How to check on immigrant to US

[LizzieW]

Hello

I have found, on a shipping list someone who could be my great uncle.  He is listed as a single man of adult age.  How do I go about finding out if he is the person I am searching for?  Would the shipping company give me any information, such as a home address prior to emigration?  The person I have found went to US in 1911 when he would have been 31, so now long since dead.

Liz

[aghadowey]

Very, very doubtful shipping company would keep records that long or would even reply to queries.
How about asking someone to look for him in 1920 & 1930 census records?
U.S. vital records are by individual state so if you have an idea where he lived there might be other sources.

[LizzieW]

Thanks for the suggestion.  I posted on another site too, but then on this one as I didn't want to hi-jack another thread.  I'm not even sure my relative went to America, it is just that I can't find him and his brother, although I have found his 3 sisters and other brother (he was my grandad) and my dad always said he had an uncle in USA.

Liz

[chloespop]

What was his name?

Fred

[avm228]

The shipping record itself will often give the name of a nearest relative in the country of departure, and/or the name of the person the immigrant is joining in the US, both of which can be useful checking points.

Anna

[LizzieW]

Chloespop.

There are 2 brothers that I cannot find after the 1901 census, I have the 3rd brother, my grandad, and their 3 sisters and as my dad always said he had relatives in the US, these were the only two possibilities.  However, unless the eldest one went first and then sent for the other one who was about 13 years younger, I may just be on a wild goose chase. 

As another Rootschatter recently offered to search the US census for me, and e-mailed me to say she had found a few possibilities, I don't want to ask anyone else to do the same, I was just thinking that as I now had access to the shipping lists, I might find some info that I could pass on to confirm or reject names.  So I hope, at the moment, you don't mind if I don't give you any names until I hear from the person who offered (by e-mail) to search for me.

I am grateful for everybody's help and suggestions.  Someone else has suggested that the records on Ancestry give more info than the ones I found on Findmypast, so I am going to look at those.

Regards
Liz

[avm228]

Have a look also on the Ellis Island website:

http://www.ellisisland.org/

for lists of passengers arriving in the US (different lists from the outbound passenger lists available at findmypast).

Anna

[LizzieW]

Thank you Anna, I'll have a good search tomorrow.

Liz

[aghadowey]

I'm a bit confused- are you talking about passenger lists? The passenger lists on sites like Ellis Island were complied for allowing passengers entry into the U.S. and often give details like person they are going to in U.S. and name and address of nearest relative in country of origin.