Floating Households
The 1911 Census of Victoria
Reconstructing a Population Afloat
Victoria's Inner Harbour in 1912.
Image courtesy of BC Archives, A-05639.
Victoria, British Columbia’s economy during the Edwardian era was fundamentally shaped by maritime commerce. A 1912 photograph of Victoria’s Inner Harbour depicts several commercial vessels operating from the provincial capital. On the left are Canadian Pacific steamers, Princess Victoria and Princess Adelaide, which provided connections between Victoria, Seattle, and Vancouver. On the right stand Grand Trunk Pacific steamers, Prince George and Prince Rupert, transporting passengers and cargo to Prince Rupert and Alaska. The coastal freighter Amur is docked in the foreground, while the S.S. Joan departs for Nanaimo.
Beyond the frame, tug boats, sealing schooners, and whaling ships were moored in the Upper Harbour. Additional vessels, including government lighthouse tenders, were situated near Victoria's Outer Wharf.
In most cases, the people who manned these vessels when they were at sea also lived aboard the vessels when they were in port. Crew members assigned to ships based in Victoria can be identified from Canada’s 1911 census records.
According to the official Instructions to Census Officers, Commissioners and Enumerators for the 5th decennial census of Canada (1911), any vessel considered a person’s “habitual home or place of abode—that is to say, where the person usually sleeps or dwells,” qualified as a "census household." Everyone aboard a ship classified as such was enumerated with comprehensive details, including: name, age, date and place of birth, nationality, year of immigration (if applicable), religion, occupation, annual earnings, and other personal information.
The master usually held the designation of ‘head of household,’ with other crew listed as ‘shipmates’ by rank. For instance, on passenger steamers like the Princess Victoria, the census began with the captain, followed by chief officer, engineer, purser, seaman, and continued through the hierarchy to pantryman and mess boy.
Census officials responsible for documenting Victoria’s population afloat commenced their enumeration with passenger steamers in the Inner Harbour, expanded to vessels in the Upper Harbour, and concluded with those at the Outer Wharf. The census reference date was Thursday, 1 June 1911. The maritime portion began on 2 June and was completed in about six weeks. Over fifty vessels and nearly 1,200 crew members were recorded in what became known as the "shipping list."
S.S. Princess Victoria.
Image courtesy of City of Victoria Archives, M00466.
In this historical research project, vessels enumerated in Victoria during the 1911 Dominion census are identified, described and organized into eight sections, covering Canadian Pacific steamships, Grand Trunk Pacific steamships, coastal freighters, tugs, sealing schooners, whaling boats, government vessels and dredgers. In the process, we reveal a distinct, organized community previously overlooked by historians.
The final section provides suggestions for further research using geographical information system [GIS] tools. GIS is a method of displaying and analyzing spatially referenced data. With historical GIS, we can view Victoria from a novel perspective, the waterfront.
18 April 2026