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Scotland (Counties as in 1851-1901) => Scotland => Topic started by: Artrat on Wednesday 22 October 08 12:36 BST (UK)

Title: Occupations of ancesters before the Census
Post by: Artrat on Wednesday 22 October 08 12:36 BST (UK)

Hi all who can help.
How can one find out what their ancestors occupation was from the O.P.R.s. It tells you on the census from 1841, but I am looking for what they did prior to that. Can you find out from any web sites?.  ???

Title: Re: Occupations of ancesters before the Census
Post by: Gadget on Wednesday 22 October 08 13:23 BST (UK)

Hi Artrat

It varies from parish to parish and the status of the people concerned. Sometimes it is mentioned in the OPRs but not very often - it depended on the Minister/Clerk. Possible sources include wills, local tax, etc. listings and Kirk Sessions minutes and local trade directories. Not all of these are online. It might be worth doing a web search on particular parishes to see if there are any listings   :-\

Other indications are the type of parish they lived in. Here the Old and New Statistical Accounts might help:

http://stat-acc-scot.edina.ac.uk/sas/sas.asp?action=public&

These will tell you about the parish in general rather than individuals though.

Gadget


forgot to mention MIs - often the occupations are engraved on the tombstones

Title: Re: Occupations of ancesters before the Census
Post by: Artrat on Friday 24 October 08 10:09 BST (UK)

Thanks Gadget,

I will try that out.

Artrat.

Title: Re: Occupations of ancesters before the Census
Post by: RJ_Paton on Friday 24 October 08 10:18 BST (UK)

As Gadget says the possibilities depend very much on the persons status but if they were involved in specialist occupations there are apprenticeship records for some trades and you also have Guild membership where some records still exist.

Another possibility comes in the form of "Friendly Society" records where people of similar occupations or interests formed insurance groups.

Title: Re: Occupations of ancesters before the Census
Post by: Artrat on Friday 24 October 08 17:12 BST (UK)

Thanks For that Falkyrn,

Will keep all this info in mind. No I will write it all down.

Thanks again,

Artrat.

Title: Re: Occupations of ancesters before the Census
Post by: Gadget on Friday 24 October 08 17:50 BST (UK)

Hi Artrat  :)

You don't even have to write it down - let you're printer do the hard work  :D

Just click print at the top/bottom of this thread and a new window/tab will come up with a nice 'print ready ' copy of our messages for you to print!


Gadget