Census of Ireland 1911

The online 1911 Census of Ireland is fascinating. I probably mentioned before that I spent quite a while searching this and the 1901 Census in the National Archives looking for people who had been involved in the Civil War to investigate their social background. It was time consuming, tedious work - but worthwhile in the end. How much easier that would be nowadays!

There are 138,714 Michaels in the Census record for that evening of Sunday 2nd April 1911, 6,036 Micheals, 238 Micheáls and 696 Micks. This is based on transcriptions of the actual records.

There were eighteen Michael Farrys recorded in Ireland. Fourteen of these were in Sligo, one in Dublin, Donegal, Fermanagh and Roscommon. The Dublin Michael Farry, living in Capel St, had been born in Dublin, was a baker and was married to an English-born woman called Elizabeth. They had a nine-month old daughter also called Elizabeth. The oldest Michael Farry was a seventy four year old widower who could not write but could speak Irish and English. He signed the form with an X.

The census form for Ireland in 1911 was different from that distributed in Britain. On the Irish form there was a question asking the religion of every person in a household. This question was not included in the British form. It included the advice that "Members of Protestant Denominations are requested not to describe themselves by the vague term 'Protestant' but to enter the name of the Particular Church, Denomination, or Body to which they belong".

Often where Catholics returned their religion as "Catholic" someone else, probably the enumerator who collected the form added a "R." or "Roman".

There was no indication as to how non-believers should fill the space so there was a great variety, thought not a great number, of such returns.

Years ago while looking through the Census summaries for either 1901 or 1911 I noticed in the religion summary one person in county Sligo had described him/herself as "free thinker". I always felt I would love to know who was this solitary Sligo "Freethinker" of 1901 or 1911.