Canada Passenger Lists (National Institute)

Establishment of a Canadian Immigration Service
In 1828, the British government instituted a new Passenger Act in order to regulate the conditions on ships bringing immigrants to the new world. An emigration agent was appointed to work at Quebec where by far the vast majority of immigrants were headed. The duties of this office required the agent to:


 * “...receive immigrants on landing, distribute landing money, if available, clothe and feed the indigent, hear complaints, launch proceedings against shipmasters violating passenger vessel laws, direct newcomers to places of employment, help new arrivals to locate their friends, and transship newly arrived immigrants to their destination.” (Knowles 1992, 36)

There was a huge increase in numbers of immigrants in the early 1830s. The numbers decreased around the time of the 1837 Rebellion, but picked up again in the 1840s. In order to encourage emigration to British North America, the British government made passage to Quebec cheaper than that to American ports. The government also at times provided free transportation in barges up the St. Lawrence to poor immigrants who declared their intention to settle in Canada. Most of the immigrants, being English speaking, were headed for Upper Canada, as by this time most if not all the good land in the Maritimes was taken. As the numbers increased, a network of agents operating in other locations was established. These agents continued to report to the chief agent at Quebec. The cost was borne by the British government until 1854 at which time the responsibilities were assumed by the government of the Province of Canada.

Immigration/emigration agents during the nineteenth century were of two types. Land companies often hired agents to recruit those willing to move to British North America and sometimes to assist them in settling on their land once they had arrived. Land company agents worked in locations on both sides of the ocean. We’ve also seen that sometimes their tactics were less than professional and in some cases unscrupulous. The other types of agents were the ones who were actual government employees. These agents like the private ones were stationed both in British North America and abroad.

As we discuss arrivals in this module, you will see the private emigration agent disappear as land companies ceased to operate and the role of the government immigration agent evolve from one of encouragement and assistance in the early days, to one of determining admissibility of immigrants in the 20th century. We will also see the development of Emigrant Societies in some of the larger cities—these were usually organizations comprised of well meaning citizens who volunteered their time and solicited money from the well-to-do to assist those in need.

Ocean Ports
As we have discussed in earlier modules, major points of arrival in the 18th and 19th centuries included Halifax, Saint John, Pictou and Quebec. Records for these arrivals are sporadic as there was no requirement for the keeping of passenger lists. It is important to remember that some Canadian ports were ice bound in the winter so the shipping season usually ran from spring to late fall. If you think your ancestor arrived during winter, he or she could have been on a ship bound for one of the American ports. It was not uncommon for immigrants to arrive in the U.S. and travel overland to Canada. Although American immigration is not the subject of this course it would be a great omission not to mention two very helpful research sites: Castle Garden and Ellis Island, both of which have searchable online indexes.

Castle Garden
From the Castle Garden website

Castle Garden is now known as Castle Clinton National Monument, and is the major landmark within a 23 acre waterfront park at the tip of Manhattan called The Battery. From 1855 to 1890, the Castle was America’s first official immigration centre, a pioneering collaboration of New York State and New York City. The website has a search engine which allows free access to a database containing information on over 11 million immigrants who entered the U.S. through this location between 1820 and 1892.

Rick Roberts of globalgenealogy.com has written an article on Castle Garden which can be viewed at the Global Gazette (Canada's Online Family History Magazine).

Castle Garden Exercise

Search the Castle Garden website for any John Pullman entries.


 * What do you find?
 * Examine the matches for more details.
 * Can you eliminate any of the ‘hits’? On what basis?
 * Are there any that could be the missing John Pullman, son of John and Ann?
 * Why or why not?
 * What other research could you do?

For answers, see Answers to Castle Garden Exercise.

Ellis Island
After the close of Castle Garden in 1892 and up until 1954, more than 12 million immigrants entered the U.S. through Ellis Island, a small island in the New York Harbour just off the New Jersey coast. You can read more about it at the Ellis Island site.

The Ellis Island site contains a free search engine which you can use to search the index of passenger arrival records. In order to view the actual record, you must register (it’s free) and create a password.

Pier 21
From 1928 to 1971, over a million immigrants, wartime evacuees, refugees, troops, war brides and their children came to Canada through Pier 21 in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Pier 21 has been transformed into a National Historic Site, an incredibly moving tribute to the immigration experience. Interactive displays, virtual projections, interesting photographs and articles contemporary to the immigrant’s experience are all available for viewing in a very realistic environment.

The following figures taken from the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 website indicate the numbers of people who passed through this facility during its 43 years of operation:


 * 1 million immigrants
 * 100,000 displaced persons and refugees
 * 50,000 war brides and their 22,000 children
 * 3,000 British evacuee children, escaping the ravages of war at home
 * 494,000 Canadian troops bound for Europe during World War II

Part of Canada’s past and what continues to shape our future began at Pier 21. You will find photographs and the names of passengers and ships. If you have a chance to visit, you will see actual passports, immigration papers and other articles that illustrate the immigrant’s experiences of coming to a new land. The website contains a great deal of information plus links to other sites on immigration. Unfortunately, most of the records are still unavailable to the general public due to privacy restrictions.

Grosse Île
After the end of the Napoleonic Wars more and more immigrants began arriving in North America. One of the most popular destinations was Quebec City because that was where the timber ships were headed. Timber merchants jumped at the opportunity to fill their empty ships with passengers on the westerly Atlantic crossings.


 * “Shipmasters eagerly converted their hulls outgoing from the British Isles into a semblance of passenger carriers and took on board anyone willing to pay for a trip to America. Thus was born the “emigrant trade” which characterized a great part of the nineteenth century shipping between the British Isles and Quebec. This “paying ballast” walked on board, and without too much trouble on the part of the masters, might walk off at Quebec.” (O’Gallagher 2001, 17)

The Quebec Emigrant Society was founded in 1818 to provide assistance to the large numbers of newcomers who were arriving every summer. The society offered shelter and food as well as assistance with passage up the river towards Montreal and places further west. The Marine and Emigrant Hospital was established to supplement the care provided by two other hospitals in Quebec City. In addition, temporary clinics were set up in the summertime near the piers in order to respond to any immediate medical needs of arrivals. All of this was the start of an infrastructure that would be hard pressed to respond to what was to come.

