"...have no idea why there's no birth certificate."
Up until 1875 it wasn't compulsory to register a birth. It was only from 1875 that a person could be fined £2 if a birth wasn't registered. Given that this birth was just two years after this I wonder if, given the situation, perhaps the mother didn't want to register the birth and wasn't aware of the new law?
She may have got the child baptised, or she may not, and if she did get Edith baptised then she may not have given her real name at the time.
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"I'd like to know the address where she worked in Maldon. Is that on Find My Past? As I couldn't find it on Ancestry."
It's all on Ancestry, but this is where things get tricky.
It's a bit like one of those puzzles that goes "Mrs Brown lives next door to the butcher and Mrs Blue lives opposite the baker"
When enumerators were recording the census they would start at one end of the street, go along it and then do the other side of the street.
Very often they would record house numbers, but not always. Anyway, sometimes, especially on main shopping streets, house numbers aren't always displayed (that's still true today).
In that situation, the only thing you have is the "Schedule Number" which is the number on the left hand side of the page. This isn't a house number but simply the order that the enumerator recorded them in, simply starting at one and going up from there.
The 1881 Census shows Louisa living at an address on the High Street working as a domestic servant. She is at the top of the page here:
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/imageviewer/collections/7572/images/ESSRG11_1772_1775-0790
If you look further down on that page you will see the Middleditch family, Edward & Hannah who are bakers, living at Schedule 34 (this is where that puzzle comes in). Next door to them are the Handley family, William & Jane. William is a mariner.
On the bottom of the previous page it shows living in the same household as Louisa, Sarah and Elizabeth Richardson who are unmarried sisters aged 76 and 74. They are at Schedule No 28
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/imageviewer/collections/7572/images/ESSRG11_1772_1775-0789
If you look on the same page you will notice that the Samms family, who are grocers, are living at Schedule No 24 and William Gower, a clerk, lives at Schedule No 23 and that there is a butchers at No 22.
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OK, so if we now fast forward to the 1891 Census and this time round the enumerator did record the house numbers. So we need to see if any of those people mentioned above are still living on the High Street.
As it happens, Sarah Richardson is still living on the High Street and is recorded as then living at 15 High Street with a housekeeper and two servants:
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/imageviewer/collections/6598/images/ESSRG12_1396_1399-0362
15 High Street today is occupied by Holden estate agents.
But, she may have moved house since 1881. How do we know she's still living in the same house? That's where the neighbours come in.
Edward Middleditch, the baker, is still living five doors away at number 25 although his wife Hannah has since died.
Next door to him, at number 27, there is still a Handley living there although William & Jane have since moved up the street to number 31.
Going in the opposite direction, the Samms family are still living in the same home as Grocers at number 9 and William Gower is still next door at number 7. There is also still a butchers next door at number 5 although it is run by different people now.
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/imageviewer/collections/6598/images/ESSRG12_1396_1399-0363
Fortunately, Sarah Richardson was still living on the High Street so we can easily identify which house it was. But, even if she wasn't living there any more we can work out from the neighbours living either side in both 1881 and 1891 where Louisa must have lived in 1881. That's where the puzzle I originally mentioned comes in.
I hope that makes sense?
It's also interesting to see how things have changed over the years. In 1891 there was a draper's shop at 19 High St and today it is still a clothes shop.
The Samm's grocery shop is now a cafe and jewellery workshop.
The butcher's shop at No 5 is still a butcher's shop (Ansell & Sons). So there's been a butcher's shop on that site for at least 140 years.
The Moot Hall (a building with four pillars and a clock) back in 1891 was the police station and there was one prisoner in the cells on that evening.
On the other side of the street, in 1891, the widowed Mrs Hicks ran a large grocery store at No 40-42. Today, it is an M&S Foodhall
The building next door to the old Kings Head hotel that looks very much like an old bank branch was indeed a bank back in 1891 (or, at least, a bank manager lived there).
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"...and her (the second person) aged 10."
If you're having trouble tracing a particular person then one thing you can do is to look for others who lived with them.
For example, in the 1871 Census Louisa is shown as living with her sister Margaret and brother George. If you then search for them in the 1861 census you can find, ten years younger still living on the same road and Louisa is there shown as 8 months old.
However, the handwriting on the form is not very good and her name has been transcribed incorrectly as "Louize" instead of Louisa.
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/discoveryui-content/view/records?recordId=16796544&collectionId=8767