Probably the last thing on
the mind of anyone in the West Country in the early days of Spring 1891 was the Census. The weeks just before Sunday April 5th (Census night) were
totally dominated by the weather, and the terrible hardships it brought to
everyone and everything in the counties of Devon and Cornwall.
A spell of intensely cold weather blew in from the Arctic early in
March 1891, bringing with it gales, blizzards, ice and extreme falls of snow.
The West of England was particularly hard hit and it was not until the
third week of March that a slight thaw began in the Axminster area, spreading
very slowly to other parts of Devon and Cornwall by the end of the following week.
It was assumed in 1891 that most people could read and write so every householder was supposed to fill out a form with the required information.
The enumerator would then collect the forms and copy the information into the official Census
Return book and the plan was to deliver the forms to every home ahead of April
5th.
The railways should have played a key role in conveying Census forms
(and enumerators) around the area, but the rapid onset of the storm and the
sheer volume of snowfall defeated everyone. To begin with, Brunel's main
Great Western line from Exeter to Plymouth (which runs along the sea
coast) was kept open, with gangs of railway workers digging and
shovelling snow in the most appalling conditions. But within hours they
simply had to give up and numerous trains, with their passengers, became
stranded. On inland lines, like the track from Plymouth up to Princetown
over Dartmoor, trains literally became engulfed in snow and it was days
before rescuers could reach the passengers. By March 17th, the entire
county was impassable by road or rail.
