Hamburg Records on Ancestry.com with Free Access (On-Site in Hamburg)

The State Archive in Hamburg is releasing the genealogical records emigrants who passed through Hamburg Harbor on route to America from 1850 to 1934. Starting in July 2013 the travel records from 1850 through 1876 fills the currently available data to 4.6 million passenger records. The passage records indicate the emigrant’s name, birth place, profession, destination, as well as travel dates and vessel information, and serve as one of the most comprehensive sources for families conducting genealogical research on ancestors from Northern and Eastern Europe.

The data is available to the public on www.ancestry.com (for a membership fee), but on visiting Hamburg, the records of the State Archives are available for free access.. Once a person is found, the digitalized version of the original passenger records can be accessed online. In the second half of the 19th Century and the decade and a half before the outbreak of World War I in 1914, millions of Germans as well as Central and Eastern Europeans left their home countries in search of a better future for themselves and their families. Now, their descendants and historians can study this migration in great detail, telling the stories of despair and hope, fate and determination. The records can be best appreciated in their original form – 555 large scale folio volumes. An additional 300,000 data records spanning the post war years from 1920 to 1923 are scheduled to be available in November of 2013.

Special Exhibition: Ship of Dreams – The Emigration Experience Celebrating the 100th anniversary of the ocean liner “Imperator”, Hamburg’s BallinStadt Emigration Museum is staging a special exhibition dedicated to the emigration and cruise liners of the HAPAG cruise company. Until 1914, the “Imperator” was the largest ship in the world and offered space for up to 4,300 passengers. At the exhibition, visitors will be able to glimpse what it was like to be on this ship and what the ocean crossing experience entailed. For many of the passengers on the ship, the 7 to 10-day crossing was the last opportunity in their lives to take a break before the realities of the life of emigrants caught up with them. The exhibition runs July 5th until August 31st, daily from 10 AM to 6 PM at the BallinStadt Emigration Museum.