Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.The Great Britain Historical Database has been assembled as part of the ongoing Great Britain Historical GIS Project. The project aims to trace the emergence of the north-south divide in Britain and to provide a synoptic view of the human geography of Britain at sub-county scales. Further information about the project is available on A Vision of Britain webpages, where users can browse the database's documentation system online.

These data were originally published in the reports of the Registrar-General for England and Wales. They were computerised by the Great Britain Historical GIS Project and its collaborators. They form part of the Great Britain Historical Database, which contains a wide range of geographically-located statistics, selected to trace the emergence of the north-south divide in Britain and to provide a synoptic view of the human geography of Britain, generally at sub-county scales. This study mainly comprises data from the RG's Annual Reports, with some data from the Quarterly Returns. A very extensive transcription from the Decennial Supplements forms a separate study. In this pre-1911 period, the main reporting units were approximately  630 Registration Districts, grouped into Registration Counties and subdivided into around 2,000 Registration sub-Districts.Latest edition informationFor the second edition (December 2022) the previous data and documentation files were replaced with new versions, and access conditions were changed from safeguarded to open access.

Main Topics:

Annual counts of births and deaths for all Registration Districts in all years 1850 to 1910, with marriages for some years. Annual cause-of-death data for all Registration Districts in all years, 1856 to 1910. The causes of death focus on epidemic diseases. Annual age-specific mortality data for all Registration Districts for 1840-42, 1850-52, 1860-1882, 1890-92, 1900-02, 1908-1910 (i.e. for most of the period, census years plus immediately adjacent years). Quarterly counts of births, deaths and selected causes of death from the Registrar-General's Quarterly Returns, for Registration sub-Districts. This is limited to (1) a full transcription of all four quarters for each census year within the period covered by the Quarterly Returns: 1871, 1881, 1891, 1901 and 1911; (2) numbers of births and infant deaths in all sub-districts in the County of London from the full run of reports from 1871 to 1911; and (3) a full transcription of all four quarters of 1876, but limited to the north-west of England, defined as Cheshire, Lancashire and Westmorland plus Chapel-en-le-Frith and Hayfield Registration Districts in Derbyshire and Saddleworth in the West Riding. Individual cholera deaths in London in summer and autumn 1866 arranged by date and causes of death, plus a variant which is adjusted for deaths in hospitals (these data were created by Graham Mooney). A separate UKDS study contains decennial age-specific cause of death data for all Registration Districts in all decades from 1851-60 to 1901-10. Please note: this study does not include information on named individuals and would therefore not be useful for personal family history research.

No sampling (total universe)

Compilation/Synthesis

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