Your Ellis Island Ancestors Are Waiting To Be Found

Welcome to a new free service designed to help you and your family uncover valuable clues contained in historic passenger arrival records at Ellis Island. In the four years since ellisisland.org first enabled free online access to passenger arrival records, we have responded to more than a billion queries about immigrant arrivals through the Port of New York. This Search Tips Series is designed to share our experience with you, making it even easier for you to locate the records for each of your immigrant ancestors.

Additional Free Resources Available On Our Web Site:
    • Celebrity Arrivals Through Ellis Island
    • Free Genealogy Charts and Forms
    • A "How To" Guide for Getting Started with Genealogy
    • 2005 Family Heritage Award Recipients Honored at Ellis Island
    • Timeline of Ellis Island History from 1630
    • Advanced Search Tips

   What Can You Expect To Find On An Ellis Island Passenger List?

Ellis Island Passenger Arrival Records are among the most valuable family history documents for tens of millions of Americans tracing their ethnic heritage. For many, these historic documents contain seemingly ordinary facts which now provide invaluable clues about the extraordinary events in the lives of our immigrant ancestors.

Depending upon the year of arrival, information for an individual passenger as recorded on a 'Passenger List' (also called a 'Ship Manifest' or 'Ship List') can contain more than two dozen clues and can lead to significant breakthroughs in your genealogical research. In some cases, a careful review of other passengers recorded on the same manifest can also yield unexpected family discoveries.

In the partial example above, passenger Anna Orsatti is listed on line two aboard the ship Barborossa arriving from Naples on May 4th, 1906.  A closer inspection of this manifest yields her sister Chiarina (age 11) and brother Pietro (age 9).  A notation in the left margin near Anna states 'daughter', therefore introducing us to Anna's mother Teresa De Cesare, traveling with her children to America. Further handwritten detail on the original manifest shows a final destination as Waterbury, CT and notes they will join 'son Giovanni, 24 Phoenix Ave, Waterbury Conn' (not visible on partial image above).

ELLIS ISLAND PASSENGER SEARCH First Name (Optional) Passenger Last Name Gender     Either Male Female Birth Year Year Range   Exact Year + or - 1 year + or - 2 year + or - 3 year + or - 5 year + or - 7 year   (Birth Data is Optional)

Note that the mother (line 1 above) is listed under her maiden name rather than her married name, as was customary for Italian and other European women. If you search for Teresa Orsatti, you would find no passengers by this name are recorded. You might draw incorrect conclusions or may become frustrated, but don't give up. There are many reasons why you may not find a passenger on your first attempt.

Additional Details For This Featured Topic
If you find our featured topic to be of interest, you may also wish to view additional details which are posted on a free, private page on our Web site. This page examines more closely the changes in passenger records over several decades and what data was captured for each passenger.

Registration on our site is completely free, but is required to view these pages and several other advanced features.

This message is #1 in a series designed to provide users of ellisisland.org with tips
for using the Ellis Island Passenger Arrival Index to locate their immigrant ancestors.