Occupied Rooms in census records

[stewpot72]

Hi
I believe that the 1891 census was the first to record the number of Rooms Occupied in a dwelling. Does anyone know exactly what this means? Some of my ancestors lived in Hampton Lucy in Warwickshire and an amazing number of people lived in dwellings where there were only TWO occupied rooms. I would have thought that, as a minimum, a dwelling would be "two up and two down", so which rooms counted as occupied - a bedroom and a kitchen/dining room?

[rosie99]

See stanmapstones reply on this post asking the same question
https://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=630537.0

[stanmapstone]

See also https://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=584282.msg4356234#msg4356234

Stan

[stewpot72]

I thought I posted a Thank you yesterday but I can't see it, so, Thank you for your pointers.
Would you indulge me further? If neither the householder nor the enumerator were given guidance back then as to what was or wasn't an "Occupied Room", how would they decide what to count? I'm guessing that most dwellings would be a minimum of "two up and two down", so how would they know to count only two of the rooms? Would it just be reliant on common sense, e.g. a bedroom and a downstairs front room would count as occupied?

[stanmapstone]

According to "Making Sense of the Census" by Edward Higgs, the problem of the number of rooms in which a family resided, or the definition of "family" or "household", was was never resolved in this period. There might have been cases where householders were reluctant to give information which might have led to accusations of overcrowding. He says that as late as the 1981 census a post-enumeration survey revealed that the number of rooms inhabited had been given incorrectly in 28.6 per cent of households.

Stan

[josey]

I'm guessing that most dwellings would be a minimum of "two up and two down",

A dwelling might be that minimum but the number of rooms occupied by one household might be less. My grandparents rented a 3 bed terrace in Peckham in the 1920s but lived with 5 children downstairs & sublet the upstairs.

[stanmapstone]

I'm guessing that most dwellings would be a minimum of "two up and two down",

There were many tenements where only one room was occupied.

This is from the 1901 Census report.
 

[Sloe Gin]

I'm guessing that most dwellings would be a minimum of "two up and two down"

Not so.  Two-room cottages with one room upstairs and one downstairs were common.

[stewpot72]

Thank you again everybody for taking the trouble to shed light on this. I am constantly amazed by how much you learn from "doing" family history. Thank you