Curious about census info

[Sarahjones1993]

Hi everybody!

I was just wondering if someone could perhaps help shed some light on something interesting I discovered going through the census information. I've been looking into the life of my fourth great grand uncle Simeon Rawlinson. Through the 1871 census I discovered that he was married with two daughters and a son. However, something caught my eye in terms of a 2 year old 'boarder' called Mary Wilson. Couldn't help but find that a weird term for a 2 year old!

Simeon    Rawlinson    Head    60 Lancashire
Jane    Rawlinson    Wife    59    Lancashire
James    Rawlinson    Son    22 Lancashire    
Mary    Rawlinson    Daughter    20    Lancashire
Elizabeth Ann    Rawlinson    Daughter 16 Lancashire
Mary    Wilson    Boarder    2 Lancashire

I then discovered that in 1881 Simeon had passed away by this point (seems his death occured in 1872) and it was Jane and their daughter Elizabeth Ann still at the residence and Mary Wilson was still living there but this time, she's described as a 'servant'

Jane    Rawlinson    Head    Widow 69    Grocer    Bonds, Lancashire
Elizabeth A    Rawlinson    Daughter 26 Grocers Assistant Bonds, Lancashire    
Mary Wilson Servant Single 12    Dom Servt    Lancaster, Lancashire

My question to you guys, has anyone come across something similar? Who could she be? I've seen before boarders but for example they've obviously been relations of the wife or husband but this one I'm kinda stumped. Any help would be great!

Thanks for all your help and the tips you guys have kindly given me!

Sarah.

[KGarrad]

Legal, formal, adoptions only came into being in 1927.

So maybe the family "adopted" a young girl, and used her as a live-in domestic servant?
Or maybe she is what we would now call a foster-child?

[Sarahjones1993]

Legal, formal, adoptions only came into being in 1927.

So maybe the family "adopted" a young girl, and used her as a live-in domestic servant?

Now I didn't know that!

That's intriguing...

[groom]

Possibly fostered or a nurse child rather than "adopted" as she didn't take the name of the family. By the 1891 census she is a boarder with another family and it looks as if she is working in a cotton mill.

[stanmapstone]

She could have been a 'Nurse Child'. A nurse child is a young child being brought up in the household of someone other than the parents, normally for money, so she would have been a boarder,A "Boarder" pays for a room and meals. The 1871 Census schedule in the column "RELATION to Head of Family" gives a limited number of options, and the householder filling in the schedule has decided that 'Boarder' is the correct description.

Stan

[iolaus]

Boarder sometimes seems to be used as 'can't think of any other term'

I had 'boarder' in mine, he wasn't related to the head of house but they had their niece living with them, and he was the niece's grandfather (his daughter died in childbirth, her husband died when the baby was young and she went to live with her father's sister and her husband)

Although the grandfather wasn't related by blood in a lot of areas he'd still come under the heading 'family'


BTW she may be a daily domestic servant living out - ie working elsewhere and coming home each night rather than being that families servant

[groom]

BTW she may be a daily domestic servant living out - ie working elsewhere and coming home each night rather than being that families servant

I thought that as well, iolaus, but she is described as servant in the relationship to the head of the house column, and as domestic servant in the occupation column.

[Sarahjones1993]

Thanks for the responses all