NAUVOO UNIVERSITY FAMILY HISTORY CLASS Class 09 -- US AND LDS IMMIGRATION RECORDS ©2010 by Donald R. Snow
This page was last updated 2010-03-16.
Return to the Utah Valley Technology and Genealogy Group Home Page , or Don's Class Listings Page .

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WELCOME AND INTRODUCTION TO CLASS

• Instructors are Donald R. and Diane M. Snow ( snowd@math.byu.edu , dms34@juno.com ) of Provo, Utah; St. George, Utah; and Nauvoo, Illinois.
• These notes with active Internet links are posted on the Utah Valley Technology and Genealogy Group website http://uvtagg.org under Class Outlines , Don's Listings .  Many other class notes for family history are linked on the UVTAGG website also.
• This class will discuss a few sources of US immigration records and how to use them.
• Song: Ellis Island by the Three Irish Tenors

INTRODUCTION TO MIGRATION

• The word "migration" includes both "immigration" (= inbound "in") and "emigration" (= outbound "exit")
• Many books and films on this in the Family History Library Catalog -- do keyword searches for terms like 'immigration United States'
• "United States Emigration and Immigration" -- https://wiki.familysearch.org/en/Portal:United_States_Emigration_and_Immigration
• "Researching Passenger Arrival in the United States" --  http://www.infoukes.com/genealogy/primer/arrival.html
• "What Passenger Lists are Online?" -- http://www.germanroots.com/onlinelists.html  
• "Immigrant Ship Passenger Lists - Main Index" -- http://distantcousin.com/Links/ships/  
• "Cyndi's List - Ships and Passenger Lists" -- http://www.cyndislist.com/ships.htm  
• "Cyndi's List - Immigration and Naturalization" -- http://www.cyndislist.com/immigrat.htm  
• "Research Guide to Immigration and Ship's Passenger Lists" -- http://home.att.net/%7Earnielang/shipgide.html 

US AND MORMON IMMIGRATION (INBOUND) RECORDS

• Numbers of immigrants into US -- Map of Immigrants Admitted Through Each Port of the U.S. 1820-1920 -- map on FamilySearch
• 1900-1920 US Censuses give immigration year and whether naturalized citizen
• "Finding Passenger Lists and Immigration Records 1820-1940s, Arrivals to US Ports from Europe" -- http://www.germanroots.com/onlinelists.html  
• History of immigration through New York -- of the 30 million US immigrants between 1820 and 1920 24 million (79%) went through New York City -- see map listed above on FamilySearch
• • Castle Garden -- 1855-1890 -- search the records for free at http://www.castlegarden.org/
  • Ellis Island -- 1892-1924 - 71% of all US immigration records -- search the records for free at http://www.ellisislandrecords.org -- have to register, but it is free
  • No name changes at Ellis Island -- see article about Ellis Island by Kimberly Powell on About Genealogy
  • Stephen Morse's search engine for New York and other passenger records -- http://www.stevemorse.org
• Mormon immigration to Nauvoo and Iowa, then across the plains to Utah
  • Mormon Immigration Index (1840-1890) -- index of ship manifests of Mormon immigrant companies; on CD available at FHC's and from LDS Distribution Centers -- has lists, reports, letters, and journals of immigrants crossing the oceans
  • Mormon Pioneer Overland Travel (1847-1868) -- see http://www.lds.org > About the Church > Church History > Mormon Overland Travel -- has lists, reports, letters, and journals of immigrants crossing the plains

ASSIGNMENT

1. Find one of your immigrant ancestors in the 1900 or later US Census and determine which year he immigrated to the U.S.
2. Search the Castle Garden or Ellis Island records for one of your surnames and see if you can find one or more of your ancestors. Save an image or text copy of the information and enter it in your PAF (or other program) database.
3. If you have Mormon ancestors, check the Mormon Immigration Index and Mormon Overland Travel Index for one or two of them. Save an image or text copy of the information and enter it in your PAF (or other program) database.

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Return to the Utah Valley Technology and Genealogy Group Home Page , or Don's Class Listings Page .