In 1826 there was an outbreak of Asiatic cholera in India. By 1831 it had progressed as far as Moscow. It quickly spread across Europe and by the end of that year had arrived in Britain. Consider that ships leaving the British Isles were crowded—usually carrying between one hundred and two hundred adults plus children; that most ships’ masters were more concerned about fares than the comfort or health of their passengers; and that voyages could last anywhere from 36 to 80 days. This was a fine recipe for the transmission of contagious diseases.

News of the arrival of the disease in Great Britain traveled across the Atlantic and attempts began to prevent the entry of the epidemic into North America. The search began for a station which would provide for the inspection of ships before they landed at Quebec—a place where cholera victims could be quarantined in order to keep the disease out of the colony. Grosse Île was chosen because it was located in the St. Lawrence River below Quebec and because it was positioned in the middle of the channels through which the ships traveled.

None of the doctors working at Grosse Île had ever seen a cholera victim and the first deaths from cholera actually occurred at Quebec City, not at Grosse Île. There continues to be debate about which ship actually carried the disease, but once it had arrived it spread with a vengeance.


 * “So sudden and so great was the onslaught of the disease that the island was soon overcrowded with the sick, dying and dead. And the ships in their summer procession kept on coming. Despairingly the authorities gave up their attempts to stop every ship at Grosse Île and, with a minimum of inspection and segregation, permitted all but Irish ships to proceed up-river.” (O’Gallagher 2001, 25)

As the immigrants moved up the river, so went the disease. By the end of September 1832, newspapers reported that over 3,000 had been buried at Quebec. After that terrible outbreak of 1832, 1833 was much less eventful but there was cholera again in 1834. Immigration to Canada dropped off somewhat around the time of the 1837 Rebellion but picked up again in the 1840s. In 1842, Sir Charles Bagot, Governor General of British North America announced that there would be lots of work for unskilled labourers in the coming summer and agents in Britain began advertising for immigrants. Over 44,000 people sailed to Canada in 1844—many of them expecting to find work building canals. As it turned out, there was far less work available than advertised. Many of those who came went on to the U.S. and some eventually returned home.

The United States had doubled the cost of passage to American ports and was confiscating overloaded immigrant ships. The failure of the potato crop in Ireland “upset the delicate (and miserable) economy of an agricultural people reduced to eating one staple, potatoes, while they paid to an absentee landlord the rent from the proceeds of the only other staple, wheat.” (O’Gallagher 2001, 47) And so the influx began again.

The Quebec Emigrant Society began to prepare for large numbers of immigrant arrivals. However their preparations were based on experiences from previous years in the early 1840s where the yearly average of sick was around 200. They were not prepared for a typhus outbreak. It’s referred to as ‘Black ‘47’—the disease spread all along the St. Lawrence and as far as Kingston and Toronto. By the time the epidemic was over, approximately 30,000 people had died. On May 23, 1847 the doctors at Grosse Île reported 520 sick individuals in the hospital and were seeing about 40 to 50 deaths a day. Many children who survived were left orphaned. Some were adopted by French Canadian families, but many others spent their childhood in orphanages.

Records exist from “La Societe Charitable des Dames Catholiques de Quebec”. They ran schools and orphanages in Quebec City. In 1847 and 1848 someone from the Richelieu Street Orphanage “recorded with meticulousness all the information possible concerning 619 orphans in their care.” (O’Gallagher 2001, 56) This list has been transcribed and included in the appendix of Gallagher’s book Grosse Île, Gateway to Canada 1832-1937. The list was preserved by the Grey Nuns and annotated as those children were adopted, ordained or got married. O’Gallagher includes examples of several other records in her book pertaining to the events of 1847 including deaths, letters and names of vessels boarded.

While immigration continued every summer, Grosse Île came to be used only in emergencies, and many ships were allowed to bypass the island altogether. Later epidemics such as Asiatic cholera in 1866, typhus in 1868, yellow fever in 1889, cholera in 1892, bubonic plague in 1902 and smallpox in 1912 were all prevented from reaching epidemic proportions in Canada through quarantine operations.

Grosse Île is now a National Historic Site.

Library and Archives Canada has a searchable database of immigrants who passed through Grosse Île between 1832 and 1937.

Quebec Mercury Newspaper
The Quebec Mercury newspaper published ship arrivals at Quebec as well as information about the Quebec Emigrant Society and deaths at Grosse Île. The example articles have been chosen to demonstrate the type of information that can be gleaned from newspapers.

Sample Articles from Quebec Mercury

Arrivals at Grosse Isle since Saturday Last. Quebec Mercury, Sat., 3 Aug 1847, Page 3, Column 2, Library and Archives Canada microfilm N-36605.



State of Affairs at Grosse Isle. Quebec Mercury, Tues., 29 June 1847, Page 2, Column 3, Library and Archives Canada microfilm N-36605.



Emigrant Society Member. Quebec Mercury, Tues., 29 June 1847, Page 2, Column 4, Shipping Intelligence, Library and Archives Canada microfilm N-36605.



Other Quarantine Stations
Dr. F. Montizambert, General Superintendent of Canadian Quarantines, reports on the government’s Quarantine Service in the Handbook of Canada 1897. At that time quarantine service came under the control of the Minister of Agriculture. In 1897 the ‘official’ quarantine stations of Canada were:

On the Atlantic Coast

 * a. Grosse Île and substations
 * b. Halifax
 * c. Saint John, NB
 * d. Sydney, Cape Breton
 * e. Pictou
 * f. Hawkesbury
 * g. Chatham, NB
 * h. Charlottetown

On the Pacific Coast

 * a. William Head, BC
 * b. Vancouver

He reported that all other ports were “unorganized Maritime Quarantine Stations” and every inland port was to be considered an “unorganized Inland Quarantine Station”.

