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by Josephine Masterson (Author)
Mrs. Masterson continues her assault on Famine-era Irish genealogical sources with this transcription of 1851 census records for County Antrim, and it may be her most ambitious effort to date. As is well known, most of the 1851 Irish census was destroyed in the 1922 fire at the Four Courts in Dublin. The largest collection of surviving census fragments pertains to County Antrim, and, in particular, to the following parishes: Aghagallon, Aghalee, Ballinderry, Ballymoney, Craigs, Dunaghy, Grange, Killead, Kilwaughter, Larne, Rasharkin, and Tickmacrevan. Working from microfilm copies of the 1851 census available from the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Mrs. Masterson has transcribed data on all 28,000 persons enumerated in the surviving records for County Antrim. The records are arranged by Irish parish and thereunder by townland, and they are grouped by household in the very same sequence as they were tallied in 1851. Each person in a household is listed by first and last name, relationship to the head of household, age, marital status and year of marriage, place of birth (if not from County Antrim), literacy, and occupation. Recently deceased members of a household, who were tallied on a separate schedule, are also transcribed here with an indication of the date and cause of death and their former occupation. Rounding out this magnificent addition to the published sources of 19th-century Irish genealogy are a number of facsimile reproductions of the census schedules, the compiler's very helpful Introduction and key to abbreviations, a list of all parishes/townlands for which census fragments have survived, and an every-name index keyed to family group numbers.
