In 2023, almost nine million people lived in Greater London, making it the most populated ceremonial county in England. The West Midlands Metropolitan County, which contains the large city of Birmingham, was the second-largest county at 2.98 million inhabitants, followed by Greater Manchester and then West Yorkshire with populations of 2.95 million and 2.4 million, respectively. Kent, Essex, and Hampshire were the three next-largest counties in terms of population, each with around 1.89 million people. A patchwork of regions England is just one of the four countries that compose the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, with England, Scotland and Wales making up Great Britain. England is therefore not to be confused with Great Britain or the United Kingdom as a whole. Within England, the next subdivisions are the nine regions of England, containing various smaller units such as unitary authorities, metropolitan counties and non-metropolitan districts. The counties in this statistic, however, are based on the ceremonial counties of England as defined by the Lieutenancies Act of 1997. Regions of Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland Like England, the other countries of the United Kingdom have their own regional subdivisions, although with some different terminology. Scotland’s subdivisions are council areas, while Wales has unitary authorities, and Northern Ireland has local government districts. As of 2022, the most-populated Scottish council area was Glasgow City, with over 622,000 inhabitants. In Wales, Cardiff had the largest population among its unitary authorities, and in Northern Ireland, Belfast was the local government area with the most people living there.

Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.

The Ashford study aimed to create a machine-readable database of information relating to the social and economic activities of the inhabitants of Ashford in the mid to late nineteenth century. Material has been transcribed from the census enumerator's books, civil registers of births, marriages and deaths, poll books, trade directories and Parliamentary sessional papers listings of landowners. Each source is held as a separate data file containing the following information:
1) Census data: the data consists of all persons residing in Ashford and surrounding rural areas on the night of the censuses of 1841, 1851 and 1861. However, the data file for 1841 is only a partial transcript as some of the original enumerator's books are missing. The data comprise one record for each individual transcribed as recorded in the source with some additional information.
2) Civil register data: The data comprise all marriages which took place in Ashford churches between 1837 and 1870, in total about 1600, of which around 600 were in non-conformist churches. Also recorded are births and deaths registered in the Ashford division of the West Ashford Union, including the parishes of Bethersden, Great Chart, Hothfield, Kingsnorth, Shadoxhurst and Ashford. For each marriage two records were prepared, one for the husband and for the wife thereby retaining all details of the marriage. Births and deaths are recorded as in the original source with some minor coding.
3) Directory data: The data comprise details of various members of the community including local officers, gentry, professionals, shopkeepers and traders.
4) Electoral data: The data comprise details of enfranchised members of constituencies and how they cast their votes in the Parliamentary elections of 1852, 1857, 1863 and 1868.
5) Landowners data: The data comprise details of landowners, land and estimated rental for all those people with addresses in the East or West Ashford Union who owned land in Kent.
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The data files may be analysed separately or linked and merged to provide a means of evaluating and quantifying aspects of the lives of the people of Ashford over a period of time. The data may be of interest for a wide range of topics, for example, fertility patterns, marriage patterns, household structure and composition, migration, (during this period Ashford experienced a large influx of migrants associated with the newly built railway works), economic activities, social composition.