My problem is I want to look at a microfilm reel of LAC but I find the Heritage search engine terrible.Normally it would be as simple as viewing the microfilm at the Library and Archives Canada building here in Ottawa but with the COVID-19 lock down in effect in Ottawa (and much of the world) and the various buildings closed to the public it makes for a bit of a challenge.
I am looking for C-1305 the 1861 census for Ottawa County. What I want is the agriculture schedule that follows the nominal one. It may not be on the site.
Is there a way to just ask for a particular reel.
The first step for me was the obvious one, try various searches on the Héritage project site just to verify what is being found:
- "C-1305" - That microfilm didn't appear at the top of the list.
- "census" - Various census returns for the Township of Augusta, 1801 & 1818 returns for Edwardsburgh Township (includes various years forElizabethtown, Johnstown District, Oxford-on-the-Rideau Township, Westminster Township, and Woodhouse Township), Lower Canada/Canada East census returns for 1825, Department of Indian Affairs: Census records, and also other census returns but no 1861.
- "agricultural" - Lower Canada / Canada East census returns for 1825 and many other microfilms that pertained to agriculture but no 1861 census.
As an aside, I agree that the Héritage project search is not great but I can't really fault the search engine itself. The challenge is that the search system only looks in the metadata and descriptive information of the microfilms. Often the information provided is minimal at best and I've found that it doesn't list all the volumes found on the microfilm. When using the search feature on the Héritage project site make sure you check out the "Search Tips" page. Even I learned a few new tricks in reviewing that page.
However, back to the matter in hand, finding the 1861 Census of Canada agricultural schedule returns.
Next it was off to the landing page for 1861 Census of Canada on the Library and Archives Canada web site to find out what they have to say about the various schedules.
SchedulesSo it appears that the Agricultural schedule for the 1861 Census of Canada was microfilmed. Note the sentence that I've underlined, it should be found after the personal returns for the entire county.
Personal Census
The enumeration data were collected using documents known as schedules. Each province submitted unique schedules. Questions were asked either in French or in English in Canada East depending on the language spoken by the enumerator.
Agricultural Census
Agricultural returns provide information such as lot and concession number, acreage, livestock and agricultural products. The agricultural returns are listed by the name of the head-of-household and can be found after the personal returns for the entire county.
In some cases, the name of the head of household was indexed both from the personal census and from the agricultural census returns. This has resulted in more than one entry for one individual and is particularly noted in the returns for Canada West.
I know that Ancestry has the images of the Personal schedule of the 1861 Census of Canada searchable online. Might the agricultural schedule also be included but not indexed at the end of the county returns? Even if you don't have your own subscription to Ancestry you may be fortunate to be able to access to the Library edition from home via your local library's web site like what the Ottawa Public Library has done during these challenging times.
On Ancestry go to the "1861 Census of Canada" collection page. However, don't search by name. Instead we are going to browse the collection.
First of all, do you know what province Ottawa county is in? If you said Canada West or Ontario you need to guess again. It is in Canada East (now Quebec). Yes, that got me too!
So select Canada East from the Province drop down box and then click on Ottawa county. This will bring up the first page of the returns for Ottawa county.
Screen capture of the 1861 Census of Canada, Canada East, Ottawa county, image 1 from Ancestry.ca. |
Screen capture of the 1861 Census of Canada, Canada East, Ottawa county, image 577 from Ancestry.ca. |
It looks like it is still a Personal schedule from Ottawa (Outaouais) county. With the virtual microfilm strip displayed we can see that the next county is Pontiac in Canada Eest. So it doesn't seem like the Agricultural schedule is included on Ancestry.
But don't give up yet, there is one other place. However, it will take a bit of copying and pasting and some work on our part.
We need to first to look at the URL that Ancestry has used to display that last page:
https://www.ancestry.ca/interactive/1570/4108806_00007?backurl=&ssrc=&backlabel=Return#?imageId=4108807_00556
It is made up of several parts. The "https://www.ancestry.ca/interactive/1570" is the base of the 1861 Census of Canada interactive viewer but don't bother going there since it isn't for us humans. "4108806_00007" is the census page we first started from. The key piece of information though is what comes after the "imageId": "4108807_00556". We are going to need this for the next part and the Library and Archives Canada data collection image page starting point for the 1861 Census of Canada (I found this through my use of the LAC site and looking at their images):
http://data2.collectionscanada.gc.ca/1861/jpg/Putting the two together plus ".jpg" at the end creates http://data2.collectionscanada.gc.ca/1861/jpg/4108807_00556.jpg and if you click on that link you bring up the same page as seen on Ancestry.
