Elkin Population Change in England and Wales

Using information taken from the 1881 Census and the Civil Registration records, it is possible to estimate the Elkin population in England and Wales from 1837 onwards. This graph shows that, during the period 1837 to 1910, the population grew steadily, doubling in fifty years.

It must be emphasised that the figures are estimates, as many factors have been ignored;

not all births marriages and deaths were registered in the early days of civil registration,
errors in indexing means that even when an event was registered it may not be possible to find it,
changes in name other than by marriage have been ignored,
immigration and emigration clearly took place in this period, but has been ignored,
the 1881 census, used to fix the population in that year, may have understated the true population in that year,
errors in the transcription of the 1881 census may have reduced the number of entries found

Looking at the figures for males (blue chart) and females (pink chart) seperately shows that, although the populations of each sex started out roughly equal in 1837, by 1910 that were nearly 10% more females than males.

It is expected that analysis of the data for the next ten years to 1920 will slow the increase, and perhaps show a reduction in population, due to the impact of the Great War, the flu epidemics, and the social changes which reduced family sizes.

I would be interested to correspond with anyone who has conducted a similar investigation on another name, to see if there are common features in the population profile.

The Method

The 1881 census transcript for England and Wales was used to provide a count of the number of males and females with the surname Elkin in that year. For each following year, the numbers of births was added to these figures, and the number of deaths subtracted. For each marriage of a female, one was subtracted from the number of females, and for each marriage of a male, one was added to the number of females (assuming in each case that the female changed surname to match that of her husband). For each year before 1881, these calculations were done in reverse to work the population back to 1837 when civil registration began.