No persons were allowed to disembark from any vessel until it had been declared free from disease by a quarantine officer. The officer also had to ensure that the landing of any ship would not cause a danger to public health.

Dave Obee in his book, Destination Canada: A guide to 20th century immigration records, includes a list entitled “Deaths of Arrivals at William Head Quarantine Station 1897-1958” (p. 20).

Canadian Passenger Lists can be Divided into Three Groups:

 * Prior to 1865
 * 1865-1935, and
 * 1936 onwards

Prior to 1865
From 1803 the British government required a ship’s captain to list all passengers at point of departure. In 1817 it became a requirement to also list passengers at the disembarkation port, but unfortunately these records seem not to have been preserved in any official capacity. Some of these earlier records have survived. However the chances of finding some kind of list are much greater if your ancestor was part of an organized party of immigrants. In that case you should check the appropriate provincial archives to see what types of records they hold. Also many of the provincial genealogical societies have published transcriptions of records pertaining to local immigration.

As was mentioned earlier, many immigrants to Canada came through U.S. ports: New York, Baltimore, Philadelphia and Boston being the most common, but don’t rule out smaller ports such as Hartford, Bangor and Kennebunk.


 * Some arrivals were recorded in newspapers in Halifax, Quebec City, Montreal and other port cities, but generally speaking, any names mentioned were those of cabin passengers, while those travelling steerage—as most did—were dismissed with the words, “there were also 385 immigrants in steerage (Baxter 1999, 56)

Some Passenger Lists exist for the period of the French regime and are held by LAC (MG 1 F5B). From the time of the British victory over France in 1763 until 1865, almost every ship arriving at a Canadian port came from Great Britain. This does not mean that all immigrants during this period were of British extraction, but that the majority of immigrants from other countries would have travelled from their homelands first to Britain and then to Canada.

As you can see from the passenger list for The Ann, some early lists provide very little genealogical information.



List of Loyalists Aboard “The Ann”, 1792. Library and Archives Canada. RG 19, Vol. 4447, file folder 16.

Passenger and Immigration Lists Index
One useful source to consult is Filby and Meyer’s Passenger and Immigration Lists Index. Originally published in three volumes alphabetically by surname of passenger, supplementary volumes continue to be added annually. Keep in mind that the information in these books is from lists already published. This is a collection on Ancestry.com called U.S. and Canada, Passenger and Immigration Lists Index, 1500s-1900s. The information is also available on CD-ROM.

Newspapers
The Quebec Gazette newspaper has been indexed from 1764-1825 and is available on microfilm from Library and Archives Canada. Editions of the Quebec Mercury, although not indexed are also available on microfilm from LAC. A complete list of LAC newspaper holdings, sorted by province is available.

1865-1935
This time period is discussed in three separate sections in order to address the different ways in which information was collected.

1865-1918 The recording of immigrants did not begin officially until 1865 for Quebec and 1881 for Halifax, which were the two main ports of entry between 1865 and 1900. In most cases to search these records you need to know date and port of arrival.

As of 1865, federal immigration authorities provided preprinted forms to shipping companies. Information on passengers was to be filled in by the ship’s purser, before they disembarked. Passenger lists exist for the official ports of Quebec City and Halifax (see details below). Some other ports became official later on: Saint John, N.B. in 1900, Victoria and Vancouver in 1905, North Sydney, N.S. in 1906 and Montreal in 1919. There are no records for arrivals at ‘unofficial’ ports.

The Jewish Genealogical Society (Toronto) has created an index of the Rotenberg Ledger and placed it online. The ledger provides passenger information on people (mostly of Jewish origin) travelling between Europe and Toronto during the years 1911-1917. Information may include passengers’ names, ages of children, points of embarkation and debarkation, Toronto address etc.

Other good news is that Library and Archives Canada (LAC) and Ancestry.ca entered into a partnership to index Canadian passenger lists encompassing the years 1865-1935. The index became available to Ancestry.ca subscribers in September 2008 and provides links to the actual images held by LAC.

This is a great research tool which no doubt will help many genealogists finally locate the arrival records of their ancestors. However, remember, a transcription is only as good as the quality of the microfilm and the skill of the transcribers. Just because you don’t find it in the index doesn’t mean it’s not there. Don’t forget to search alternate spellings.

Compare the information contained in the following “Bavarian” passenger list with that of the Ann.

1919-1924
The records for this time period are different. Rather than lists of everyone travelling on a given sailing, each passenger (including children) required a separate form, called a Form 30A. However, in the earlier version of Form 30A used in 1919, the names of accompanying dependents were usually included with the head-of-household, not on separate forms. Those heading to the United States were not required to complete the form. Be aware that there is some overlap between 1919 and 1922 in the use of the Form 30A and the previous passenger lists. “Officially, the individual manifests were in use from June 1, 1921 to Dec. 31, 1924 ...” (Obee 2004, 10). These forms were microfilmed in quasi-alphabetical order, reverse side of the form first.

Examine the Form 30A for Barbora Butkute. What genealogical information can you find in this record?

“Bavarian” Passenger List

“Bavarian” Passenger List. Date of Sailing 21/9/05. Library and Archives of Canada. Part of first page. Microfilm T-485.



 Form 30A

Barbora Butkute. Front of Form 30A, SS Cleveland, 1924. Library and Archives Canada. Microfilm T-14978.



Barbora Butkute. Back of Form 30A, SS Cleveland, 1924. Library and Archives Canada. Microfilm T-14978.



1925-1935
In 1925, the Department of Immigration and Colonization reverted to the passenger list format, but the newer manifests contained even more information than those up to 1919. These lists have also been indexed and are available on the LAC website.

The indexes contain basic information such as name of immigrant, port of arrival, age, country of origin and the page and film number for the actual passenger list. If you find your ancestor on the index, it is important to consult the actual film as much more information is available from the passenger manifest. Library and Archives Canada has information on their website regarding inter library loans. However—a word of caution: there are some inconsistencies in the transcribed database. If you don’t find your ancestor in the database, the name may just have been missed. Transcribed databases can contain errors or omissions.

