Ancestry/Genealogy

When you left Europe, your name was written on the ship's manifest. It was either spelled correctly or phonetically. When the ship left port, its projected arrival date and time was sent by telegraph along with names of countries of origin. The transatlantic telegraph was operational from 1858.

Before a ship arrived, translators were notified to be on hand to assist with documenting the ship's passengers. This along with the manifest was used to certify the accuracy of the names of arrivals.

This was important because the U.S. was concerned about European anarchists gaining entry to our ports. Anarchists were the terrorists of their time.


About 15 years ago, staff at Ellis Island National Park published requests for people whose family names were changed at Ellis to come forward to verify their ancestors' stories of the name changes. None were verifiable.

Once the immigrants left Ellis, they could easily change their surname. It was difficult, if not impossible for that to have happened at Ellis.