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Many of us are driven to find out about the "old country"
where our ancestors originated, and so we work hard to locate
immigration records. If we are lucky, we find information pinpointing
the location from which the ancestor left his home, family, and
everything that was familiar. Unfortunately, there is no one source
of information that we can consult to find the origins of our
immigrant ancestors — but one good starting place to look
are ship's passenger arrival lists. Passenger lists were kept
not as genealogical records, but as a record of immigration to
the U.S. The Germans to America CD contains information
on approximately 1.5 million individuals who arrived at a number
of U.S. ports during the years 1875 to 1888.
Researchers who have German ancestry will be familiar with the
resource Germans to America series of volumes edited by
Ira A. Glazier and P. William Filby; the volumes are one of the
best-known resources to help researchers tackle the daunting task
of locating details about immigrant ancestors. The information
you'll find was originally published by Scholarly Resources, Inc.
and includes the references to individuals included in Volumes
32 to 56 of the Germans to America series.
Records found within this Family Archive may include information
about an individual's age, gender, occupation, last residence,
date of arrival in the U.S., final destination, ship name, manifest
number, captain's name, mode of travel, and port of embarkation.
For example, the following are two sample records:
Passenger's
Name: Marie Arend
Age: 24
Gender: Female
Occupation: None
Last Residence: Luxemburg
Date of Arrival: Apr. 24, 1882
Final Destination: USA
Ship's Name: Rhynland
Manifest ID Number: 36571
Port of Embarkation: Antwerp
Passenger's
Name: Paul Saube
Age: 29
Gender: Male
Occupation: Joiner
Last Residence: Germany
Date of Arrival: Aug. 13, 1875
Final Destination: USA
Purpose for Travel: Staying in USA, but not a citizen of USA
Ship's Name: Neckar
Captain's Name: Meyer
Manifest ID Number: 33882
Port of Embarkation: Bremen
Mode of Travel: Steerage |
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July
21, 1999
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