The Structure of the Household

From the block diagram below, it can be easily seen that, in 1871 the division of the population by age groups forms a very different pattern to the graph for 1966. The larger number of children born gives a wide base to the graph for 1871, but the early age of death forms the 'Christmas Tree' shape which is typical for the 19th century. That Dore was a comparatively young society in the 19th century is also borne out by the comparison of household sizes. The modern sample shows a larger number of houses with only one or two occupants - many of which must be the elderly, living alone and the married couple, whose families have left home.

In the census returns for 1851 and 1871 for Dore the average household sizes were 4.7 and 4.82 respectively, which compares favourably with the national average figure of 5.3 for 1871. Of these households, over half were occupied by the family alone. Less than a quarter of homes had servants, but as these were often a relative, they were probably not all paid servants in the modern sense. A proportion of houses had lodgers, 16% ad 14% for 1851 and 1871 respectively.

(To see data values for the following graph, hover your cursor over the plotted bars)

Created with Highcharts 4.0.1Age in 5 year divisions1871 CensusMaleFemale0-45-910-1415-1920-2425-2930-3435-3940-4445-4950-5455-5960-6465-6970-7475-7980-8485-8990-940-45-910-1415-1920-2425-2930-3435-3940-4445-4950-5455-5960-6465-6970-7475-7980-8485-8990-94-60-50-40-30-20-100102030405060Female, age 0-4Population: 56Highcharts.com