Here’s an example of what you can find:

From the index page, select the search option, enter the name Malcolm McGregor and click on Search.

From the returns, click on the name of the one who is 36 years of age.

Information provided:

Surname: McGregor Given name: Malcolm Age: 36 Sex: M Nationality: Sco Date of arrival: 1926/06/27 (YYYY/MM/DD) Port of arrival: Quebec, Quebec Ship: AURANIA, Cunard Reference: RG76 - IMMIGRATION, series C-1-a Volume: 1926 volume 8 Page: 23 Microfilm reel: T-14723

Next, it is important to view the actual microfilm if you can. Note the additional information found from consulting the full record:

Name: Malcolm McGregor Occupation: Miner Going to friend: Mr. Robert McMillan, Ste Annes de Bellevue, Quebec Nearest relative in country he came from: Mrs. Letitia McGregor (wife), 53 Robertson Place, Kilmarnock Money in possession: 5 pounds Birthplace: Hurlford, Scotland By relying solely on the online index, you may miss important information on your ancestor.

After 1935
From the LAC website:


 * “Records of immigrants arriving at Canadian land and seaports from January 1, 1936 onwards remain in the custody of Citizenship and Immigration Canada. To request a copy of another person’s immigration record, you must mail your request to the under-noted office:”

Citizenship and Immigration Canada Public Rights Administration 360 Laurier Avenue West,10th Floor Ottawa, ON K1A 1L1

Note that you must complete an Access to Information Request form and pay a fee of $5.00. The form is available through a link at the above noted site.

Sound confusing? Use the following ‘Tip Sheet’ to keep it all straight:

Library and Archives Canada
LAC holds passenger lists as follows:


 * Quebec City and Montreal (Quebec), 1865-1935
 * Halifax (Nova Scotia), 1881-1935
 * Saint John (New Brunswick), 1900-1935; North Sydney (Nova Scotia), :1906-1935 (these include mostly ferry arrivals from Newfoundland and St-Pierre-et-Miquelon, with a few passengers in transit from other countries)
 * Vancouver (British Columbia), 1905-1935;
 * Victoria (British Columbia), 1905-1935;
 * Via New York, 1906-1931; and other eastern United States ports, 1905-1928 (these lists include only the names of passengers who stated that they intended to proceed directly to Canada).

Use the following finding aid to determine the microfilm you need Libraries and Archives Canada

Additionally, there are the following finding aids available:


 * an index for Quebec City Passenger Lists Index (1865-1900)
 * an index for Halifax arrivals (Jan. 1881-Feb. 1882) - LAC Microfilm C-15712

Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia Archives and Records Management (NSARM) includes records relating to black immigration and settlement in Nova Scotia from 1783 to 1839 (Inventory no. 345). It also holds some records of arrivals from Great Britain and the Netherlands from 1749. There are 10 reels of microfilm for ships arriving at Halifax from 1881-1900. In his bookGenealogical Research in Nova Scotia, Terrence Punch includes the names of ships for which NSARM has passenger lists. (pp. 99-100)

About these records he states the following:


 * “The surviving passenger lists come from many sources, including some original lists, contemporary and later copies of original lists, and secondary sources.” (p.98)

Newfoundland
There is no indication of surviving official passenger lists for ports in Newfoundland. However, “newspapers from small communities would often list vessels arriving and departing along the coastline, mentioning passengers by name.” (Punch, Atlantic Canada p. 55)

The Newfoundland's Grand Banks website provides information on ships to and from Newfoundland ports.

Also worth mentioning is The Maritime History Archive located at Memorial University at St. John’s, Newfoundland which collects and preserves documents related to the history of sea related activities in the north Atlantic.


 * “A major focus of the Archive’s holdings are records relating to the fishery, trade and settlement of Newfoundland. Some of these records are of particular interest to people researching Newfoundland families.”

Records collected include photographs, maps, parish records, surname indexes, shipping records and student research papers.


 * Maritime History Archive Memorial University of Newfoundland St. John’s, NL A1C 5S7 Telephone: 709-864-8428 Email: mha@mun.ca

New Brunswick
The Provincial Archives of New Brunswick hold the Custom House Records on microfilm. These include passenger lists and manifests of ships that arrived at the Port of Saint John in 1833, 1834, 1837 and 1838.

The Archives has an online searchable database for [http://archives.gnb.ca/Irish/Databases/PassengerLists/?culture=en-CA. Port Returns] (including passenger lists) for the years 1816-1838:

The Custom House Records have also been transcribed and published inPassengers to New Brunswick: The Custom House Records by Daniel Johnson, Peter M. Toner and Kenneth Kanner.

Angus Baxter notes that the majority of passenger lists were lost when the Customs House was destroyed by fire in 1877. However, passenger lists for ships of the J.J. Cooke line of Liverpool, England bound for Saint John have been published inIrish Passenger Lists 1847-1871 by Brian Mitchell.

Prince Edward Island
A few early passenger lists have survived and have been published in volumes ofThe Island Magazine, published by the Prince Edward Island Heritage Foundation. They have also been indexed and added to the Master Name Index.

In addition, editions of early newspapers 1790-1809 and 1819-1827 have been checked for first class passengers, indexed and published inThe Island Magazine. Keep in mind that the records are not complete—not all editions of the newspapers survived, some custom house records are missing, and names of passengers in steerage were not recorded.


 * “It is said that ages of children given on passenger lists may not be reliable, having been sometimes stated as less than they actually were as a means of getting cheaper passage if the child was rather small for his or her age, or even exaggerated to get a larger allowance of food.” (Punch 1997, 127)

British Columbia
The British Columbia Archives holds copies of records from Library and Archives Canada (RG 76, Series 1) pertaining to western immigration. Consult their webpage for further information.

Other Sources for Passenger Lists
LAC holds a card index called Immigrants Before 1865, formerly Miscellaneous Immigration Index, pertaining mainly to British immigrants who came to Quebec and Ontario between 1801 and 1849.

