Is it worth trying this 1901 census site

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A.� Absolutely - but give it a little while. Millions of amateur family historians were left frustrated in the first few days of the Public Record Office putting the 1901 census online. < xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

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Q.� Why

A.� Within three hours, more than a million people had attempted to search the database for ancestors. At one point 1.2 million people were trying to connect. It crashed.

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Q.� So what is it

A.� The Census Online project is one of the most ambitious of its kind. For the first time, all 32 million census entries collected on 31 March, 1901, have been made available via the internet - on www.census.pro.gov.uk. The site was designed to let visitors research their family tree, or find out who lived in their home 100 years ago.

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Q.� It's free

A.� Not entirely. You'll have to pay for some information. Users will be able to search under several categories including name, place and address and look at a digital image of the census return for 75p. The transcribed details from the census return will cost 50p and another 50p buys the details of all other people listed at that address.

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Q.� So it's just a money-making ploy by the Government

A.� Yes - but for a good cause. The money raised will help pay for putting other censuses in digital format. The 1901 census was scanned in by software company QinetiQ, formerly part of the government's Defence Evaluation and Research Agency.

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Q.� Any interesting details in it

A.� Millions! Of particular note, however, is one eight-month-old Elizabeth Angelia Bowes Lyon, of Walden Herts.

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Q.� Who's she

A.� Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, gawd bless 'er. The Angelia is a spelling mistake. It should be Angela.

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Q.� Any more

A.� Plenty. One Charles Chaplin, living in Surrey, is listed as a 'music hall artiste'. Legendary cricketer W G Grace is described as a 'physician and secretary of the London County Cricket Club'. It also records the abodes of French artist Claude Monet, H G Wells - author of War of the Worlds; J R R Tolkien, whose Lord of the Rings is now a film blockbuster; and the nurse Florence Nightingale (click here for a feature on her).

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Q.� So will I be able to find details of my ancestors

A.� If you know their names and that they were living in Britain in 1901, yes. But be prepared for a shock.

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Q.� Why

A.� These were the days before political correctness. The Edwardians, like the Victorians before them, were quite brutal in their medical descriptions. The 1901 census asked for health details, and whether people were deaf and dumb or blind. You might also easily find one of your ancestors was described as 'lunatic, imbecile or feeble-minded'.

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Steve Cunningham