London Electoral Registers - ancestry

[Asa]

On Ancestry - up to 1965 and I notice that there are some Walthamstow ones in the update so they've strayed into Essex. Some of the addresses appear as badly as on the Birmingham ones!

http://search.ancestry.co.uk/search/db.aspx?dbid=1795

[kiterunner]

How do you see what's in the update, please, Asa?

[Asa]

Just by looking about unfortunately. Didn't they just go up to 1960 before? My great grandmother now appears up to 1965 and I can see relations in Barnet and Walthamstow who didn't appear before - a lot of the outer areas finished in the 30s before.

I do wish Ancestry would tell us what exactly has been added.

[kiterunner]

The title said 1965 before, but it only went up to 1961. Ooh, my parents are on there together in 1962 now!

[Phoenix]

Wow, thanks, Asa! Found my parents... and a few local scandals the adults never mentioned among the neighbours!

[Phoenix]

It looks like two years worth: presumably the new authorities collected the old electoral rolls to ensure a smooth administrative transition when Greater London mushroomed in 1965.

[Jill]

Thanks for flagging this up, I've found my parents - though they appear to be living at different addresses as not ony has as the trascriber has used the voter number instead of the house number and has transcribed them as being in the next street to the one they obviously lived in!

[Phoenix]

I got fooled that way too, Jill. In fact every look up I have done (well, okay, four!) has given the address incorrectly: previous road, mistranscription and wife's name!

[kiterunner]

There is no transcriber, Jill; it was done using OCR software.

[Nell]

My grandfather Jeuel Gray has been the subject of many errors in recording - Juel, Jewel, Jule etc. But I found him in the electoral roll for 1927 as Jcuol Jabez J. Gray. They've even given him an extra initial!

And his wife Annie? She's down as Aiftiie!

[kiterunner]

A lot of entries have that extra "J" initial added, Nell, because the letter J appears after a lot of the names, I think it means "eligible for jury service".

[Nell]

Oh, thanks for that KiteRunner. Obvious when you know!

[Nell]

Gosh, the transcriptions are full of errors. I've found several instances of Southwark and Stoke Newington being lumped together as ward/division/constituency, when they are opposite sides of the river.

[kiterunner]

They weren't transcribed, Nell, it was done using OCR software. If you look at the total number of records in the database - 159,232,274 - it would have taken an enormous number of transcribers (or a very long time!) to transcribe them by hand. It isn't very accurate but in many cases, the same person will be at the same address for several years and once you have found them in one year you know where to look.

[Nell]

True, KR, but I have several lots of people at the same addresses for decades and its rare that the address is indexed the same way more than a few times. Often it gives someone else's name or another street nearby as the address, so you have to check every image, which is a bit of a pain.

Mind you, not complaining, its great to have another resource. I've found a chap in ex's tree from 1832 which is fab, and another which gives a description of his house (1st floor, 4 unfurnished rooms) plus the amount of weekly rent - I thought the landlord had a familiar name and sure enough, it's the tenant's father-in-law!