Find your ancestors in Westminster Roman Catholic Census 1893

Was your ancestor a good Catholic or bad Catholic? Explore thousands of names from this Roman Catholic census and discover more about your ancestor.

The records provide you with a transcription and an image of the original census record. Similar to other census records, you will be able to see the names of other people listed in the census at the same residence. The detail in each record can vary, but most will include the following:

• Name
• Age – only recorded if the individual was under the age of 21
• Birth year
• Occupation
• Criminal risk
• House
• Street
• Parish
• Mission
• Deanery
• Diocese
• Ecclesiastical province

The images will give you additional details about ancestor including the following facts:

• Occupation
• Did the individual attend mass?
• Did the individual participate in Easter duties?
• Did the individual receive confirmation?
• If married, was the marriage a mixed [religion] marriage?
• For the children – did the child attend Catholic or non-Catholic school?
• Is the child’s faith in danger?
• Is the child in imminent danger of joining the criminal classes?
• Remarks – In this field you can find notes about the local priest’s opinion of the individual or family such as, ‘good poor family’, ‘trustworthy’, ‘living on charity’, or ‘bad Catholics’.

Discover more about these records

The original records are held by the Westminster Diocesan Archives. The diocese of Westminster was created in 1850 after the reestablishment of the Catholic hierarchy by Pope Pius IX. It is one of the smallest Catholic dioceses in terms of geographical area, but it is one of the largest in population. To find more of your ancestors, search England Roman Catholic parish baptisms, which include records from the diocese of Westminster.

The census was instated by the Archbishop of Westminster Herbert Vaughan when he first arrived in the diocese. The census found that there were less Catholics in the area than previously estimated. Furthermore, the census revealed that less than half of the known Catholic population were practicing Catholics.

Among the names found in the census, we discovered Albert Chevalier, a music hall singer, comedian, and actor, particularly known for is coster songs and cockney rhyming. In the census he was living with Marie Chevalier, a chiropodist. The census showed that they regularly attended mass.