General-North/South America:
Do you know much about their emigration? The dates, the reason
why they left, who they may have travelled with?..etc..Generally more information was given at
the port of arrival rather than the port of departure. If you knew which city they arrived at (e.g.
Liverpool, New York, etc.), this could be a good place to find more information. -And perhaps even
find out an exact place of origin.
Ellis Island:
http://www.ellisisland.org/search/passSearch.asp
Castlegarden:
http://www.castlegarden.org/
US National Archives/Immigration info:
http://www.archives.gov/research/immigration/
The Boston Pilot; From October 1831 through October 1921, the Boston Pilot newspaper printed a
?Missing Friends? column with advertisements from people looking for ?lost? friends and relatives
who had emigrated from Ireland to the United States. This extraordinary collection of 40,743 records
is available here as a searchable online database, which contains a text record for each ad that
appeared in the Pilot. http://infowanted.bc.edu/
The first place to start your search is in your own home - talk to elders in the family - find out about
their parents, grandparents etc. Perhaps they have a story of one of your ancestors?
Things to enquire about include: occupations, places of residence, who they were living with
(people often stayed with others from their home villages after emigration), siblings & other family
members, first names (important -as usually past from father to son/mother to daughter) ages at
time of emigration, possible dates of birth/death, religious denominations. Also ask if there are any
surviving photographs, old documents or letters - record all the information you can find.
Write/telephone other members of your family to check details -perhaps they can remember other
facts about your ancestors? Hopefully when you have done this - some clues will emerge! After you
have identified the emigrant- begin tracing the steps back to Ireland.
Do you know much about their emigration? The dates, the reason why they left, who they might
have travelled with..etc.? Generally more information was given at the port of arrival rather than the
port of departure. If you knew which city they arrived at (e.g. Liverpool, Ellis Island), this could be a
good place to find more information, and perhaps even find out an exact place of origin. Shipping
manifests can be checked ?which may lead to more clues.
The next thing you could do is find the counties and places in Ireland your family names are most
prevalent. Look at the website http://www.irishtimes.com/ancestor/surname/ and perhaps
something will match some other clue you may have found elsewhere? If nothing turns
up ? it is advisable to try different variations of the spellings of the names. If you have a possible
first name you could try the Irish Census 1901, 1911 at www.census.nationalarchives.ie/ or the land
valuation record called Griffiths Valuation
http://askaboutireland.ie/griffith-valuation/index.xml
