In Harbour, or on boat in Harbour for Census night: where to find records?

[guest259648]

Regarding UK Census 1861.

If a person [crew, or passenger,] was on a boat in a UK harbour for Census night, will they appear on the UK census and, if so, where?

Also, if in 1861 they were staying at a small UK Harbour which had cabins in the harbour area for passengers [they got off the boat, to avoid fire risk, but didn't go to lodgings in the town], where would they be recorded on a Census?

While I'm here;  I'm searching for the births of a Mariner's 2 daughters (circa 1864 + 1866) but not finding them anywhere at all. The daughters (who had later emigrated to the USA) believed they were born in Sunderland, Co. Durham, but there are no convincing birth records for them in Sunderland or County Durham or anywhere on UK land that I can see. Your thoughts, please.

Thank you. 

[Maiden Stone]

People on boats (+ tents, caravans, outhouses &c.) should be at the end of the enumerator's book as far as I know. That's providing the enumerator knew where to look and the people were present when he turned up. If they arrived late at night and left early next morning and didn't stay in lodgings with a lodgings-keeper,  they may have gone uncounted. Another complication is that an enumerator may have got details about them from a third party who had incomplete or inaccurate information.       

[Rena]

I've got an ancestor who was recorded twice on census night.

He is recorded at home in Sunderland, Co. Durham, with his wife and several children.

He is also recorded as a captain on a small ship in Monkwearmouth, Co. Durham, together with his wife and their new baby plus the captain's brother.

I think this probably came about because the house census was previously filled in and a few days later the captain and his wife took their new baby to introduce the baby to family in North Yorkshire.   The harbour/port census was filled in by an official who was responsible for making sure all boats in the harbour were accounted for.

[Galium]

Type 'vessels' in the 'lived in' box on the search form. If they were on a boat  in port in England or Wales, they should have been recorded.
On land, they should be findable by age and birthplace in the usual way.

As to your second enquiry, Sunderland, Durham seems fairly specific, and not somewhere you'd name unless you had at least some association with it.  Have you found them on censuses?

[guest259648]

People on boats (+ tents, caravans, outhouses &c.) should be at the end of the enumerator's book as far as I know. That's providing the enumerator knew where to look and the people were present when he turned up. If they arrived late at night and left early next morning and didn't stay in lodgings with a lodgings-keeper,  they may have gone uncounted. Another complication is that an enumerator may have got details about them from a third party who had incomplete or inaccurate information.     

Maiden Stone, thank you.
'Gone uncounted'... I was afraid of hearing this, but I'm sure you're right, it did happen.

I have checked at what I believed to be the end of the Seaham censuses but was surprised that there seemed to be so little mention of boats, especially when accounts from the period in question mention a great deal of activity in the docks etc. So I guess I must be looking in the wrong place... or the Harbour Master was lazy and didn't keep his records, or the enumerator didn't know where to ask for details of passengers... or?

D

[guest259648]

I've got an ancestor who was recorded twice on census night.

He is recorded at home in Sunderland, Co. Durham, with his wife and several children.

He is also recorded as a captain on a small ship in Monkwearmouth, Co. Durham, together with his wife and their new baby plus the captain's brother.

I think this probably came about because the house census was previously filled in and a few days later the captain and his wife took their new baby to introduce the baby to family in North Yorkshire.   The harbour/port census was filled in by an official who was responsible for making sure all boats in the harbour were accounted for.

Rena
Thank you for sharing your story.
I'd say that was a stroke of great good luck, there being two records instead of one: it enlarges your picture of this family and what they were doing.

Was it common for women and babies to be on board boats in the 1860s? Many of the boats around Seaham etc were coal boats and I'd always (probably wrongly) assumed that seamen couldn't bring their wives along - but maybe they could?
D

[guest259648]

Type 'vessels' in the 'lived in' box on the search form. If they were on a boat  in port in England or Wales, they should have been recorded.
On land, they should be findable by age and birthplace in the usual way.

As to your second enquiry, Sunderland, Durham seems fairly specific, and not somewhere you'd name unless you had at least some association with it.  Have you found them on censuses?

Galium, I'm grateful for your thoughts.

The (Irish) mariner and his lady were wed in Sunderland, I have the marriage certificate. The name Sunderland has gone down through the family, and the 2 daughters born in the UK believed they were born in Sunderland... so I'm wondering if they came into the world on a boat?

I'm asking about Harbours, and where harbour-dwellers/temporary visitors get recorded in a general sense, because the bride gave her address as 'Seaham Harbour' - no street, no nothing, just 'Seaham Harbour'.
    I have enquired at Seaham, and have been told that this very probably means she was actually AT the harbour, at the time of her wedding, rather than in lodgings or with any family in the town.

Which also suggests she arrived by boat? and then got married in Sunderland - and then what?

This couple emigrated to the USA in about 1868, after having 2 children (the daughters whose birth records I'm seeking). But I can't find the couple on any UK census, nor can I find the daughters' births.

D

[Rena]

I've got an ancestor who was recorded twice on census night.

He is recorded at home in Sunderland, Co. Durham, with his wife and several children.

He is also recorded as a captain on a small ship in Monkwearmouth, Co. Durham, together with his wife and their new baby plus the captain's brother.

I think this probably came about because the house census was previously filled in and a few days later the captain and his wife took their new baby to introduce the baby to family in North Yorkshire.   The harbour/port census was filled in by an official who was responsible for making sure all boats in the harbour were accounted for.

Rena

Was it common for women and babies to be on board boats in the 1860s? Many of the boats around Seaham etc were coal boats and I'd always (probably wrongly) assumed that seamen couldn't bring their wives along - but maybe they could?
D

I went to school in a Yorkshire seaport during the 1940s-1950s and we were told by our school teachers that it was a fact that officers wives would travel on ships (boats sail on rivers; ships sail on the high seas).  Ancient Sailing Ships with sails were known to be temperamental and were classed as "she", many ordinary seamen thought having a woman on board was unlucky. It isn't known when the superstition started, as with Friday 13th being an unlucky date - nobody knows why and when that started either.

The ancestor was born in a small east coast place named Filey and the owner of the ship was a Mrs Coggins, her ship was named the "Jack Coggins" after her son who had died at sea.  Her ship was registered in the large port of Sunderland and as was usual in those days, there were hundreds, if not thousands of small ships sailing from the northern waters to Europe and beyond carrying exported wool and bringing back tea, sugar, precious gems, smuggling Scottish whisky, etc.  I suspect the ancestor did a bit of smuggling, as his son had a tobacco shop and that son gave his wife an enormous ruby and diamond engagement ring.

[Galium]

I'm asking about Harbours, and where harbour-dwellers/temporary visitors get recorded in a general sense, because the bride gave her address as 'Seaham Harbour' - no street, no nothing, just 'Seaham Harbour'.
   

Addresses recorded in the marriage register in the 1860s aren't usually very specific.  You will sometimes find street addresses, but more often it's only the parish or town.  If the couple are marrying in Sunderland and the bride says she lives in 'Seaham Harbour', then most likely she means the town of Seaham Harbour (which began in the 1820s as a new town separate  from the village of Seaham; today the two together are just known as Seaham) and that would be all anybody would think it necessary to write down.