Abstract

This paper utilizes a digitized version of the 100% sample of 1881 Census Enumerators’ Books (hereafter CEBs) to investigate women’s work by marital status in England and Wales. Prior to the availability of this 100% sample of 1881 CEBs in a machine-readable form, analysis of women’s work by marital status in the nineteenth century was either done by using tabulated figures in a couple of published censuses or only a small number of CEBs confined to a small area. With the digitized 100% sample of CEBs in England and Wales, this paper can offer a systematic analysis of women’s work by marital status with a wide geographical coverage. The nominal data in the CEBs allow me to investigate the employment of single women, married women and widows through various aspects of the household such as co-residence pattern and kin’s occupation etc. This allows me to identify some of the important factors behind women’s labour force participation.