57
Much freight was being carried by boat, and how important ferries were, in the area, both in Northern and Southern District. The census also shows just how many specialist cargo boats there were operating, as well as the large numbers of general cargo vessels.
911
The 1921 Census records all the vessels seen by the enumerators. In Northern District 456 fishing boats, 84 cargo boats and seven sampans were recorded, and in Southern District 672 fishing boats, 33 cargo boats and 236 sampans. In Northern District 2.1 males are recorded for every fishing boat, and 4.1 for every cargo boat and sampan; in Southern District 4.7 and 2.8 respectively. The most likely reason for the lower figure for persons recorded for every cargo boat/sampan in Southern District as against Northern District is the very much higher number of sampans recorded in Southern District. The higher figure for males recorded against Southern District fishing boats is probably due to the fact that Southern waters were oceanic, and the fishing boats were in fact larger than those operating in the creeks and shallows of Northern District. The numbers recorded, however, in each district and for each class of vessel, are such that it is likely that few boats were manned by more than the males of a single family.
There were clear differences between women's and men's work among the floating population. The overwhelmingly female nature of the passenger-carrying work in particular is very clearly brought out in these statistics. Probably the women were working passenger sampans while their menfolk were out fishing.
The recorded occupations of Northern District women in the 1911 and 1921 Censuses and for Southern District women in the 1911 Census are given in Tables 25 and 26. Unfortunately, the method of recording the occupations of women is, for the reasons outlined above, flawed, and the information given is of only modest value, since women working from the home were left out of the census figures, thus biasing the statistics by underplaying the role of women in fishing, shopkeeping, and the minor services such as hairdressing, especially in the 1911 Census. It seems likely that the vital role of women as grass-cutters and fuel sellers is also seriously under-recorded, since this seems almost always to have been a part-time occupation.