Ship records of passengers can be informative, possibly revealing places of origin, occupations, and relations in the originating country as well as the destination country.
You can view indexes on the websites of the National Archives, Family Search (current catalog of passenger lists here), and Ancestry.
The most recent immigrant ancestor in my family tree is Herman Lutter (1860-1924). I have not (yet) found him on any passenger list. From his entries on the federal census of 1900 and 1920 in Newark, New Jersey, he gave his year of immigration as 1881. In 1910, it looks like his year of birth, 1860, was written instead of his year of immigration. His brother, Otto Luther (1845-1909), arrived in 1884.
On November 1, 1892 Herman Lutter swore his Declaration of Intent in Newark. Frank Geisler (1848-1937) swore to Herman's "good moral character." At that point in time, Herman was living apart from his wife, Clara Uhl (1865-1955), and their son, Howard Lutter (1889-1959).
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| Herman Lutter. Declaration of Intent. Essex County, New Jersey. Naturalizations November 1, 1892. Film 1317423. |
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| 1900 United States Federal Census. Newark, Essex County, New Jersey. Herman Leuter, boarder of Frank Geisler. Born May 1860 in Germany. Immigrated in 1881. Naturalized. |
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| 1910 United States Federal Census. Newark, Essex County, New Jersey. Herman Lutter, lodger of Frank Geisler. Age 50. Immigrated in 1860. Naturalized. The year of immigration is probably wrong; he was born in 1860. Joseph Hoffman Jr, age 9, was probably Joseph Edwin Hoffmire (1909-2007), a grandson of Frank Geisler. |
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| 1920 United States Federal Census. Newark, Essex County, New Jersey. Herman Lutter. Immigrated 1881; naturalized in 1886. |
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| 1900 United States Federal Census. Harrison, Hudson County, New Jersey. Otto Lutter, born January 1845 in Germany. Immigrated in 1884. Alien. |
In 1881, the nearest port of entry to Newark, New Jersey was Castle Garden in Manhattan, New York. (Now a national monument called Castle Clinton.) Yet Herman and Otto do not seem to appear on any lists or indexes, including Germans to America.
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| Close proximity of Castle Garden in Manhattan to Newark, New Jersey |
The port of entry may not be where the person settled. They could have arrived in Boston, Baltimore, Philadelphia, or New Orleans. Even Canada!
In 1875, a family of Lutters arrived in New York, among them Hermann Lutter, age 15. This matches the year of birth of my Herman- 1860. We can look at their records to see that this is not my Herman.
First I found the passenger list for Steamer SS Silesia, which arrived in the Port of New York on March 19, 1875 from Hamburg and Havre- ports in Germany and France. Hamburg is over 200 miles north of Herman's hometown of Scheibe, now called Neuhaus am Rennweg, in Thuringia, Germany.
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| Map of modern-day Europe showing the 200 mile distance between the port of Hamburg, Germany and Scheibe (now Neuhaus am Rennweg), hometown of my Lutters |
On this list, "Herm" Lutter was 15 years old and the brother of Aug Lutter, age 30. Among the people with them was Ottilia, their sister, though this name was scribbled. Herman and Otto had a sister named Ottilia. She ended up staying in Germany.
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| Passenger list of SS Silesia. Arrived in New York March 19, 1875. The Lutter family is crossed out; they took an earlier ship. |
The strikethrough lines signal that these people did not make the trip. This made sense since my Herman arrived in 1881, not 1875, but this is not him.
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| Passenger list of SS Herder. Arrived in New York March 11, 1875. |
More digging revealed the reason for the crossed out names. The family took an earlier ship, SS Herder. On March 11, 1875, Hermann Lutter, age 16, arrived in New York with his family. The names varied a little from the other entry.
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| The originating record of the Lutters' sail to the United States |