The Ships' List has been online since 1999 and holds a wealth of information on passenger lists and other immigration details including “immigration reports, newspaper records, shipwreck information, ship pictures, ship descriptions and shipping-line fleet lists”.

One interesting group of records is the St. Lawrence Steamboat Company Passenger Records. Many of our ancestors arriving at that time would have travelled from the port of Quebec to Montreal by steamboat. While other companies also existed, it seems that this is the only company for which some records have survived. The passenger records cover the years 1819-1836. The originals are at the McGill University Archives (McCord Museum and McLennan Library), but LAC has copies on microfilms M 8272-M 8287. The Ships’ List has begun transcribing them and so far has put passenger lists transcriptions online covering the years 1819-1828.

The Immigrant Ships Transcribers Guild is a group of volunteers who presently (2007) have transcribed over 12,000 manifests and made them available online for free.

Olive Tree Genealogy also has a number of transcribed ships lists plus links to other useful websites

In addition to the above, Olive Tree has added transcriptions of the JJ Cooke Shipping Line Records of Irish passengers sailing from Ireland to Quebec, Saint John New Brunswick, Philadelphia Pennsylvania and New Orleans Louisiana between 1847 and 1858. The index to the online JJ Cooke ships.

The British Isles Family History Society of Greater Ottawa (BIFHSGO) has published The Lanark Society Settlers by Gerald J. Neville which includes Ships’ Lists of the Glasgow Emigration Society 1821 and a personal name index.

Sometimes lists survive that were created at the point of embarkation. In some cases these were published in local newspapers. The Old Mersey Times website contains pages on emigration and transcriptions of lists of passengers on ships arriving at and departing from Liverpool, England.

Consider joining a mailing list. The Ships List Mailing List is described at this website and includes instructions on how to join.

Arrivals from Other Parts of North America
Travels back and forth across the Canadian-U.S. border have been going on since long before there was an actual border. In fact, the Native Americans’ hunting grounds and trade routes included territory in both countries. Even once the two countries were developing, the dividing line was not one they recognized.

This was the time also when those loyal to the British crown moved from the Thirteen Colonies into British controlled territory. The most common routes were from New York City to Halifax, through the 13 Colonies up towards Montreal via the Eastern Townships of Quebec and through western New York to the Niagara River. As mentioned in the section on the Loyalists, many Blacks came as well.

The following is an account of the route from Quebec into south-western Upper Canada in 1819:


 * “Emigrants intending to proceed to Upper Canada, take their departure from Montreal to La Chine, a distance of 9 miles: from thence they go to Prescot in boats, 111 miles: from thence there is a steam-boat to Kingston, where there are other steam-boats proceeding to York, the capital and seat of government for the Upper Province. After landing passengers, the boat proceeds to Queenstown, on the Niagara frontier. Between Queenstown and Lake Erie, there is a portage of 18 miles.” (Lamond 1978, 109)

The Underground Railroad
In 1793 an act was passed in Upper Canada to prevent the introduction of slaves into the province. It was the first British possession to legislate against slavery. After the turn of the century some 30-40,000 fugitives from the slave system made their way north via the Underground Railroad. The Underground Railroad was not about trains, rather it was “an extensive network of up to 3,000 dedicated men and women who used railroad terminology to disguise their liberation efforts.” (Riendeau 1984, 10)

The influx of former slaves along with the many Black Loyalist settlers stimulated the growth of Black communities particularly in Essex and Kent Counties of Ontario. Amherstburg in Essex County was regarded as the principal terminal of the Underground Railroad because of its location at the narrowest part of the Detroit River. Other terminals included Windsor and St. Catharines. The largest centre of Black population in Ontario was Chatham in Kent County. While some Blacks returned to the United States after the Civil War ended, many more who had established roots in the area decided to stay.


 * “Moving to Canada via the Underground Railroad was a traumatic experience for the Black refugees and certainly a stern test of their courage and determination. They had to endure the sorrow of leaving friends and relatives behind, the danger of night-time escapes through swamps and forests, and the uncertainty of having to start a new life with no worldly possessions in a distant and unknown land.” (Riendeau 1984, 11)

Because this was a secret network it’s easy to understand why few records exist. There were no free land grants awaiting these fugitives. Assistance to fugitive slaves was voluntary and secret—assistance was offered through word of mouth and not administered through detailed record keeping. Some former slaves later wrote accounts of their experiences and two newspapers were established in Ontario that served the Black communities:


 * Voice of the Fugitive, established in Sandwich in 1851
 * Provincial Freeman, established in Windsor in 1853

Library and Archives Canada has microfilm copies of issues of Voice of the Fugitive from the years 1851-1852. Two small articles from the newspaper are included to give you a sense of the type of information you might find.

Voice of the Fugitive Articles

Just From Slavery. Voice of the Fugitive. 12 Feb 1851, Page 2, Column 2, Library and Archives Canada. Microfilm N-9538.



Slavery in Michigan. Voice of the Fugitive. 1 Jan 1851 Page 3, Column 1, Library and Archives Canada. Microfilm N-9538

You can learn more about the Underground Railroad at the AfriGeneas website which includes many other links.

The Olive Tree Genealogy website contains information on blacks in Ontario. After accessing the page at the following link, click on “Blacks in Ontario”:

The following articles and books are also recommended:

A Proud Past, a Promising Future: Ontario Black History Society by Grace Lawrence in OGS Seminar Annual 1987.

The Black Image in Nineteenth-Century Ontario by Allan P. Stouffer in Ontario History, vol. 76 (1984).

Upper Canada’s Black Defenders by Ernest Green in Ontario History, vol. 27 (1931).

The Search for Mary Bibb, Black Woman Teacher in Nineteenth-Century Canada West by Afua Cooper in Ontario History, vol. 83 (1991).

The Blacks in Canada: A History by Robin Winks.

An Enduring Heritage: Black Contributions to Early Ontario by Roger Riendeau.

