FFHS-NEWS Online launch of Canadian Passenger Lists, 1865 - 1935 by Ancestry.co.uk

[News from the Federation of Family History Societies]

Online launch of Canadian Passenger Lists, 1865 – 1935 reveals the four
million Brits who settled Canada

• Records include detail on 150,000 foster children re-settled as part of
Britain’s Child Emigration Scheme
• One of the largest scale migrations in Britain’s history – more British
emigrants than to Australia

The records of millions of British emigrants who headed for a new life in
Canada are available online for the first time.  Now available at
Ancestry.co.uk, the Canadian Passenger Lists, 1865-1935, the originals of
which are held by the Library and Archives Canada, contain 7.2 million
names, including those of more than 5.6 million immigrants from all over the
world who headed to Canada for a better life, of which the vast majority -
over four million - were British.

Advertised by British colonial authorities as ‘The Last best West’ in an
attempt to draw prospective immigrants away from the American prairies and
into the North West territories, Canada’s immigration heyday took place at
the end of the 19th Century and lasted until the onset of the Great
Depression.  With its fertile land and long agricultural season, millions
journeyed into the Canadian wilderness in search of prosperity. Pitting
themselves against long winters and harsh conditions in their struggle to
settle the land, the movement became one of the largest scale migrations in
Britain’s history.

The passenger lists are indexed by name, year of arrival, port of arrival
and departure and ship name, revealing fascinating detail about passengers,
from their health to religion and even the amount of cash they had in hand
when they disembarked.  Serving as a record of the voyage, they also contain
information on the vessel, the crew, births and deaths and even marriages,
which sometimes took place on board and were overseen by the ship’s Captain.


The most popular ports of departure were Liverpool and Glasgow, and as the
records show, the voyage to Canada was sometimes not without its perils. 

Among the 4000 plus recorded voyages detailed in the collection was that of
The Empress of Ireland, a passenger ship carrying 1,477 people, which was
rammed in dense fog on the St Lawrence River near Quebec on the 29th of May
1914. She sank in just 14 minutes, drowning 1,012 passengers and crew - a
larger loss of life than the Titanic. The Titanic’s rescue ship, RMS
Carpathia, is also listed in the collection.

Also included are the details of over 150,000 ‘home children’ who were sent
overseas alone as part of the Child Emigration Scheme, a
Government-supported programme to aid settlement of British colonies and
raise the prospects of orphan and foster children.

These children worked as indentured farm labourers and domestic servants
until they were 18 years old, and while some were placed in loving homes,
others were exploited as cheap labour. For the descendants of these
children, the records will be a first step to tracing their roots back to
Great Britain and discovering their lost heritage.

The Canadian Passenger Lists, 1865-1935 is available to Ancestry.co.uk
Worldwide members and through a 14-day free trial and can be viewed at
www.ancestry.co.uk/CAPassengerLists.

About Ancestry.co.uk

Ancestry.co.uk has more then 800 million names in major collections
including the seven England, Wales and Scotland Censuses, 1841-1901, the
Birth, Marriage and Death Indexes,1837-2005, World War One British Army
Service and Pension records, UK and Ireland parish and probate records and
the British Phone Books, 1880-1984.

Ancestry.co.uk was launched in May 2002 and is part of the global network of
Ancestry websites (wholly owned by The Generations Network Inc), which
contains seven billion names in 26,000 historical record collections. To
date more than 6.5 million family trees have been created and 650 million
names and 10 million photographs uploaded. Six million unique visitors
logged on to an Ancestry website in June 2008.*

The Ancestry global network of family history websites: www.ancestry.com  in
the US, www.ancestry.co.uk in the UK, www.ancestry.ca  in Canada,
www.ancestry.com.au in Australia,  www.ancestry.de in
Germany, www.ancestry.it in Italy, www.ancestry.fr in France,
www.ancestry.se in Sweden and www.jiapu.cn in China. 

*comScore, Unique Visitors, June 2008.

                 
Maggie Loughran 
Joint Administrator, Federation of Family History Societies 
Email: admin at ffhs.org.uk 
www.ffhs.org.uk