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Instructions to the Enumerator

Relating to his duties in connection with the census
Prescribed by the local government board


I. Duties before Monday, the 6th April 1891
[] 1 Having received from the registrar a written description of the boundaries and contents of your enumeration district, your first duty will be to obtain a thorough knowledge of every part of the district. You should make yourself well acquainted, not only with the precise boundaries of your district but with the boundaries of every local sub-division wholly or partly situated within it, such as Civil Parish, Municipal Borough and Ward, Urban Sanitary District, Town or Village or Hamlet, Rural Sanitary District, Parliamentary Borough or Division, Ecclesiastical Parish or District, and c., applying to the registrar for further information in all cases where you may be in doubt. You should be careful to set at rest any doubt that may arise as to the boundaries between your own and adjoining enumeration districts in order to assure yourself that no single house is omitted from the enumeration.
[] 2 Should you be authorized by the registrar to engage an assistant it must be at your own expense, and you must superintend and hold yourself solely responsible for the accuracy of the whole work?
[] 3 You will receive from the registrar with the "Instruction and Memorandum book":-
(a) An adequate number of blank schedules of every description, including single householder's schedules, double schedules for large households or establishments, schedules for institutions, and schedules for vessels, is required.
(b) An enumeration book into which you will have to copy the contents of the several schedules after they have been all collected, examined, and found to have been duly filled up.
[] 4 You should carefully examine the householder's schedule and other forms, and familiarize yourself with their intended use, and the proper manner of filling them up.
[] 5 If at any time you find that you require an additional supply of schedules, you must immediately apply for them to the registrar.

Delivery of Householder's Schedules
[] 6 In the course of the week commencing March 29th it will be your duty personally to deliver for each occupier of a house or tenement in your district, a householder's schedule. You will write the name and address of each occupier for whom the schedule is left in the space provided for that purpose on the schedule. As a general rule, the term "occupier" is to be understood to apply to the resident owner, or to the person who pays rent, whether for the whole of a house, or for a tenement consisting of one or more rooms; but some persons who are neither owners nor tenants paying rent, such as inmates of almshouses, public buildings, porters' lodges, and c., are also to be treated as "occupiers".
[] 7 Visitors staying in hotels or inns are to be included in the schedule to be filled up by the proprietor or manager; and persons in licensed lodging houses are to be returned in the same manner.
[] 8 Persons travelling during the night of Sunday, April 5th, and who arrive at hotels or inns on the morning of Monday, April 6th, are to be entered by the proprietor or manager of the hotel in his schedule.
[] 9 The following are amongst the cases in which one householder's schedule must be left:-
[] For a family consisting of a man, his wife, and children; or of parents, children, servants, and visitors.
[] For a family consisting of parents and children, with boarders at the same table, and with the servants of the family, if any.
[] For the occupier of a tenement living alone; or for two or more lodgers living together in one tenement.
[] For an out-door servant living, with or without a family, in a detached out-office of tenement contiguous to a mansion, as in a lodge, a gardener's cottage, or coach-house and stable with dwelling rooms attached. But a servant sleeping in any out-building, and boarding in his master's house, should be included in his master's schedule with the other servants of the family.

[] 10 For every family, the members of which, including servants and c., exceed 17 in number, you must leave one of the double schedules, intended for the use of family mansions, large establishments, schools, hotels, licensed lodging houses and c. If you find that you have not a sufficient supply of double schedules, you may leave two of the single schedules, or more if needful.
[] 11 You must also be careful to leave at any institutions which you may be instructed to enumerate an institution schedule.
[] 12 Should your district include any portion of a canal or navigable river not within the limits of a port, you will deliver one of the "schedules for vessels" (printed in blue) to the master or person in charge of each barge or vessel.
[] 13 On leaving the schedules, you will give any information or explanation concerning them that may be asked for. You must also state that you will call for the schedule on the following Monday, that the answers must be written in by the morning of that day, and that the schedule must on no account be lost or mislaid. You will take care to observe the utmost civility in carrying out this and all you're other instructions. In performing this important duty of delivering the schedules in person, you will obtain such a knowledge of every part of your district, and of the number of occupiers in every house, as will prove of the greatest assistance to you on the day of the enumeration.
[] 14 The whole of the schedules must be delivered before the night of Saturday, April 4th.
[] 15 While delivering and collecting the schedules the memorandum book supplied for the purpose must be used in the manner therein directed.

