Google Ship Passenger Lists

Learn to Google Ancestor ship passenger lists and use them to develop individual and family profiles and write narratives.

Your ancestors most likely came to America on a ship. Every ship had a record of its passengers—a passenger list or manifest. There are good chances that you will be able to find these records. The information found on these records varies over time. Below is an outline of the information you can find in a ship’s passenger lists from different periods.

Google Ancestor Ship Passenger Lists
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Ship Passenger Lists Before 1820

Most sailing ships were cargo ships, and the passenger list may be found among the ship’s cargo manifest. Ships sailed only when the cargo hold was full. There is no consistency in the type and amount of information that exists. The manifests were usually deposited at the port of arrival and were initially kept at these colonial ports. Many of these early records have been lost or destroyed. If they exist, you will find them distributed among libraries, historical societies, museums, and private holders. If you are fortunate enough to find them, the type of information you may find includes the following:

  • Country of origin (possibly province or exact town)
  • Date of arrival in the United States
  • Family members or others who immigrated on the same ship
  • Destination in the United States
  • Occupation, age, and sex
  • Information about the ship—its name, master, port of embarkation, and port of arrival[TOC]

Ship Passenger Lists Between 1820 and about 1891

After immigration to America increased, ships were being built especially for passenger traffic; companies had regularly scheduled sailing dates. After the 1840s, trans-oceanic, steam-powered ships replaced sailing vessels, reducing travel time from one or two months (or longer) to about two weeks.

Customs passenger lists were prepared by the ship’s captain and filed with the customs collector at the port of arrival. These lists were initially meant to serve statistical purposes. Except for a few ports, most of these passenger lists have survived. Information that may be found includes the following:

  • Country, province, or exact town of origin (About ten percent of the lists may have an exact town listed)
  • Date of arrival in the United States
  • Family members or others who immigrated on the same ship
  • Destination in the United States
  • Occupation, age, and sex of immigrant[TOC]

Ship Passenger Lists About 1891 to 1957

In 1892, Congress passed the first federal law regulating immigration. In 1891, the Superintendent of Immigration was established, which became the Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization in 1906. The Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) records are called Immigration Passenger Lists. The 1891 list consisted of one page of information. Further information was added in following years and the list became two pages in 1906. Information found on these lists includes the following:

  • Ship’s name and date of arrival in America
  • Family members or others who immigrated on the same ship
  • If going to join a relative, the relative’s name, address, and relationship
  • Birthplace, including country and city (added in 1906)
  • Name and address of the immigrant’s nearest relative in the country from which they came (added in 1907)

Look closely for notes marked on the passenger lists. For example, some annotations indicate the passenger was naturalized (possibly leading you to find the naturalization record), other notes indicate they were detained. (Note: The detained passengers—with the reason for the detention and other information—are generally listed on the last sheet of the ship’s manifest.)[TOC]

Available Immigration Passenger Lists

The implementation of the new forms depended on many factors, including who was in charge of the port. Some ports were regulated by federal immigration officials while, for other ports, federal officials contracted the administration to local officers. Usually, any lists created under the authority of the Immigration Bureau are considered Immigration Passenger Lists. The following table identifies these significant ports. Other ports with significant Immigration Passenger Lists on microfilm include Key West, FL, and Providence, RI.

Immigration Passenger Lists in the National Archives
Ports Lists Indexes
Baltimore, MD 1891-1957 1897-1952
Boston, MA 1891-1943 1902-1906, 1906-1920,1903-1945 1899-1940
New Orleans, LA 1897-1948 1900-1952
New York, NY 1883-1945 1897-1902, 1902-1948
Philadelphia, PA 1893-1953, 1954-1957 1883-1948
San Francisco, CA 1890-1957, 1949-1954 1893-1934
Seattle, WA Un-indexed[TOC]

How to Use Ship Passenger Lists

You can use ships’ passenger lists to do the following:

  • Discover when your ancestor arrived in the United States
  • Find out which country your ancestor was from
  • Learn roughly when they were born
  • Find the occupation of your ancestor
  • Uncover family relationships
  • Find evidence of chain migration
  • Perhaps find the name of a county, town, or another place more specific than a country
  • Learn the dividing period of when to focus your research in the United States and when to focus on the country of origin
  • Learn the marital status
  • Learn the place of origin in the “old country.”
  • Find names and addresses of other family members
  • Find clues to initial (perhaps temporary) settling places in the United States
  • Learn of previous stays in the United States (leading to other arrival records)
  • Determine literacy
  • Get a feel for economic status
  • Help reconstruct the immigrant journey and experience
  • Seek clues for motivation of emigration (poverty, possibly avoiding draft in home country)
  • Learn about health problems
  • Learn of family members who may have been turned back or who died before formally entering the United States (at sea or in a hospital)
  • Learn of ancestors born at sea
  •  Discover an ancestor’s physical appearance
  • Learn the birthplace
  • Learn of other places the ancestor may have lived before emigrating
  • Obtain information to lead to emigration records [TOC]

Google Ancestor Ship Passenger Lists

The following are sample search queries you can use to find online databases for passenger lists:

Searching for free state databases

  • “passenger lists” Maine
  • “passenger manifest” Massachusetts
  • “passenger lists OR manifests” “New Jersey”

Searching free online databases

  • “Passenger Lists” site:rootsweb.ancestry.com (RootsWeb)
  • “passenger lists” site:familysearch.org (FamilySearch)
  • “passenger lists” site:libertyellisfoundation.org Ellis Island Website)

Searching subscription databases

  • “passenger lists” site:ancestry.com (Ancestry)
  • “passenger lists” site: myheritage.com (MyHeritage)
  • “passenger lists” site:archives.com (Archives)
  • “passenger lists” site: findmypast.com (FindMyPast)[TOC]

Google Other Ancestor Records

The following is an overview of the common 18 types of ancestor records that I have found constantly valuable in my historical and genealogy research and hundreds of other resources I have learned to research and use through the years. When I mastered researching these resources, I could quickly expand my research to other records to help me connect the pieces of my genealogy puzzle.

Google Ancestor Records
Cemetery Records Census Records Church Records
Civil Vital Records Directory Records Family Histories
Histories and Biographies Land Records Maps
Message Boards, Mailing Lists, and Wiki’s Military Records Naturalization Records
Newspaper Records Photographs Probate Records
Publications and Periodicals Ship Passenger Lists Writings of Ancestors

In my profile of each resource, I have included what you will find, how to use the resource, and research insights for each resource. I would encourage you to use this section as a starting point from which you can search out and find other genealogical tutorials, and guides that help to provide deeper insights.  The common websites that researchers first think of are Ancestry, Archives, FamilySearch, FindMyPast and MyHeritage.

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