Regarding Virginia, Don Trent wrote: >In several 1850 Campbell Co., VA census records, there appears the number 1 in parentheses after a person name. This is always after a name other than the "head of household" and may be seen on one or more names in that family unit. What is the enumerator trying to tell us? Regarding New York, Donal O'Kelly wrote: >I ran into it on a census containing surname Williamson in the state of New York. enumeration John (2) Later it turned out there was a John head of household and a son John Jr. head of another family in the same household. Still I cannot just assume that the (2) means two Johns in the same house. Donald Moore responded: > Buried somewhere in the NARA web site are instructions to census takers for each census year. Perhaps that might shed some light on the notations. Don and Donal, would you cite the specific households or pages for which you found these entries? (The more examples the better.) As Donald pointed out, census instructions tell us what the enumerators were *instructed* to do. Most of those instructions for 1850-1950 are online at http://usa.ipums.org/usa/voliii/tEnumInstr.shtml. The (1) and (2) notations that Don and Donal have noted are not authorized notations. If they represent, say, John the First and John the Second, then they represent yet another aberration, because "(1)" and "(2)" were not standard ways of writing "first" and "second" in that era. To have entries written this way by random enumerators in both Virginia and New York would add coincidence to the aberration. Meanwhile, many markings made on the censuses were made by clerks in the census office itself---not by the enumerators. I'd like to examine the entries, if specific entries can be cited. (I won't volunteer to read all of Campbell County---or New York state---in search of those entries :) Elizabeth ------------------------------------------------------------ Elizabeth Shown Mills, CG, CGL, FASG Advanced Research Methodology & Evidence Analysis Samford University Institute of Genealogy & Historical Research AUTHOR OF: _Evidence Explained: Citing History Sources from Artifacts to Cyberspace_ _QuickSheet: Citing Online Historical Resource, Evidence Style_ _Evidence: Citation & Analysis for the Family Historian_ _Professional Genealogy: A Manual for Researchers, Writers, Editors, Lecturers & Librarians_ To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-roots.html