Funny ways in which people lied on the census

I found a relative who had a baby a year before she was married... and from that point forward lied about her marriage date on the census.

Not a lie, but interesting to find on the census. One relative had the interesting job of running the county poorhouse.
 
I found a relative who had a baby a year before she was married... and from that point forward lied about her marriage date on the census.

Not a lie, but interesting to find on the census. One relative had the interesting job of running the county poorhouse.

I was a census worker one year and it was COMPLICATED! Some people treated me like an unwanted FBI agent. Others had me all the way in to the dining room and sat and drank coffee while they happily answered.

What gets me is an assertion I keep making is, MOST HISTROY ISN'T RECORDED. Even the census.

We have 2 cabin sites on the old farm and their is NO record of anything about anybody living in either place!
It was deep woods till 40 years ago. Legend on one site is that it was a outlaw family member in his old age.
Judging by the huge mound of whiskey bottles that might be true.

One site has local lore that says that at one site an unknown man squatted on the site and built a cabin and brought out his wife and toddler son. One day both were struck by lightning and killed and the man soon committed suicide.
ONE local newspaper seems to refer to this incident, but at NO point are names given. This second site is where I found the planted rows of jonquils I mentioned in the thread titled, Spring.

Whether your rifling through old census records or walking over old ground, your mind is wondering what REALLY happened here!?
 
I was a census worker one year and it was COMPLICATED! Some people treated me like an unwanted FBI agent. Others had me all the way in to the dining room and sat and drank coffee while they happily answered.

What gets me is an assertion I keep making is, MOST HISTROY ISN'T RECORDED. Even the census.

We have 2 cabin sites on the old farm and their is NO record of anything about anybody living in either place!
It was deep woods till 40 years ago. Legend on one site is that it was a outlaw family member in his old age.
Judging by the huge mound of whiskey bottles that might be true.

One site has local lore that says that at one site an unknown man squatted on the site and built a cabin and brought out his wife and toddler son. One day both were struck by lightning and killed and the man soon committed suicide.
ONE local newspaper seems to refer to this incident, but at NO point are names given. This second site is where I found the planted rows of jonquils I mentioned in the thread titled, Spring.

Whether your rifling through old census records or walking over old ground, your mind is wondering what REALLY happened here!?
Very true. There are so many things we may never know due to lack of records. Our great great great great grandchildren may have the ability to learn about almost every hour of our lives thanks to things like Facebook and the internet, but for many of our ancestors we know little more than when they were born and where they lived!
 
My father's family moved to Bound Brook, NJ sometime in the 1920's when he was a child (the youngest of 11 children), and my grandmother died in 1962 while still living there. My grandfather died in 1948 but apparently was living in Brooklyn at the time, and for the 1940 census he reported himself as "widowed."

I have no idea what that was all about as I only found out upon my family's genealogy search a couple years ago. Could explain why my father didn't really talk much about his family history though :whistling:


EDIT: This was not my unusual find referenced in my introduction post (this was hardly that unusual I'm sure) - will post the unusual story hopefully tonight :smug:
 
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If you think the census is something, nothing's funner than a tribal roll! And figuring out which one they're going by this year. It's like the old folks stood on the porches of their shacks watching the government guys toil up the canyon and said, so which tribe are you going to be this time? Dunno. Was a Poohawk last time, think I'll be a Hekawi this time... Well, myself I'm going to marry my brother-in-law, divorce him and marry my other brother-in-law, and have fourteen kids which I'll name John, and register only half of them... Yes, and I'll just forget I have four wives since they only want one of them... :frantic:
 
My sister and I spent hours looking for an "Arry" listed in the 1871 census, he ,she or it ,suddenly appeared. We couldn't find a paper trail. Then, having found his father had been jailed for stealing money from the public house he ran, we got hold of the court records and lo: " are you Benjamin Francis Wallis, known as "Arry" ? GOT HIM !
Born the wrong side of the blanket and not acknowledged by his own father, we don't think he was even adopted, he just arrived and stayed. He was buried in that name too, which is technically illegal here.
 
My sister and I spent hours looking for an "Arry" listed in the 1871 census, he ,she or it ,suddenly appeared. We couldn't find a paper trail. Then, having found his father had been jailed for stealing money from the public house he ran, we got hold of the court records and lo: " are you Benjamin Francis Wallis, known as "Arry" ? GOT HIM !
Born the wrong side of the blanket and not acknowledged by his own father, we don't think he was even adopted, he just arrived and stayed. He was buried in that name too, which is technically illegal here.
I haven't the faintest how you get Arry from Benjamin Francis, but I have a few equally weird ones in my own family. I guess if Clive Staples Lewis could call himself Jack, anything was possible.
 
