Doug Bowerman left a comment on the August 27 post Stefania Chmielewska Arrives at Ellis Island, where I mentioned that my Great Aunt Stefania had sailed on the SS Barbarossa from Bremen to New York . Doug had read that the records for Bremen had been destroyed in a fire during World War II bombings and asked if there is any way to access the records that survived this catastrophe.
The short answer to this question is that, yes, some emigration records from Bremen did survive and one may be able to obtain those records.
To begin, Bremen was once a major port for emigration from Europe, processing over seven million emigrants over the past two centuries . Bremen is located on the Weser River and served as a major port of departure until silt in the river began to restrict access to Bremen’s docks . In 1825, the mayor and senate of Bremen purchased land for a new port at the mouth of the river and, in 1830, the port of Bremerhaven opened and served as the actual place of embarkation for those emigrating through Bremen.
Beginning in 1832, all companies transporting emigrants from Bremen were required to file lists of emigrants with Bremen’s emigration department . Between 1875 and 1908, these passenger lists were purposely destroyed for lack of space, and only the most recent three years of passenger lists were maintained . Thus, all Bremen Passenger Emigration Records prior to 1905 were destroyed, but the records from 1905-May 1914 were preserved . Unfortunately, even these records were destroyed during an Allied bombing raid on Bremen on October 6, 1944.
However, Bremen Emigrant Passenger Lists for the years 1920-1923 and 1925-1939 still exist . The surviving passenger lists are maintained at the Handelskammer Archiv in Bremen, and, although these lists are not indexed, the archives personnel will search these lists on request . The lists have also been transcribed and are searchable online at Die Maus.
Some other lists, indexes, and historical materials for earlier years also exist . Some ships that departed from Bremen provided copies of the emigration lists to officials at the ports of arrival . The information on these lists is summarized in Lists of Passengers Bound from Bremen to New York . The reference works Germans to America and Migration from the Russian Empire also include information on emigrants who passed through Bremen . These works are available through the Genealogical Publishing Company and many public and private libraries.
In addition, some information may be obtained directly from Germany . The City Archives of Bremerhaven holds some records on emigrants, the Bremen State Archives holds copies of passenger lists for ships involved in court cases, and the Deutsches Schiffahrtsmuseum holds plans, photographs, and logs of emigrant ships.
Finally, the Family History Library holds a few microfilms of indexes to the Bremen Emigration Lists under the title Namenskartei aus den “Bremen Schiffslisten” 1904-1914 . These indexes were prepared in 1941 and contain mainly information on emigrants from Germany, but not on the 80% of emigrants who were Slavs, Jews, and Hungarians.
Copyright © 2006 by Stephen J. Danko
Steve,
Thank you for answering my question. I am new to genealogy and I want to know how to research. I’m trying to learn as much as I can. So I greatly appreciate it.
The manifest I found on ellisisland.org was a departure from Bremen on Nov 1st 1906. The wife and children were from Magdeburg. So I probably will be unlucky to find a departure listing. The husband was already in America. I cannot find him in Ellis Island searches. My quest on these ancestors is to find out why the husband came to America first, when he came, how he got here, and why he went to his destination.
Doug
My GGF Ignatz Steiner left the port of Breman late 1864 bound for New York. Born in Bohemia, and became a naturalised citizen of USA. Have been searching my ancestors since 2012. To find that my family lived in New York, New Orleans and Hamilton Ohio.
Just found out my paternal grandfather was aUS citizen Ervin Steiner. Want to find out more .
Mainly the reason for a husband to have settled in America prior to his wife and children is to take advantage of the need for workers (Hungarians, or present day Romanians mainly were amazing farmers) so they could afford to send some money back to family for their tickets and other expenses with emigration. My Hungarian family was able to afford to all come together, but my Italian family was not and my great gpa came first. Also, to my understanding, sometimes when a family was very poor (as many farmers were) the men would come work and stay in houses together.. they may have been called Wards if remember right.
Some countries sometimes would offer emigration, I think the individual had to pay their way and then they were sent certain places when they arrived in America to do whatever job they were offering.
Anyway if someone could tell me why the heck my great grandma when she came over, used her maiden name for herself and my great great Aunt–their daughter?! Things like this …all the mysteries involved in genealogy research…all the countless hours that go into actually researching to better understand the emigration process. For example certain areas ie states, counties, and cities had settlers from all the same area of the country they originated from. Especially Italians but also Polish etc.
Also immigration from countries can sometimes be broken down in what I like to call waves. Like the first immigration wave would be a certain group/status of people..for Romania first immigrants were almost always very wealthy maybe businessmen or something who were very educated and charming then later came farmers/landowners/hard working men and women (Yes Romanian women were hard ass workers too!) And then came the peasants and the uneducated, non English speaking along with family that is coming to join.. stuff like that. I’ve spent 1000s of hours over a years time researching haha but, I love this stuff!