War, Women and the 1921 Census
Dan Snow's History Hit
History Hit
4.7 • 12.9K Ratings
🗓️ 8 March 2022
⏱️ 22 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
After World War One women outnumbered men by the highest margin in recorded history, even compared to after World War Two. This had wide-reaching implications for the social, demographic and economic fabric of post-war society.
Today Dan is joined by Mary McKee and Paul Nixon from Findmypast to explore: What does the 1921 Census reveal about the impact of the First World War for Britain?
Are you interested in exploring your own family history? After years spent digitising and transcribing this unique record of your recent history, the 1921 Census is now available exclusively online with Findmypast. Start exploring now at findmypast.co.uk.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi, and welcome to Dan Snow's History here. I have been enjoying the release of the |
| 0:05.0 | 1921 census very much. Every 10 years, the British government since 1801 has taken |
| 0:10.3 | a census of the British population. The 1921 census, though, is a special treat because |
| 0:16.8 | we're not going to get another one for years. One was destroyed and the other one didn't |
| 0:19.7 | get conducted because of the war. So if you like censuses, whatever the plural of that |
| 0:23.7 | census, this is your last chance to get stuck into one until 2052. And so to mark this |
| 0:31.7 | occasion, we've done a few podcasts about the census and we've got another one coming |
| 0:35.2 | up now. We're going to talk about women in particular because it's International Women's |
| 0:37.6 | Day when this podcast is first broadcast. We are going to look in particular at what the |
| 0:43.2 | census tells us about women. Never before or since in Britain have there been so many |
| 0:49.0 | women compared to men. So terrible weather losses of the trenches, of the battles at sea |
| 0:54.8 | and the desert, East Africa, the mountains of Italy and elsewhere, that there were |
| 0:59.7 | now 1,096 women in the UK for every thousand men. It was an imbalance. It was something |
| 1:08.1 | they talked about a lot at the time. So we're going to talk about it a little bit now. |
| 1:11.2 | What's it all mean? We've got Mary McKee. She's find my pasts women's history expert. |
| 1:16.2 | And we've got Paul Nixon. He's the find my past military history expert. So these are |
| 1:21.4 | the two perfect people to have on. Don't forget the 1921 census is now available exclusively |
| 1:27.0 | online with find my past dot co dot UK. If you want to listen to previous podcasts on |
| 1:33.5 | about the census, you can head over to history at TV. You get to listen to them without |
| 1:36.6 | the ass. Just follow the link in the information of this podcast. But in the meantime folks, |
| 1:42.8 | enjoy Paul Nixon and Mary McKee telling us all about women, world war one and the years |
| 1:47.6 | that followed. |
... |
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