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1851-81 UK Census Records on number of employees - applied to several London Gun Makers including Reilly, Greener, Purdey, Lang:
Reilly was by far the largest company in 1881 - see conclusions

I’ve been going through the London 1851, 1861, 1871, 1881 (March 31) census researching two things:
. . . .Question 1). The census for those years asked questions of Masters about the number of employees (men, hands) they had.
. . . .Question 2). I have the name of Reilly’s foreman in 1861 John Baker, who took out a patent on a shotgun shell crimper for Reilly. I wanted to identify him from the 1861 census to see how he listed his occupation….to use as a tempplate to search for others involved in the gun trade.

Re Question 1:

The methodology of the UK census question might best be explained here:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01615440.2019.1707140
“The British business census of entrepreneurs and firm-size, 1851–1881: New data for economic and business historians”

These two books also are interesting general looks at the topic:
-- AN ECONOMIC HISTORY OF LONDON 1800-1914
https://books.google.com/books?id=WNKAAg...851&f=false
-- THE AGE OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP; BUSINESS PROPRIETERS, SELF-EMPLOYMENT AND CORPORATIONS SINCE 1851
https://books.google.com/books?id=Q5qfDw...851&f=false

In addition, according to the book London; A Social History, per the 1851 census out of 24,356 employers only 7 London firms employeed over 350 men and only 80 employed over 100. . So the data has to be available, and might even list the firms in order of their size. This data has been used in a number of studies on entrepreneurship in UK. It, however, was widely recognized as being incomplete.

In addition, someone somewhere also had detailed info on the trade at the time.

-- Per Wikipedia: “The number of firms in Birmingham's gun industry was 125 in 1815, 455 in 1829 (two-thirds of these in the Gun Quarter), and by 1868 there were 578 gun firms in the city. The trade employed 2,867 people in 1851, out of a total of 7,731 in the whole of England and Wales.. (The statistics had to come from the 1851 census....where can one find them?)

-- And per this article on the Birmingham gun trade, there are very detailed statistics available somewhere. Goodman - "On the Process of the Small Arms Manufacture"
https://books.google.com/books?id=SUwuAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA497&lpg=PA497&dq=the+list+of+workmen+employed+estimates+the+total+number+at+7,340&source=bl&ots=WDuTRfe2vO&sig=ACfU3U3jNVTfTnhHS9_e7DPwxVEneWKU-A&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwih9o_7r9npAhXjlXIEHTe_CAsQ6AEwAHoECAcQAQ#v=onepage&q=the%20list%20of%20workmen%20employed%20estimates%20the%20total%20number%20at%207%2C340&f=false


Results for question 1: I cannot find a gunmaker in London who listed the number of persons he employed in 1851 and 1861. However here are examples from 1871 and 1881:
-- 1871 Purdey employed 58 men
-- 1881 E.M. Reilly reported to the census that he employed 300 men;
-- 1881 WW Greener said he employed 140 men:

1) Reilly entries:
Edward Michael Reilly 1861 and 1881 Census entries:

Joseph Charles Reilly 1841 Census entry - note that Edward Michael was also identified as "Gun Maker."


2) Purdey entries: Here are the three entries for James Purdey (Elder – retired in 1858, and Younger) for the 1851, 1861, and 1871 census. There is not a word about the number of people they employed in 1851 and 61. In 1871, Purdey said he employed 58 persons - 1/5th the number of Reilly in 1881. (Purdey elder identified his occupation as "Gun Maker & Seller" in 1851).


3) Lang entries: 1851, 1861 entries for Joseph Lang, Gun Maker - nothing about employees.


4) John Blissett: 1851 entry for John Blissett (who listed his occupation as “Whitesmith”).


5). WW Greener, Gun Maker, 1881 census entry - employed 140 men:


CONCLUSION: From the above, Reilly employed 5 times as many men as Purdey in 1881 and more than twice as many as WW Greener. Per the above article on Birmingham gun quarter in 1868, however, these numbers must have fluctuated regularly as demand increased/decreased.

I'm still having problems searching these census databases. I know that TRW999 did research on Reilly and used the census records. Any tips on how to use the data would be appreciated and also where might the data on entrepreneurs in London on these census dates be found?

Last edited by Argo44; 06/10/20 10:38 AM.
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