Border Crossings and Immigration Policy
As both the U.S. and Canada expanded westward, movement across the border increased. Canadian settlers migrating west often selected the easier American route, crossing back into Canada at points west of the Great Lakes. The Canadian government in the late 1800s was actively recruiting American farmers to move north. Chinese immigrants heading to Canada during the gold rush and later to work on railway construction often came by land and sea from cities along the American west coast.

No records were kept of early cross border travel. Even in 1900 “most Americans and other people could and did cross the border without anybody paying the slightest attention.” (Bothwell et al. 1987, 59)

Remember that at this time there was no such thing as Canadian citizenship. The Statistical Year Book of Canada for 1890 states that it is impossible to report on numbers related to cross border travel:


 * “While there is such a long line of open frontier there must always be a considerable movement of population on both sides, of which it is impossible to obtain any record... The greatest care is taken by the Department, and by the agents, that all the returns shall be as accurate as possible, but the only ones that can be thoroughly relied on ... are those of arrivals at the principal sea ports, as Quebec and Halifax, which are also a registration by names and callings, from the ships’ passenger lists. No distinction is made in British Columbia between passengers and immigrants and the figures for that province can only be arrived at by estimation.” (p. 87)

Cross border travel was becoming a concern in the early 1900s. When Clifford Sifton became Minister of the Interior in 1886 there were no controls over people who came to Canada by rail, land or inland waterways. Many immigrants who arrived at American ports made their way overland to Canada. Movement in the other direction occurred as well, for many who arrived at the port of Quebec were simply ‘in transit’ to the United States. Many Canadian-born individuals and families were also moving south of the border.


 * “In those days before quotas, visas, ‘landed immigrant status’, and SIN numbers, no one knew just how many immigrants there were.” (Bothwell et al. 1987, 59)

Politicians were beginning to look at ‘net migration’—immigration minus migration. There were concerns expressed in the Maritime provinces that overall population was just holding its own, if not actually decreasing. New arrivals were not coming in sufficient numbers to offset those leaving. At the same time, British Columbia was facing a different issue. Leaders and residents there were vocalizing concerns about the number of Asians (mostly Chinese and Japanese) entering the province via CPR steamships or across the Canadian-American border. In 1901, 20,000 of the 22,000 Asian residents in Canada lived in B.C.; by 1911 over ¾ of the total Asian population of 40,000 had settled there.

Throughout the first decade of the 20th century, provincial legislators in B.C. attempted to enact legislation to control the influx of Asians. These attempts were always disallowed by the federal government. The fear of British Columbians was that without some type of control the province would soon have an Asian majority.

So with all of this movement back and forth, no one had a good understanding of the cross border migrations. A new Immigration Act in 1906 established some control along the American border. Immigrants were now required to come by direct continuous journey from their homeland. However, this requirement did not apply to Americans or those from the British Isles. The Act also included:


 * “... new provision for the deportation of immigrants who might become criminals, public charges, or infirm; new rules for the exclusion of the same groups, as well as prostitutes and procurers; and means by which the government could fix a necessary minimum ‘landing money’ and make other regulations as well. In 1907, consequently, there were regulations to exclude certain subsidized immigrants and to require from $25 to $50 in landing money, except from agricultural workers, domestic servants, and immigrants who were coming to join close relatives.” (Bothwell et al. 1987, 56-57)

While the government was able to practically shutdown Chinese immigration with the regularly increasing head tax, it was not so simple to control Japanese entry. Because of the alliance between Britain and Japan, the Canadian government could not take independent action. Indeed the Anglo-Japanese Treaty allowed for free movement of nationals between the two countries. If Canada wanted a different approach it would have to be achieved through diplomatic negotiations. In 1907 an agreement was reached with the Japanese government. “... in an early form of ‘voluntary quotas’, the Japanese government would allow no more than 400 migrants to go from Japan to Canada each year’’. (Bothwell et al. 1987, 57) The ‘direct voyage’ regulation further closed the door for Asians as they could no longer use Honolulu as a transfer point.

1908-1918
Starting in 1908 and up to 1918 almost 200 border ports of entry were established in Canada with the purpose of inspecting and recording arriving immigrants. Do not be confused by the word ‘port’—these included “inland crossing points as well as ferry ports and ship landings on lake and coastal areas” (Merriman 1996, 143). The records (RG76, Series C5a) at Library and Archives Canada are arranged by port and then date of entry into Canada. Unfortunately this often means a long and tedious search. There are no nominal indexes and you will have to figure out where your ancestor entered Canada and in which year.

Brenda Merriman in her book,Genealogy in Ontario: Searching the Records, includes a list of border ports in Ontario between 1908 and 1918 as well as the associated Library and Archives Canada microfilm numbers.

Destination Canada: A guide to 20th century immigration records, by Dave Obee includes lists of border entry records by province. For each port in that province, he identifies the appropriate LAC microfilm number. Obee’s newest book Destination Canada: A Genealogical Guide to Immigration Records has recently been published.

Border entry film numbers are also available at the LAC page.

Border Entry Documents
Border Entries at Emerson, 11 July 1913. Page 5 of 6. Library and Archives Canada. Microfilm T-5478.



1919-1924
Individual forms, called ‘Form 30s’ recorded immigrants entering Canada from or via the United States. Some forms from later years are also included in the series. These forms replaced the large sheet border entry forms previously used. This form was discontinued after January 1, 1925 although some later dated forms do exist. The following information is usually contained in a Form 30:


 * Port and date of entry
 * Name
 * Date
 * Age
 * Occupation
 * Birthplace
 * Race
 * Citizenship
 * Religion
 * Last permanent address
 * Destination

When consulting these forms, it is important to remember that they were filmed in reverse order—the backside of the form first and then the front side. Also they were microfilmed in quasi-alphabetical order. From the LAC website:


 * “For each letter of the alphabet, surnames are arranged in groupings based on the initial letters of each name. For example, surnames starting with Ada, Adc and Add are grouped together starting with given names beginning with A. Such a grouping could include the following arrangement of forms: Anne Adair, Benjamin Adcock, Christopher Addison, David Adair, etc.”

