Transcriptions were made of some of the census records of Rimington and Middop which took place every ten years between 1841 and 1901. These were made from notes and photocopies Brian Stott produced at Clitheroe Library during his active period of tracing his family tree, back in the 1980s and early 90s. However he discovered these transcriptions aren't quite as complete as they could be and unfortunately a small amount of information on some censuses is missing.
For information the censuses conducted in 1801,11,12 & 13 were mainly headcounts. The 1841 census was the first one to record the names of all individuals in a household.
Rimington & Middop Census 1901 (Open Office Document)
Rimington & Middop Census 1891 (Open Office Document)
THE 1939 REGISTER
The 1939 Register was taken across England and Wales on the 29th September 1939.
It gave an overview of the makeup of the population at the beginning of the outbreak of the war. It also provided information for the issuing of identity cards and, later, ration books.
It was very much styled on the censuses taken every ten years previously, of which the next one should have been in 1941 but that didn't happen.
Censuses are closed for 100 years after their compilation but the 1939 Register was released by the National Archives in November 2015. This being the case many children who were registered would still be alive in 2015.Their entries are blacked out with the wording THIS RECORD IS OFFICIALLY CLOSED written across it. The accompanying spreadsheet is a transcript of the document held at the National Archives, Kew.
The properties in Rimington's survey didn't always follow a logical order of appearance and a few are not listed at all – neither in the main schedule nor in what appears to be a Vacant list at the end of it i.e. The Old Farmhouse, Susie Cottage, Matchers, Istana (not the building it is today), & Ox Close Farm.
I am very grateful for the help of Miss Mary H Bairstow in identifying who lived in which of the several terraced cottages in the village. She also explained that the Wallbank family of Lower Gills Farm was also farming Matchers Farm land at that time, which may explain its absence in the Register. The same may go for Ox Close Farm which the 1942 Farm Survey shows was being farmed by Mr Bulcock of Newby Hills Farm at that time.
The 1939 Register was also used in the coding of childrens identity bracelets designed to help reunite children with their families if they became separated from them for whatever reason. They were primarily worn by children who were not evacuated from towns and cities, but not issued from a central point because the bracelets were made in different styles and forms. Below is a picture of the one Mary had. It highlights the fact that the population had to notify the authorities of a change of address because the code number at the bottom of the bracelet was taken from the Register.
KRBB was Rimington's Enumeration District code.
63 was the Schedule No of the property on the register.
3 was Mary's blacked out entry number in the Sub Section. (Her father and mother being 1 & 2.) In September 1939 Mary and her parents were still living at Stopper Lane. She thinks they did not move into Oakdene at Newby until sometime in 1940.
Mary's bracelet is possibly a unique example of being the only one created for a child living in Rimington. Rimington was (and remains) a village situated in the countryside, so wasn't a primary location warranting the issuing of such bracelets. A possible reason why Mary did have one was that she and her parents had moved into the village from Heywood, on the outskirts of Manchester in 1937, and still regularly returned there to visit family and friends in the years following.
The Register information continued to be used even after the 2nd World War had ended. For instance there are several entries where the lady's surname was crossed out, their married one written above, and the date the marriage took place.
Only the last two numbers of the BIRTH YEAR appear in the register. On the spreadsheet the first two numbers are also included in [] brackets, so as not to confuse the issue that the figure is the age of the person.
Most of the entries just filled one side of two pages of the register, but some crossed onto the opposite page which appears to have been for additional information / comments. The copies I received contained all of the first page information and a fraction of the second one, hence the [rest missing] notes.
Brian Stott January 2025
Note Open Office Documents Can be opened by MS Office.
