Source and Accuracy

This copy of Cusop Parish Herefordshire census records was transcribed from “Ancestry” at Hay on Wye local library in Autumn 2016.  I double checked my transcription but there could still be errors.  In some cases it is impossible to decipher the photograph of old copper plate handwriting that some unhelpful clerk has in places put a thick pencil mark on top.

I have picked out some of the curiosities from the dry records .  There follows a typed up version of the national census taken in Cusop Parish in the years 1841 to 1911 with a summary cover sheet for each.  Sadly the census record for Cusop in the 1861 survey never made it to the national archive and is missing.

One note of caution, treat these records with a degree of scepticism.  Not just because I might have made one or two transcription errors but more because the original census recording is a bit slapdash.  Where it is possible to identify the same people recorded in successive censuses we can see that recorded ages do not go up by the expected 10 years and names vary.  I suspect some busy census enumerators were more diligent and precise than others.

                                                                                                                         Jim for Cusop History Group

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Trends:

Population:  Hardly the straight line steady increase one might have imagined -

Year                            1841   1851                  1871    1881    1891    1901    1911                  2011

Total population       223      223                    208      189       294      430      415                    356

 

Household[1] size:  In 1841 16 people lived alone, 20 couples lived on their own; households were small.  But by 1901-

Household occupants               1          2          3          4          5          6          7          8          9

Number of households             4        10        14       14        14          8          9          8          7

 

Family groups:  Presuming households that share a family name are related to some extent, in which case the Williams clan ruled Cusop; the Price clan were on the rise from 1871; while the Watkins clan crowded in by 1901.

 

Mobility:  Knowing little about local history I had imagined families would largely stay put over time even if some young adults moved away.  The evidence shows the reverse; roughly 75% of adults in each census where I can compare, had not been living in the parish 10 years before.  I suppose work in a rural location was variable and if houses were mostly rented then whole families were free to move so the breadwinners could find work. 

 

Servants:  From the 1851 census when first recorded, Cusop had servants, the number fluctuating from 12 to 38 across censuses, a mixture of farm worker and domestic help.

 

Occupation:  Unsurprisingly Cusop has always had a number of farmers and agricultural labourers.  In 1881 we see 2 masons.  By 1901 there are 8 masons as well as quarrymen.  Despite the railway coming to Cusop in 1863 it is not until the 1891 census that we see anyone living in Cusop employed by the Midland Railway.  4 people employed by Midland Rail in 1891 grows to 9 in 1901.

 

It is only starting in the 1891 census that there is a sense of Cusop as a place the middle class professional might choose to live with 4 people living on their own means, 2 solicitors, 2 solicitor’s clerks, a first officer of excise and a retired manufacturer.  

Curiosities

• The most common first names were the dull Elizabeth and William but not every parent was so unimaginative in the case of Agnep, Amsting, Anise, Baldan, Baly, Bugush, Cuanah, Cyleanath, Elice, Elise, Eliga, Elisha, Emay, Emsley, Enoch, Ephraim, Esam, Esten, Eun, Ezekel, Guenllian, Guenther, Guyenne, Hanan, Hiva, Houghton, Indith, Jerama, Keziah, Laetitia, Levin, Rogges, Tror, Waller.  (Why do so many unusual names start with an E?)

 

• In 1841 most heads of household were (unsurprisingly) agricultural labourers, so Thomas James attorney at law was a curious neighbour.  How did he pursue his profession from rural Cusop especially given the bother of getting around back then?

 

• Did neighbours take it in stride that Sarah Street and Ann Prosser were women farmers in an all female home?

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• Thomas Lindsay landscape painter living in Cusop in 1851 was the creator of pictures still valued and traded today.  (He was a member of the British Academy)

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• Roger Rowlands farmer of 20 acres at 88 years of age.  William Williams agricultural labourer aged 80.

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• The 1861 census returns for Cusop never made it in to the national archive.  The county archive have no copy.

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• In 1871 John and Harriett Elliott must have wanted to impress visitors since they employed a page boy.

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• The 71 year old Henry Pritchard was living as a lodger while earning his keep as a fishing tackle maker.  Nearby was Hester Morley a female accountant; William Swinburne a retired plate glass manufacturer; Edward Lee a retired shepherd from New Zealand; Margaret Price companion to a lady; and Charles James was collector at the toll gate

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• Either it was a matter of family choice and the ability to pay that led to children going to school or the early census enumerators were hit and miss over recording who were scholars.

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• In 1881 Marshall Evans horse breaker sounds dramatic.  John Wharton spade handle maker less so.  Mary Watkins cottager when that label had a far more innocent and presumably literal meaning.

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• There was plainly an important distinction between lodger and boarder because in 1891 Margaret Boman had 26 year old Esten Edwards as a lodger but 20 year old J Bwinfield as a boarder in the same house.

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• In 1891 there were two couples called John and Hannah Greenway and in both cases the husband was a labourer!  One couple were 68 and 70 years old and the other were 70 and 71.  I thought this has to be a double entry but they have separate addresses.

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• David Christinas Moore must have been destined when he was christened because he became a clergyman.

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• Charles Williams teamster for hire sounds exotic.  As is James William Richardson primitive Methodist minister. 

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• Plainly Cusop is a parish of Herefordshire in England yet in the 1911 census it is listed under Brecknockshire in the Wales census.

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• Alfred Davis 61 years old fish hawker and his wife Alice, 43, assisting in the business.

 

[1] Household as opposed to family size.  Many households included boarders, visitors and servants.