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Problem with 1881 census entry

Pauline

Pauline

LostCousins Megastar
I'm still busy entering 1881 census entries for extended family at Lost Cousins and have hit a problem. As instructed I've been entering details exactly as given in the census transcription, but in this particular entry the surname is given as "Go??ery", and when I try to enter it as that I am told the surname contains invalid characters.

The reference is RG11 235 fo: 103 p: 66 and the surname should be Gosney.

The above transcription is from Ancestry - FamilySearch has the surname as "Go?Ery", FMP as "Go?ery"

I can't find any help on this, so what should I do, please? And should I be entering the surname with one "?" or two - I thought all the transcriptions for 1881 were usually the same.
 
Personally, I would enter it as Gosney. Everyone who tries to enter it with ?? will get the same response as you. And everyone who is entering this person will know it should be Gosney.

But Peter may have another guideline....
 
Tim's advice is spot on. I don't believe there are very many names of this type in 1881 - unfortunately it's hard to check because ? is a wildcard character, but I certainly don't recall this question being asked before.
 
Many thanks! I shall enter the surname as Gosney.

I hadn't come across an entry like this before in the 1881 index - I wonder what the transcriber guidelines were for partially illegible entries?
 
Well, I've entered them but didn't get any new matches - oh well, can't win 'em all.:)

Looking at the image I can sort of see why the transcriber struggled to decipher the surname, and I'm also pretty sure that the forename of the oldest child has been mistranscribed. I think it actually says Samuel rather than Edward - but I've entered that as transcribed.
 
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Pauline said:
I hadn't come across an entry like this before in the 1881 index - I wonder what the transcriber guidelines were for partially illegible entries?
Click to expand...

From my experience it seems the instructions were 'Stick something down even if it makes no sense.'

I am pretty sure I have a relative with first name Cutty, and who appears in some census as 'Cu??y' but that probably wasn't 1881 , so I have never tested this out.
 
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OK, this is 1911, but same sort of problem.

I was looking to put a 1911 census entry on my LC page and hit a snag

The family is headed by John Woodman, born 1856 Gravesend Kent, living 83 Thorparch Road, Lambeth
The transcription on Ancestry gives no household number, which is not unusual. However, when I went to the image I found the top corner had been torn off, removing the number. I went to FindMyPast to see what they had for a household number, and as far as I can see , they have just put a dash (-)
What do I put on LC? The form will not accept a blank, a dash or a zero.:(
 
Hmm
Another family (Stebbing) also at no 83 are schedule number 79, so I suppose my family could be 80?
However, the situation is rather like Pauline's at the top of the page here. I don't really care what number is written on a census sheet EXCEPT insofar as I use it in an attempt to match up with others on LC. The matching only works if everyone makes the same substitution for the missing corner.
 
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Liberty said:
I was looking to put a 1911 census entry on my LC page and hit a snag

The family is headed by John Woodman, born 1856 Gravesend Kent, living 83 Thorparch Road, Lambeth
The transcription on Ancestry gives no household number, which is not unusual. However, when I went to the image I found the top corner had been torn off, removing the number. I went to FindMyPast to see what they had for a household number, and as far as I can see , they have just put a dash (-)
What do I put on LC? The form will not accept a blank, a dash or a zero.:(
Click to expand...
All households should be listed in the Enumerator's Summary Book (one of the associated images). But if you look again at the Findmypast transcription you'll see that in fact they HAVE given the schedule number.
 
peter said:
. But if you look again at the Findmypast transcription you'll see that in fact they HAVE given the schedule number.
Click to expand...

Yes, I did and you're right.
Where did they get the number from? Did they find it in the enumerator's book, or use the same reasoning as I did (prompted by Tim)? I don't suppose they found the missing corner......
 
Liberty said:
I don't suppose they found the missing corner......
Click to expand...
Looking carefully at the image, I don't think the corner is actually missing, it's just torn and folded back. So the number probably is still there - just facing the wrong way.
 
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