and some notes on the father’s name, and slaves belonging to Maroons. Jamaica’s own censuses are at the Department of Statistics.

      INDIA AND PAKISTAN

       The first all-India census was taken in 1871–2 and have been taken regularly every ten years from 1881. However, these record nothing of any help to genealogists. Equally, although Pakistan has taken census decennially since 1951, including names and relationships, only the other two categories, ages and occupations, are available to the public, making them virtually useless for our purposes.

      KENYA

       Censuses were taken in 1911, 1921, 1926 and 1931, but these did not include Africans. The first complete census was in 1948 followed by one in 1969. These are at the Central Bureau of Statistics.

      NEW ZEALAND

       The few preserved census records for this country are at the New Zealand National Archives.

      SIERRA LEONE

       TNA have a Sierra Leone census for 30 June 1831 in class CO 267/111, which includes the whole population with ages and occupation of the head of household. There is also an 1833 census in CO 267/127.

      SOUTH AFRICA

       Censuses date back to 1865 for the Cape, and 1904 for the rest of the country, but they were later destroyed.

      QUICK REFERENCE

      See also Main Sources in Useful Addresses.

      CENTRAL BUREAU OF STATISTICS

      NEW ZEALAND NATIONAL ARCHIVES

       CHAPTER SEVEN THE MAIN WEBSITES

       The internet has not created any new genealogical records, but it has made some of them much more readily accessible than before. The plethora of sites out there can be very confusing, not least because a lot of data is duplicated.

      ORIGINAL DATA

      The records that you can use for tracing your family tree are clearly described in this book. Increasingly, the most useful ones are being indexed, digitised, and made available on CD-Rom and the internet. Besides producing datasets from original records, the internet sites will often license the use of their data elsewhere.

      This is all to the good, but it can make life very confusing for first-time genealogists, though nobody now can keep pace with the number of different sites, and the way many of them change. Equally, there is no duplication-free way of navigating through these sites. Which of them represents the best value really depends on your individual case – one site may contain vastly more useful information for one person than it does for another. I can only advise you to have a quick look at