I've not found any outright lies but have seen all the stuff noted by Allie. My great grandfather (avatar guy) was listed once as "guano salesman" and for a while I thought that was a joke but soon discovered that guano was sold for fertilizer at the time. When I was first getting started researching I couldn't find him or any of his immediate family on the 1880 census although everybody showed up on the 1870 and 1900 ones. Eventually I found them with the surname Wyan. That threw me until I imagined what the census taker likely heard: a very country Georgia accent pronouncing Winn. It was an early lesson in looking for different spellings.

I've also got a great grandmother who showed up twice in one census, once with her father and brothers in Florida and again with her new husband in Georgia. Looking at the dates of the census records I realized that what had happened is she was recorded first in Florida, then got on the train and moved to Athens to join her husband at his new job, and was thus recorded again the next week in Georgia. Took me a bit to figure that out (how to be in two places at once in 1900 or did great grandpa have two wives with the same names or what).

I've seen several wealthy guys who listed their profession as "gentleman." Yeah ... I don't actually soil my hands, just sit around and ring for the servants.
 
I've not found any outright lies but have seen all the stuff noted by Allie. My great grandfather (avatar guy) was listed once as "guano salesman" and for a while I thought that was a joke but soon discovered that guano was sold for fertilizer at the time. When I was first getting started researching I couldn't find him or any of his immediate family on the 1880 census although everybody showed up on the 1870 and 1900 ones. Eventually I found them with the surname Wyan. That threw me until I imagined what the census taker likely heard: a very country Georgia accent pronouncing Winn. It was an early lesson in looking for different spellings.

I've also got a great grandmother who showed up twice in one census, once with her father and brothers in Florida and again with her new husband in Georgia. Looking at the dates of the census records I realized that what had happened is she was recorded first in Florida, then got on the train and moved to Athens to join her husband at his new job, and was thus recorded again the next week in Georgia. Took me a bit to figure that out (how to be in two places at once in 1900 or did great grandpa have two wives with the same names or what).

I've seen several wealthy guys who listed their profession as "gentleman." Yeah ... I don't actually soil my hands, just sit around and ring for the servants.
There's a "gentleman" in the 1860 census of Lauderdale county district 1. I eventually learned that he was the retired father-in-law of the man listed as head of household. I guess giving him an occupation in the census was important to the family because otherwise it appeared as if he was a dependent.

That's funny about the pronunciation of the name. My husband, whose name is Brian, said that when he first came to the South he got frustrated because when he introduced himself everyone repeated, "Brad?" It took him a while to learn that in Memphis, Brad has two syllables while Brian has only one: "Brayud" and "Brine."
 
We reckon it was "Harry" , possibly a nickname but as to how ???

That reminds me of the old saying, you can call me Bill, you can call me Fred, but you doesn't have to call me Late for Dinner! In Mom's family everybody seems to have four or five completely different names which they used whimsically throughout their lives. Today I'll be Marge. Maybe tomorrow I'll be Lizzie.... Kids who have the same father but different surnames, or the surname of somebody their mom wanted to be the dad, or the name of a guy who didn't even know them or their mom!
 
I posted on another thread that on the 1880 census a woman living with a man who might be my great great grandfather listed her occupation as "satisfying the pleasure of the one paying her board."

The saddest tombstone I ever saw was of a 2-year old in the 1800s. It said "Illegitimate - murdered."
 
I posted on another thread that on the 1880 census a woman living with a man who might be my great great grandfather listed her occupation as "satisfying the pleasure of the one paying her board."

The saddest tombstone I ever saw was of a 2-year old in the 1800s. It said "Illegitimate - murdered."
Gosh, that is sad.

There's a local tombstone to "little girl in white killed by a train."
 
You also see a lot of interesting comments on death certificates - The favorite cause of death I have found was a man who died of being "Shot by wife while coming through the front window of their home." Probably a pretty good story associated with that one, wish I knew what it was. Also, on another death certificate the occupation of the deceased was listed as "general layabout."
 
You also see a lot of interesting comments on death certificates - The favorite cause of death I have found was a man who died of being "Shot by wife while coming through the front window of their home." Probably a pretty good story associated with that one, wish I knew what it was. Also, on another death certificate the occupation of the deceased was listed as "general layabout."
One interesting death certificate I happened across was for a young woman who was apparently a teen runaway. She gave birth to a baby at a hotel and then died, all the time refusing to give her name. I can't remember the details exactly but as I recall she was estimated to be about seventeen, white, and this happened in Haywood county shortly after the war. So many questions, but I wasn't able to find out if anyone ever learned who she was, or who ended up with the baby.

Death certificates can be shockers, definitely. One USCT I was following lived to a great old age with his wife. I found her death certificate and learned she had died in a kitchen fire when the stove caught her clothing on fire. Her husband died the same year a little later. Poor old man! I just wished I could unread it, it made me sad.

I learned that one of my cousins' death certificate lists her as dying "of sadness" following the death of her beloved dog. Whether this was a polite way of saying suicide or referred to something less tangible like heart failure I don't know.
 
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