When the 1901 census was taken on 31 March 1901, the total population of England, Wales and Scotland was recorded as 36,999,946. From 1801 the population had nearly quadrupled.

In January 1901 the reign of Queen Victoria ended and her eldest son became King Edward VII. In that same year, Winston Churchill made his maiden speech at the House of Commons, the Apollo Theatre opened in London and Scotland Yard established the first UK Fingerprint Bureau.

The original forms would have been given to each household several days before the 2nd April date, and the head of household would have been asked to fill in the details for anyone who would have been residing at that address on the census date. Illiteracy was still very high in 1871, and anyone unable to read or write would have made use of an enumerator - a literate person collecting the census forms - to help fill in the details. Because of this, however, many mistakes that were made, such as the spelling of names. Also, many people were often economical with the truth, especially when it came to their ages.

The surnames from the Census are:

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Transcript

A transcript of the 1901 Census for the whole of the village of Tharston has been made into a booklet and can be found on the Publications page.