If you plan on consulting these forms LAC suggests you print a copy of the instruction page.

LAC microfilm numbers for Form 30s run from T-15429 to T-15344. The finding aid for the films is online.

Examine the Form 30 for Elizabeth COLLIE. What genealogical connections can you make from the information provided?



1925-1935
The use of border lists was reinstated in 1925. For each month the records for all ports are filed together. These records contain the following additional details:


 * Immigrant’s place of birth
 * name and address of the relative, friend or employer to whom they were destined
 * name and address of the nearest relative in the country they came from

The finding aid for the microfilm reels for 1925-1935 border entries is available at the LAC webpage.

LAC has a series of old nominal indexes for the 1925 to 1935 records. Since the indexes include post-1935 entries, which are closed under the Privacy Act, the public cannot consult them. However, in cooperation with the Library and Archives Canada, the Pier 21 Society in Halifax, Nova Scotia, has input the information from the passenger list indexes into a database, called Passenger Lists and Border Entries, 1925-1935. Also included are border entries for individuals whose surname starts with the letter C.

Consult the LAC page for information on records after 1935.

Here’s a ‘Tip Sheet’ to help keep it all straight:

Crossing into the U.S. — “St Albans Lists”
Over the years there were periods of time when the price of passage to Canadian ports was cheaper than that to the United States. When the American government began to impose stricter immigration rules at its own ports, it became more attractive for some immigrants planning on settling in the U.S. to come to Canada and make their way overland to the States. By the 1890s even some of the steamship companies were suggesting to immigrants that travel to the United States via Canada was a viable option for those wanting to avoid U.S. inspectors. This evasion forced the U.S. to forge an agreement with Canadian railroads and steamship lines under which they would treat all U.S. bound passengers as if they would be landing at a U.S. port of entry. The U.S. Immigration Service stationed immigration inspectors at Canadian seaports and at northern land border entry points.


 * “At land border ports, inspectors also prepared another manifest (Form 1 - Canada) Similar to a ship passenger manifest, the form was titled: “List or Manifest of Alien Passengers Applying for Admission to the United States from Foreign Contiguous Territory”. This border port manifest often relates to immigrants who had been in Canada for months or years and applied for admission to the United States at a land border port. Before October 1, 1906, the records include only those immigrants born outside of Canada. Beginning on that date the records include Canadian-born immigrants.” (Smith 2000, 1)

The United States kept records of those crossing into that country. Although collectively these records are known as “St. Albans Border Crossings” this is misleading as they contain many other ports of entry. St. Albans was in Vermont and both Canadian and American immigration offices were established there. The original records are held at the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in Washington D.C. These lists can also be ordered through your local FamilySearch Centre.

FH Library Listing: St. Albans District manifest records of aliens arriving from foreign contiguous territory: records of arrivals through small ports in Vermont, 1895-1924


 * On 6 reels of microfilm, starting with

Consult the Family History Library for more details. Do a place search for Vermont, and then select Emigration and Immigration from the list. Select the St Albans title and the select “view film notes” for the film details.

Those with ancestors who passed through Canada on their way to the United States in the late 19th or early 20th century would be advised to read Marian Smith’s online article titled, By Way of Canada: U.S. Records of Immigration Across the U.S.-Canadian Border, 1895-1954 (St. Alban’s Lists).

Library and Archives Canada does not hold records on crossings into the U.S.

British Columbia
A new addition by Library and Archives Canada is Immigrants from China, General Registers of Chinese Immigration covering the years 1885-1949. This is a name searchable index, giving name, age, date of registration, and reference to volume and microfilm of the General Registers of Chinese Immigration.

Ontario
There are also some provincial records for Ontario when there was an Immigration Branch under the Department of Agriculture.


 * “There are some Arrival Destination registers with nominal lists from their field agencies at Kingston 1862-1878, Quebec 1872-1875 and Montreal 1878. (AO, RG11, Series M, Vol. 2; mfm MS 847 reel 6 and 7). (Merriman 1996, 142)

Recommended reading: Province of Ontario Immigration Records, An Overview, by Fawne Stratford-Devai.

The Toronto Emigrant Office
The first emigrant office in Upper Canada was opened in 1833 in Toronto, headed by A. B. Hawke. Mr. Hawke, as Chief Emigrant Agent for Upper Canada/Canada West from 1833 to 1864, was instrumental in establishing services to assist immigrants in Upper Canada. It is not totally clear which communities other than Toronto, Kingston, and Hamilton had proper “offices” as such, but Hawke received reports from agents in Ottawa, Port Hope, Peterborough, Cobourg, Prescott, and other locations at various times. Hawke’s records are held by the Archives of Ontario.

An index to the four volumes of assisted immigration registers created by the Toronto Emigrant Office between 1865 and 1883 are available online at the Archives of Ontario website. The database contains a chronological listing of transcriptions of the names of over 29,000 new immigrants who were assisted by the government to travel to various destinations in southern Ontario.

Olive Tree Genealogy has been adding transcriptions of Return of Emigrants Landed at the Port of Kingston Ontario, Canada 1861-1882. Transcribed from FHL Film 1405913: Arrival/Destination records (series M) 1862-1881 Vols. 1-7.

Also at Olive Tree, is an index of transcriptions of the Names of Emigrants at Montreal Quebec Canada 1845-1847 from the records of James Allison, Emigration Agent at Montreal.

Records of the Sick and Destitute
The Society For The Relief Of Strangers In Distress was established in York (Toronto) in 1817 and in 1828 was renamed the Society For The Relief Of The Sick And Destitute. The Toronto Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society accessed and transcribed a number of records including a Record Book of the society which contained information on families in need and has indexed and published the information in a book titled The Records Of The Society For The Relief Of The Sick and Destitute 1817-1847. WorldCat-Libraries with book.

