Anyone else excited for the Free State Irish census release tomorrow?

[AInightingale]

Anyone else looking forward to the release of the 26 county Free State Irish census tomorrow (18 April)? What do you hope to find out?

I don't know why I'm writing this, as the site will probably crash immediately and be unavailable for ages.

Ah thanks, didn’t realise that. Still the same pattern though. Do you know why the spelling changed then? In 1926 there were only 451 Seaghans and close to 3000 Seans.

'non native Irish speaker'

Can someone clarify what this actually means? They learnt Irish as a second language?

If the 1911 census is anything to go by, there will be many 'mistakes'. My great grandparents eg are down as the parents, not the grandparents of my relative. (Unlikely that my ggm was having a baby at 59.) Her names are given as Annie Kate but she was Hannah Catherine on her birth certificate etc.

The census was taken by an English speaking policeman whereas they were Irish speakers which can't have helped.

On the other hand the censuses, or even birth certificates, in the UK are no more accurate ime. People lie for all sorts of reasons/misunderstandings. My ggf kept knocking years off his age until his 3 children had to become his siblings. ( He was a widower looking for a much younger wife). My Irish speaking grandmother gave the name of her m in l as the mother of her baby. My neighbour's birth certificate gives his age the year after he was born (his parents were refugees from Tsarist Russia and didn't know about registering births.)

There is a record of one grandfather so far, exactly where I knew he would be.

How do I get from '1 of 1 result' to see the census entry though?

Underneath ‘View Census Results’ click on ‘Household Form A1’.

“Her names are given as Annie Kate but she was Hannah Catherine on her birth certificate etc.”

Names don’t have to be as on the birth certificate. They often are, but my relative Elizabeth is down as Lizzie for example. Sometimes people wrote down the name they were known by rather than the name on their birth certificate.

Yes, that’s it.

I had a look as my parents were Irish. My dad would’ve loved poring over it. Tried to spot grandparents but can’t see any on either side. 😐

I love the copperplate writing.

I found my fam in the end, with the help of some other family members.
They had reverted to Irish spelling, which I should have expected but didn't actually know. It's so interesting to see all these little babies that I knew as old adults but are now sadly dead.

Names - I noticed Seaghan when I first started to explore the 1911 census, and found that Woulfe does list it (with Shane) as a variant of John. I still find the original census site https://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/search/ easier to explore, wish they'd stuck with it. Using an asterisk as a wildcard will sometimes get a search further, and starting with it to, for instance, list all the townland names in a parish an ancestor live in might give you an extra step in a search.

Later on I'll start seeing how use of local (and global) saint's names was changing. A quick glance showed there were still no Jacinta/Jacinthas in 1926, so Fatima hadn't grabbed the imagination, but there were 7 Gemmas.

I hope they are going to make it possible to search by building. As it is I can drill down into the houses, sheds etc of people in the country (and two sets in Dublin, see below) but my father and his family were in a tenement and I'd love to know how many other people shared that house, and a bit more about how many rooms they occupied.

My paternal grandparent's families lived near each other, in number 2 and number 4 of a small street, but one was in a one-room house, one in a four-room house. I've seen pictures, it was a single story terrace, and I think they were next door neighbours, so I'm curious.

Also interested to see the g-grandfather who was excoriated by his in-laws as a Black Protestant Belfast Scottish Orangeman was a: baptised C of I in Dublin; b: listed as Roman Catholic in each census since 1901; c: had worked for Glasgow corporation in the years before 1926. In 1901 and 1911 he was a self-employed tradesman. Not listed, but I know that in old age he was caretaker for a C of I church in central Dublin.

I can't find my family! I know they were (and still are) there, but I wonder if the townland name has changed. The Border runs through the farm, so maybe the name I know wasn't in use yet.

Put the parish name into the DED district electoral district box and see what townland names come up. If you don't know the DED, search the county, 100 results at a time, for some mid-range name like Alice (or for one of your own names) and see does it shake anything loose.

I found out my granny and my great granny were Lizzie! Whereas I had always known my granny as Elizabeth or Betsy (as my grand uncles called her). She was the baby of the family. And she poshified her name 😁. And I always thought my great grandfather on my dad’s side had the same name as my grandfather and father but in one census he’s John F. and another he’s Francis John which is nothing like the name I thought he had! Oh and they had a 21 year old woman living in the house with them as a ‘servant’ in 1911. Both sets are of grandparents were farmers and my dad grew up on a farm so we’re not that far removed from the land!

Interesting too to see well-known figures of the period listed. Found WB Yeats and Eamon de Valera. Samuel Beckett and Patrick Kavanagh are both included though they were very young men then.

I think many farmers had ‘servants’ at the time. They needed help on the land and it’s not like people could drive over each morning as they do now. I know in the 1911 census my gran’s farming family had servants listed, but they weren’t rich people and it was a small farm. The children were very young at the time so they did need help. If you read the directions on the census it told people to list the head of family, wife, children, other relatives, visitors, boarders, servants. So they were more or less instructed to write ‘servant’ rather than farm labourer or home help if you see what I mean.

The altered the instructions somewhat for the 1926 census, but it’s the same thing regarding servants.

One of my grandmother's sisters had 'Lunatic' against her name

I also found out what size farm they each had, my great grandfather on my dad’s side had a farm nearly twice as big as my maternal great grandfathers! I’m not talking hundreds of acres obviously! My paternal grandfather was only 3 in 1911 and they had a dairy farm so I can see why they would need a ‘servant’. Interestingly she could also read and write.

@turkeyboots Yes townland names may have changed. Where my grandparents lived is a case in point. We have always known it as one thing but in the census it's something totally different. Luckily one of siblings remembered seeing a letter with the old name on it and she has a great memory!

Found them! In a Townland which doesn't seem to exist anymore. Wikipedia gave me a "previously known as" name for the Townland, which is recorded as the DED.

90% of the population could read or write by then. The British introduced a National school system for primary with the goal of assimilating children into having a more British identity and reducing the influence of informal schools that were prevalent. But it was effectively managed by the Catholic Church which is why they still dominate the educational system today.

Well done.

😮

@turkeyboots Yes townland names may have changed. Where my grandparents lived is a case in point. We have always known it as one thing but in the census it's something totally different. Luckily one of siblings remembered seeing a letter with the old name on it and she has a great memory!

None of my Irish family were lunatics. However my Welsh ancestors had a boarder who was a pauper lunatic. 😕
My great aunt was also Lizzie on her birth cert but upgraded herself to Elizabeth.