Differing Responses to an Industrialising Economy - eTheses ...

multiple occupations is also inconsistent. 42
Unfortunately, trade directory coverage of
the parishes in the study area is uneven. 43
However, directories have provided
background information on individuals found in other sources and have proved useful in
highlighting the part played by female business owners who go largely unnoticed in
many other records. Directories also throw light on carriers’ networks and coach routes
showing how the study area fitted into its regional setting. 44
Selected data from the trade
directories of 1792 (for Alcester) and 1835 (for Alcester and Redditch) has been used to
compile tables to allow comparisons between the two places. 45
Censuses
The censuses of 1841 and especially 1851 provide a more complete record of
people’s occupations than other sources, but even these were compiled rather
subjectively. For example, dual occupations are not consistently noted, and the 1841
census is inferior to its successor as a source for occupations of women and children.
Details of individuals have been extracted from the enumerators’ returns for the whole
study area for both these years and added to the database in order to illuminate individual
careers. 46
The occupational structure of all parishes in the 1841 census has been analysed
in tables in Chapters 4 to 7. Goose, Shaw-Taylor and others comment on the underrecording
of women’s (and children’s) occupations in this census, especially if their work
42 Sometimes many occupations are listed next to one person’s name, while in other directories the same
name appears under lists of different trades thus making it unclear whether it is indeed the same person
pursuing more than one trade or two or more people with the same name.
43 Directories consulted are listed in Sources and Bibliography. Only Alcester is covered before 1800.
Lewis’s Worcestershire Directory of 1820 covers small villages in 1820, while Warwickshire and
Gloucestershire villages are not covered until 1845 and 1856 respectively. Eighteenth century directories
of Birmingham and Worcester include references to carriers from the study area.
44 See Appendices 14 and 15.
45 See Appendix 25. These directories refer to Alcester and Redditch.
46 Some individuals have also been traced in the 1861 census.
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