The following entry is from page 9 in the Provisions section and is transcribed from page 214 of the “Provisions Issued to the Sick and Destitute Poor of York from the 7th of March 1829 to 31st December 1831.”


 * 12 July 1831, Francis Beamish, Residence: Wooden Buildings; 1 man, 1 woman, 3 children; given tickets for 5 pounds of beef and 25 pounds of flour; recommended by Dr. Baldwin; Remarks: “He has got 3 children in the hospital sick”

Quebéc
Library and Archives Canada has recently added another database to their site. The Montreal Emigrant Society Passage Book for 1832 contains notes on those individuals to whom they provided assistance between May and November 1832. The site is searchable.

Answers to Castle Garden Exercise
In the Castle Garden exercise above, a search for John PULLMAN, who disappeared after the 1851 census in Devon, England and showed up in a Toronto City Directory in 1869 produces 3 hits (December 2, 2005). Two of them can probably be eliminated.


 * one ship arrived before our John was born (1834)
 * the John Pullman on the 1868 ship was 53—too old to be our John 

The third hit is intriguing, but more research is required to be certain: The John Pullman we are researching was born in Devon, England, not Ireland, but all of the other information fits.


 * Name: John Pullman
 * Occupation: Labourer
 * Age: 17
 * Arrived: 22 Mar 1858
 * Origin: Ireland
 * Port: Liverpool
 * Destination: USA
 * Plan: Unknown
 * Ship: Ellen Austin

Further research could include:


 * a search of the 1860 census for New York State
 * a search of the 1861 census for Toronto
 * further research in Devon records

Bibliography and Suggested Reading

 * Barman, Jean. The West Beyond the West, A History of British Columbia. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1991.


 * Baxter, Angus. In Search of Your Canadian Roots. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1999.


 * Bothwell, Robert, Ian Drummond, John English. Canada 1900-1945. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1987.


 * Cooper, Afua. “The Search for Mary Bibb, Black Woman Teacher in Nineteenth-Century Canada West”, Ontario History, vol. 83 (1991).


 * Filby, William P. and Mary K. Meyer. compilers, Passenger and Immigration Lists Index: A Guide to Published Arrival Records of about 500,000 Passengers who came to the United States and Canada in the Seventeenth, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries. Washington, DC: Gale Research, 1981 and several supplements since. This is a collection on Ancestry.com called U.S. and Canada, Passenger and Immigration Lists Index, 1500s-1900s. This index can also be purchased as a CD-ROM collection through the Genealogy.com website.


 * Green, Ernest. “Upper Canada’s Black Defenders”, Ontario History, vol. 27 (1931).


 * Harrison, Michael and Dorothy Martin, transcribers. The Records Of The Society For The Relief Of The Sick and Destitute 1817-1847. Toronto Branch, Ontario Genealogical Society, 2002.


 * Johnson, Daniel, Peter M. Toner and Kenneth Kanner. Passengers to New Brunswick: The Custom House Records. New Brunswick Genealogical Society, 1987.


 * Knowles, Valerie. Strangers at Our Gates, Canadian Immigration and Immigration Policy 1540-1990. Toronto: Dundurn Press, 1992.


 * Lamond, Robert. A Narrative of the Rise and Progress of Emigration from the Counties of Lanark and Renfrew to the New Settlements in Upper Canada on Government Grant. Glasgow, 1821. Ottawa: Canadian Heritage Publications, 1978.


 * Lawrence, Grace. A Proud Past, a Promising Future: Ontario Black History Society. OGS Seminar Annual 1987.


 * Merriman, Brenda Dougall. Genealogy in Ontario: Searching the Records, 3rd edition. Toronto: Ontario Genealogical Society, 1996.


 * Mitchell, Brian. Irish Passenger Lists 1847-1871. Baltimore, Maryland: Genealogical Publishing Co. Inc. 2001.


 * Montizambert, Dr. F. "Quarantine Service" in Handbook of Canada 1897. British Association for the Advancement of Science, Toronto Meeting. Toronto: Publication Committee of the Local Executive, 1897.


 * Obee, Dave. Destination Canada: A Guide to 20th Century Immigration Records. 2nd edition, privately published, 2004.


 * O’Gallagher, Marianna. Grosse Île, Gateway to Canada 1832-1937. Ste Foy, Quebec: Livres Carraig Books 1984, 4th printing, 2001.


 * Punch, Terrence M., ed. Genealogist’s Handbook for Atlantic Canada Research. Boston: New England Historic Genealogical Society, Second Edition, 1997.


 * Punch, Terrence M. Genealogical Research in Nova Scotia. Halifax: Nimbus Publishing, 1998.


 * Riendeau, Roger and staff. Ontario Ministry of Citizenship and Culture. An Enduring Heritage, Black Contributions to Early Ontario. Toronto: Dundurn Press, 1984.


 * Roper, Sydney C. D., compiler. The Statistical Yearbook of Canada for 1890. Ottawa: Department of Agriculture, 1891.


 * Smith, Marian L. By Way of Canada: U.S. Records of Immigration Across the U.S.-Canadian Border, 1895-1954 (St. Albans Lists). The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Fall 2000, Vol. 32, No. 3. Accessed online.


 * Stouffer, Allan P. “The Black Image in Nineteenth-Century Ontario”, Ontario History, vol. 76 (1984).


 * Stratford-Devai, Fawne. Province of Ontario Immigration Records, An Overview. Global Heritage Press, 2005.


 * Winks, Robin. The Blacks in Canada: A History. McGill-Queen’s University Press, Montreal, 2000.

Additional Information
See: British Columbia Immigration

See: Canada Immigration

See: US-Canada Border Crossings

See: Finding an Irish Ancestor Using Canadian Records

____________________________________________________________

Information in this Wiki page is excerpted from the online course Canadian: Immigration Records offered by The National Institute for Genealogical Studies. To learn more about this course or other courses available from the Institute, see our website. We can be contacted at [mailto:wiki@genealogicalstudies.com wiki@genealogicalstudies.com]

We welcome updates and additions to this Wiki page.