But what does that give us?
What if you increment the image number 00556 to 00557 in that URL, does it give you a page or an error? Go ahead, give it a try, I'll wait.
If you did every thing right (you did remember to keep that ",jpg" at the end of the URL?) you saw a page that isn't on Ancestry. Curious isn't it? There are even more pages after that until we get to http://data2.collectionscanada.gc.ca/1861/jpg/4108807_00560.jpg.
Now this doesn't work in all of the cases. If you get something like the following text:
Object not found!Don't worry. It just means probably one of two things...
The requested URL was not found on this server. If you entered the URL manually please check your spelling and try again.
If you think this is a server error, please contact the webmaster.
Error 404
data2.collectionscanada.gc.ca
Apache
1. you forgot the .jpg at the end of the URL, or
2. you've tried to go beyond the end of the microfilm.
If it is #2 then just increment the number before the underscore to hopefully get to the next microfilm. So in the case of this microfilm we are looking at the virtual reel 4108807. The last image is image 00776. If you try to display 00777 it gives you the above error. To get to the next virtual reel use 410888_00001 and continue on...hopefully
Yet the reels presented by Ancestry aren't necessarily in the same order as what Library and Archives Canada has laid out. An example of this is for Lanark County, Canada West. The LAC equivalent last page is http://data2.collectionscanada.gc.ca/1861/jpg/4391940_00653.jpg. But if I increment the image number to 00655 I see the following:
Screen capture of the 1861 Census of Canada, Canada West, Lanark county, image 655 from Library and Archives Canada, Collections Canada. |
It is a really long URL from Ancestry when I look at the image and at first I didn't see any imageID= in it. So I clicked the "next image" icon on the image. There again the URL was really long but at the end of it I saw "imageId=4391558_00297" so there is hope yet. I used that number to create the URL on the Collections Canada site as the starting point. A bit of hopping forward I found the agricultural schedule for the 1861 Census of Canada for Lanark county, Canada West at http://data2.collectionscanada.gc.ca/1861/jpg/4391558_00341.jpg.
Why should you care about the 1861 Census of Canada agricultural schedule? Is knowing the number of bushels of turnips really that important? Probably not, but the agricultural schedule does give you the lot and concession where they lived if they resided outside of a town. With that you might be able to find the land records showing where they bought or received as a grant the land they farmed, and to whom the land was sold after the family moved away.
As you can see, it isn't a simple process to find these agricultural returns for the 1861 Census of Canada but it can be done with help from Ancestry and a little bit of work on your part.
Hey Ken - thanks this was great. I found the information using the paths you showed, but unfortunately the page for my ancestor was missing. There is a compilation for the township, which isn't much good :(
ReplyDeleteI've been doing my family history for years now and have the UK end of it pretty well documented. Now I want to do a more thorough search on those few who came to Canada in the 1800. The type of information you have given here is absolutely fantastic and I am looking forward to more articles like this by subscribing to your blog. PS I was a participant in your online lecture and enjoyed it immensely. Thank you so much.
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely BRILLIANT!
ReplyDeleteThank you for your very clear post on finding the 1861 Ag census! It lead me almost directly to my ancestor in Grey/Glenelg. After also finding them on the 51 Ag census, I was disappointed to see that in 61 they didn't list livestock, just crops etc. Was this a universal change in all of Canada, or maybe I'm missing something. Would have loved to see livestock 'growth' from 51 to 61. Thanks again!
ReplyDeleteTry going to the next image/page on the Library and Archives Canada site after you find the head of household in the image of the agricultural schedule of the 1861 census of Canada West. That second page has the details concerning the livestock.
Deletewill try that...I was using Ancestry's scanned images.
Deleteworked like a charm. Thanks again Ken.
DeleteWell your question has resulted in a new blog post on exactly that issue and it can be found at https://familytreeknots.blogspot.com/2021/02/missing-images-from-1861-census-of-canada-west-ancestry.html
DeleteGreat instructions- worked in Wolford Grenville! Thank you.
ReplyDelete