The 1871 Channel Islands Census

The 1871 Channel Islands Census

A page from the 1871 census covering part of the parish of Trinity

The 1871 Census for the Channel Islands was taken on the night of 2 April 1871

Enumeration forms were distributed to all households a few days before the census night and the household members were required to complete the forms themselves. The next day, the enumerators collected the completed forms. All of the details from the individual forms were later sorted and copied into enumerators’ books.

Information requested

• Address (name of the street, avenue, or road; house number)
• Occupant (name of each person who spent the night in the house; their birthplace and relationship to head of family)
• Residence (whether home was inhabited; number of rooms occupied)
• Personal (sex, age, marital status)
• Occupation (whether employer, employee, or neither)
• Health (whether blind, deaf, dumb, imbecile, idiot, or lunatic)

The original census schedules that were completed by household members were destroyed. The enumerators’ books were kept and in 1970 the records were microfilmed.

The clerks who compiled and reviewed the census data made a variety of marks on the records. Unfortunately, many of these tally marks were written over personal information and some fields, such as ages, can be difficult to read. On the other hand, some of these marks can be useful because they designate separate households. In a small parish, a double slash (//) might indicate a new household and a single slash (/) might indicate a non-related person living in the house (such as a servant or lodger). In larger parishes, a double slash (//) might indicate separate buildings and a single slash (/) might indicate separate households within the same building. The census records were grouped by county and then subdivided by civil parish groups.

If the head of the household was illiterate, or had trouble completing the enumeration form, the enumerator (census taker) would complete as much information as possible. The records include a description of each enumeration district as it was written by the enumerator.

Abbreviations were used as shown:

• WI = wife
• DA = daughter
• GD = granddaughter
• GS = grandson
• HD = head
• Lgr = lodger
• M = married
• U = unmarried
• NP = nephew
• NC = niece
• SCH = scholar
• Sis = sister
• SO = son
• SV or Ser = servant
• SL or SOLW = son-in-law (this could mean stepson, or something different from the modern usage)
• AG LAB = agricultural laborer
• FRMR = farmer

Crossings out

Errors were sometimes crossed out by an enumerator, or information was sometimes crossed out by a Registrar or Superintendent Registrar if he thought that the enumerator had completed the relevant item incorrectly. In some cases, the marks are tally marks because information such as occupation was used for statistical purposes.