Province, County, Barony and Parish--level population counts for Ireland in 1861.

Table ID:

PAR_1861_I     (1252393)

Contents:

Province, County, Barony and Parish--level population counts for Ireland in 1861.

Approx. number of rows:

3,537

Table type:

Raw Data

Documentation Author:

Humphrey Southall

Chronology:

The data are for the single year 1861.

Sources:

1. These data are a selective transcription from the main set of tables in Part I of the County Reports of the Census of Ireland for 1861. They are selective in that most of the information in these tables is for the very large number of townlands, while this transcription is limited to the totals for parishes, baronies and counties, but all columns from the source are included here.
2. The data were manually transcribed by Harold Price in 2022.

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Notes:

1. This table provides acreages, counts of persons and houses for 1861, plus retrospective data for 1841 and 1851. The difference between the Poor Law and General valuations needs further research, The General valuations are usually somewhat higher.
2. In addition to data for parishes, baronies etc, the table includes data for units which were not administrative units, and lack acreages. Some of these units have population counts for 1861, and this includes data for merchant seamen and others on board ships in harbours, which form part of county totals but not of barony or parish totals, and a single row of data for persons on board ships at sea, who form part of the overall total for Ireland but not any lower-level unit. Other units contribute only to valuation totals, and are mentioned only in footnotes to the "Barony Summaries" for each county; these have been added selectively as rows in the table where they are needed for baronies to have the correct total valuation. Such rows which would contribute to barony totals have been given the row_type of 'Other'.
3. The cities of Cork, Dublin, Kilkenny, Limerick and Waterford, the Borough of Drogheda and the towns of Belfast, Carrickfergus and Galway are listed separately from any county, but are included within province totals.
4. This table includes data for a number of different geographical levels, and careful use of the 'row_type' column is needed. One aspect is that about half of all parishes had parts falling within more than one barony, and a few baronies were split between counties. Therefore, to extract data for parishes or baronies you must group by the values of parish_unit or barony_unit.

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Checking:

1. For each individual row, the totals for population in 1861, and houses in 1861 have been checked against the component categories (e.g. all persons against males plus females). All rows currently pass these checks.
2. The reported barony totals for total area, total 1841, 1851 and 1861 population, total 1841, 1851 and 1861 houses, and both valuations have been compared with the computed sums of the parish and 'other' rows for each barony; and similarly for counties and their component baronies. All discrepancies in the population and house counts have been carefully checked against the original reports, as have discrpancies in areas over 1 acre, and discrpancies in either valuation over £10. Following corrections, only 12 such discrepancies remain:
   • The largest discrepancy in population counts is for Barrymore Barony, in the East Riding of Cork, where the calculated 1851 population is less than the reported total of 50,346 by 50.
   • The largest discrepancy in acreages is for Ibane and Barryroe barony, in the West Riding of Cork, where the reported area of 35,291.3 acres is less than the computed total by 60 acres.
   • The only discrpancy in either valuation larger than £10 is for Middlethird barony, Co. Waterford, where the reported General Valuation of £38,643 13s. is less than the computed total by £100.
3. Following a small number of modifications to the AUO, all provinces, counties and baronies have been matched to it. At the time of writing, four parishes remain unmatched, all in Ulster: Craigs, in Kilconway and Toome, Lower baronies, Co. Antrim; Portglenone, also in Toome, Lower barony, Co. Antrim; Magherahamlet, in Kinelarty barony, Co. Down; and Formoyle in Coleraine barony, Co. Londonderry. These appear to be new creations, and require further research before they can be added to the AUO.

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Columns within table:

Column	Type	Contents
row_type	Text string (max.len.=24).	Type of row. These values appear (with these frequencies): Nation (1): i.e. all-Ireland totals. As well as the totals across the four provinces, this includes counts covering 403 persons who were "Sailors and others at Sea on Census Night". Province (4). County (41): These rows include the cities and certain towns, which are included in province totals but listed separately frpm their counties. Barony (342): These rows include rows for "Merchant Seamen and Others, in Home and Foreign Trade Vessels, who were enumerated on English Census Forms only", which appear in the barony summaries as contributing to county totals. Parish (3,052). Other (97): This covers all entities which exist at parish-level, so forming part of Barony totals, but which are not parishes. This includes a variety of public buildings, such as gaols, hospitals and workhouses, which appear in listings for towns as having resident populations, and various properities, such as telegraphs, railways and fisheries, which were listed in footnotes to the barony summaries for each county as contributing to valuations.
province	Text string (max.len.=16).	Name of the province containing the county. 'Ireland' also appears here, for the national totals.
county	Text string (max.len.=52).	Name of the county. This contains a value for all rows except province and national totals.
barony	Text string (max.len.=154).	Name of the barony. This will be empty for counties and provinces.
parish	Text string (max.len.=154).	Name of the parish. This will be empty for counties and baronies. For 'Other' rows, it will contain the name of the building, company etc, or a category such as 'Fishery'.
bracketed_letter	Text string (max.len.=16).	Letters that appear in brackets immediately after the parish name, providing a link to footnotes. In general, any such notes have been copied into the 'notes' column.
area_a	Integer number.	Acres part of total area.
area_r	Integer number.	Roods part of total area.
area_p	Integer number.	Perches part of total area.
area_decimal	Floating point number.	Area in acres, including the area given by roods and perches as a decimal fraction of acres. This derived value was computed based on 4 roods per acre, and 40 perhes per rood.
pop_1841	Integer number.	Total population in 1841.
pop_1851	Integer number.	Total population in 1851.
male_1861	Integer number.	Population in 1861: Males.
fem_1861	Integer number.	Population in 1861: Females.
pop_1861	Integer number.	Population in 1861: Total.
hous_1841	Integer number.	Total number of Houses in 1841.
hous_1851	Integer number.	Total number of Houses in 1851.
inh_1861	Integer number.	Number of Houses in 1861: Inhabited.
unin_1861	Integer number.	Number of Houses in 1861: Uninhabited.
build_1861	Integer number.	Number of Houses in 1861: Building.
hous_1861	Integer number.	Number of Houses in 1861: Total.
pl_val_pnd	Integer number.	Poor Law Valuation in 1861: £ [Pounds]
pl_val_shil	Integer number.	Poor Law Valuation in 1861: s. [Shillings]
pl_val_pence	Floating point number.	Poor Law Valuation in 1861: d. [Pence]. This is defined as a floating point values as this column sometimes includes halfpennies.
pl_val_tot	Floating point number.	Total General Valuation in 1861 converted into pence, based on 20 shillings per pound and 12 pence per shilling.
gen_val_pnd	Integer number.	General Valuation in 1861: £ [Pounds]
gen_val_shil	Integer number.	General Valuation in 1861: s. [Shillings]
gen_val_pence	Floating point number.	General Valuation in 1861: d. [Pence]. This is defined as a floating point values as this column sometimes includes halfpennies.
gen_val_tot	Floating point number.	Total Poor Law Valuation in 1861 converted into pence, based on 20 shillings per pound and 12 pence per shilling.
notes	Text string (max.len.=804).	Footnotes appearing in the original tables.
province_unit	Integer number.	ID number for the province containing the county, as defined in the AUO.
county_unit	Integer number.	ID number for the county, as defined in the AUO.
barony_unit	Integer number.	ID number for the barony, as defined in the AUO.
parish_unit	Integer number.	ID number for the parish, as defined in the AUO.
rec_num	Integer number.	Sequence number to keep rows in their original order, added on loading the data into GBHDB.