Tips for finding your ancestors via address search
A few people have been having difficulty finding ancestors using the address search. Here are some tips to improve your chances of success!
The address search uses data from the RG14 (Household) schedules rather than the RG78 (Enumerators Summary Books). This means that the data being searched is what your ancestors would have written on the form rather than what the enumerator would have written. Because an enumerator would have been more likely to give a single, standard name to a particular street, there will be more variations in what the householders in a road have put on their form.
For example, the road near where I used to live is called “Clapham Manor Street”. Householders in this street have used various permutations such as Manor St, Manor Street, Clapham Manor, Clapham Manor St, Clapham Manor Street and more (including misspellings on the original household page itself).
We are using intelligent filtering to clean up the more obvious variations such as “Rd” for Road and “St” for Street but obviously, some lateral thinking may be required with these records. Here’s a few tips.
1. The wildcard search will be available soon (next few weeks). This will allow you to search for variants within a district (in my example, perhaps “*manor*” within the registration district to find all roads with ‘manor’ in the name in that area.
2. The RG78 Enumarator Summary Book images will also be available soon. These will let you find a family nearby, then look at the street summary to identify their neighbours (hopefully including your elusive ancestors). They will also give you fascinating details about the area your ancestors lived in.
Hope that helps!
January 20th, 2009 at 11:00 am
Thank you.
How can I get a list of addresses for 1911 registered by the GPO (they must have had one or how would they know where to deliver letters) or in the 1911 Census information, for a given locality (town, vilage etc)
January 20th, 2009 at 11:32 am
I find this website very complicated and can never get up any of my ancestors eho lived in the Great Howard St area of Liverpool in 1911
am I doing something wrong
i have also read all the instructions
the 1901 census seemed more staughtforward
regards
John McNamara (Very Dissapointed)
January 20th, 2009 at 11:34 am
I think I must be missing something - possibly some brain cells.
On your front screen you state:
“SEARCH FOR FREE
Search through the census index to find an ancestor, or to find out who lived in your house. This service is free. ”
When I do a place search I get a list of addresses for the place but am then unable to see who lived in the property without spending credits. How, then, can I find out who lived in a property for free?
Confused, bemused and refused.
January 20th, 2009 at 11:42 am
Hello John,
Have you tried a very loose search:
Address HOWARD
County Lancashire
District Liverpool
gives 290 results from which you should be able to pick out your ancestors. Incidentally, this search is a great example of the variations in the way people record their address. If only postcodes had existed then!
January 20th, 2009 at 10:46 pm
I found the ancestors that I sought BUT without the father who would have been about 50 years old … so I did a search only for him and he shows up in an institution.
Trouble is there is no address shown for the institution therefore I dont know where or what it is.
I have zoomed in and out but no luck.
The search reference is;
(RG14PN577 RG78PN20 RD7 SD3 ED21 SN1).JPG
Is anyone able to provide a clue to the address please?
Joe
January 22nd, 2009 at 1:50 pm
1911census , 20 searches 1 result, time is of the essence my subscription will be void before I complete my searches, are they really there? are they really ready??????????????????
February 3rd, 2009 at 5:21 pm
Hi iantester,
I had hoped you might provide me with some clues as to how to get the information on occupants of an address for free - as per my blog of January 20th. I’m afraid I can’t work out how to get a list of people without spending credits but your home page still clearly states that this feature is a free service. Am I mis-reading this or is this mis-leading?
February 3rd, 2009 at 5:34 pm
Hi iantester,
I’ve worked it out. I can now see all the occupants of the chosen address.
Your claim is absolutely right - you can get a listing of occupants for free!
I’m not inept after all, just very, very slow.
February 5th, 2009 at 7:32 pm
Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
Have you turned off the ‘.’ entry in the surname?
With this feature I could get a listing of all the individuals living at an address without knowing their surname.
Now you’ve switch this off I can no longer do this.
You really make it hard for people to be complimentary about the system.
Is there another way to find out who lived in a house?
Please tell me and others.
February 5th, 2009 at 10:42 pm
Hi Iantester,
I’m slower than Steve, can you tell me how to do that too please (occupants at an address). My search just shows the address and no names. Also i am keying in the census ref for an original page purchased and it is telling me there are no matches ? what am i doing wrong
February 7th, 2009 at 4:47 pm
Hi Joe,
Reference your address for the institution. Trick I found was to buy the transcription then to find the address click on report error and the subject details and address all came up.
July 19th, 2010 at 3:04 pm
Sehr gelun-gener Post. Da hat mich Yahoo wie schon so oft an einen super Blog geschickt.
yours
June Johson