1931 United Kingdom census

The census for England and Wales, the Channel Islands, and the Isle of Man was stored in London. The census returns for Scotland were stored separately in Edinburgh.[1][2]

The 1931 census for England and Wales was destroyed by fire 19th December 1942, during the Second World War, while in storage, along with a large amount of furniture, at the Office of Works in Hayes, Middlesex. W A Derrick of the General Register Office, who visited the scene of the aftermath, commented in a letter to the Central National Registration Office that "The fire was not occasioned by enemy action and how it achieved such dimensions in a store in which special hydrants had been fitted and said to have been in charge of a fire guard of 6 paid watchers, is a mystery which will need investigation".[3][4][5] A report the following year mentioned a theory that the fire may have been started by a fire-watch employee's discarded cigarette; no action was taken.[6] The entire census - schedules, enumeration books and plans - were destroyed and it was recommended in future that census records should be stored separately to prevent the a similar complete loss. Fortunately the 1931 census for Scotland was not affected as it was stored in Edinburgh.[7][8]

There was no census taken in 1941 due to the Second World War; however, the register taken as a result of the National Registration Act 1939, which was released into the public domain on a subscription basis in 2015 with some redactions, including details of those still alive being blanked out, captures many of the same details as the census, with the added advantage of having the subjects date of birth, and has assumed greater significance following the destruction of the 1931 census.[9]

• Census in the United Kingdom
• List of United Kingdom censuses