II. Duties on Monday, April 6th
[] 1 Early on the morning of Monday, April 6th, commence the enumeration of your district, having provided yourself with [1] a pencil, or pen and ink- (if the latter blotting paper will also be required), [2] some blank schedules of each kind, and [3] your "instruction and memorandum book". It will be useful to take with you also a bag, in which you can deposit your schedules, arranged as they are collected, and secured with an elastic band or with string. The greatest care must be taken that all the schedules are collected, and that none of them are lost.
[] 2 You should, if possible, collect every schedule on Monday, April 6th, but if at the end any schedules remain uncollected, you must conclude your task on Tuesday, April 7th.
[] 3 In addition to the instructions given in the "memorandum book", the following are to be carefully observed on visiting each house:
[] a. If the schedule is given to you filled up, you must examine it to see that all the particulars appear to be correctly entered and in the right columns, and ask any questions which may be necessary to satisfy yourself upon this point; and when any errors are discovered, you must draw a line through the erroneous words without erasing them, and enter the correct words over them in the proper columns. You should pay particular attention to the columns numbered 6-9 relating to "Profession or Occupation", taking care that they have been filled up in accordance with the instructions printed on the back of the schedule. You should also see that the Christian names of persons described as wife, son, daughter, and c. are consistent with their description as male (M) or female (F), and with their occupation, and c. If no information is inserted in the space provided on the schedule for the number of rooms occupied, you should either assure yourself that the number occupied is not less than five or get the omission supplied.
[] b. If on inquiry for the schedule it is delivered to you not filled up, you must fill it up yourself, asking all necessary questions. You should, if possible, see the "occupier" for that purpose, and obtain the information from him. In the absence of the occupier, a member of the family, or any other competent person possessing the necessary information, may supply the required particulars. When filling up a schedule yourself, you may use such contractions and such only, as are sanctioned on page ii of the "enumeration book".
[] c. If any schedule is lost or mislaid, you must supply a fresh one from the reserve in our possession, number it as before, fill up the particulars as directed, and then read it over to the occupier or person supplying the information, who must sign it at the foot with his or her name or mark.
[] d. No person alive at midnight, dwelling in the house or tenement on the night of April 5th, is to be omitted from the schedule; no person dying before, and no child born after midnight is, however, to be enumerated. No absent inmates are to be inserted, except those travelling or out at work during that night, and who return to the house on Monday morning, April, 6th, all of whom must be entered in the schedule.
[] e. In case of refusal to fill up the schedule, or to answer the questions which you are authorized to put, remind the person so refusing of the penalty imposed by the Act of Parliament. In like manner, warn any person whom you suspect of giving willfully false information. These extracts from the census act are printed under the census calendar at the end of your memorandum book. If the person still refuses to give any information, or to give correct information, note the fact in your memorandum book, and report the refusal to your registrar as soon as possible.
[] f. You must not omit to take an account of persons because you cannot get all the information required respecting them. If, for example, you can learn no more than that a person had slept in the house on the night of April 5th, who has since gone away. And whose name is unknown, you must not fail to enter such a person in the schedule of the house, or in a separate schedule, stating the sex, and the probable age, and writing "not known" or "N.K." in the several columns where the name and other particulars should be entered.

[] 4 You will collect the schedules from every barge or other vessel in canals or other navigable waters (not in ports, harbours, or docks within the jurisdiction of Her Majesty's customs) which may be within your district on April 6th, whether it is in your district at the time of distributing the schedules, or shall have come in since, and fill in the particulars where that has not already been done.
[] 5 Take an account of persons not dwelling in houses who may have been in your district during the preceding night, make a note in your memorandum book of the places where you find them, or learn that they have been, and use householder's schedules where details can be obtained.
[] 6 You will enumerate the houses, carefully distinguishing those inhabited, uninhabited, and building, in conformity with the instruction on page 4 of the memorandum book, reckoning as a separate house all the space within the external and party walls of the building, although it may be occupied by several families living in distinct tenements or apartments.
[] 7 Every schedule received by you is to be considered as a private communication, and on no account whatsoever us any schedule that has been filled up to be shown by you to any other person than the registrar, or its contents disclosed by you.

III. Duties subsequent to the enumeration
[] The requisite information concerning all the houses and inhabitants of your district having been obtained, your next duty will be to enter very legibly, without any omission, alteration, or any correction except those authorized on page ii of your enumeration book, the particulars recorded in every schedule into the "enumeration book", which must be done in strict conformity with the instructions given therein.
[] 2 Having entered the "persons not in houses", cast up the totals, filled up the abstract (p.) and summary (table 1, p.iv), and made the book as complete as possible, you must, on or before the 13th day of April, transmit the following documents to the registrar:-

[] All the schedules, arranged in order from no.1 to the last no., as entered in the enumeration book.
[] Your enumeration book.
[] Your "instruction and memorandum book".
[] Your claim for payment, a form (Form w/3) for which will be furnished to you by the registrar.

[] 3 If upon examination the registrar finds that you have duly and satisfactorily performed your duties, he will append to your claim a certificate which will entitle you in due course to receive payment for your services according to the scale of allowances sanctioned by the Lords commissioners of Her Majesty's treasury.
Brydges P. Henniker,
Registrar general.
Census office, Whitehall, London, S.W.
10th December, 1890.