Mimi,
I have had many situations like this. You have to take the
information found on the naturalization documents as a clue,
not necessarily a hard fact. Keep in mind that these ancestors
of ours often filed for naturalization many years after arriving
and that they were not able to remember the actual names and
dates due to the language difference.
In one situation I found that the naturalization stated that the
family arrived on the "Bluecher" in NY on a date which didn't
match any of the Bluecher's arrivals that year. Well, I had to
conclude that the did come on the Bluecher. It would have
been hard to pull a name like that out of thin air. I searched
13 Bluecher manifests before I found them, leaving the in
Dec. of the year stated on the Declaration but arriving in
Jan. of the next year.
Same thing with my maternal great-grandfather, who stated
on the Declaration that he arrived on the Rotterdam on a
date in 1900 that didn't match the records. His name was
Schmuel Friedman/Friedmann/Freedman/etc/etc. Would
have been almost impossible to pinpoint (this was long
before the online EIDB) except for the obvious clue. Although
he didn't arrive on the Rotterdam, I assumed correctly that he
did travel on the Holland-American line. That allowed me
to reduce the name search greatly. He did arrive that year,
different date, on the "Amsterdam" sailing >from Rotterdam.
Follow the clues and do not allow yourself to get blocked
by strictly adhering to the spelling, dates or places.
Happy Hunting!
Lois Sernoff [Philadelphia, PA, USA]
Searching: FRIEDMAN >from Beltsy, Bessarabia
KUSHNER >from Yampol, Podolia Gub.
Mimi (Weiss) Simon wrote:
" Receiving these papers has uncovered another mystery. According to the
filing, my grandfather arrived in New York on 9/10/03 on the Deutschland out
of Hamburg, Germany. However, there is no trace of him on the Ellis Island
website nor of the ship on that date. On a list of ships for the year,
incidentally, I do not see the Deutschland listed.
I have tried the Hamburg Roots website and find it impossible to navigate.
I enter the date of birth, the year of departure as per the instructions and it
rejects them, telling me to enter four digits (which I have) for the year etc.
I have tried various combinations but none work.
Aside >from my question about whether others have had trouble with this website
is it possible that my grandfather used another name to enter the U.S. or the
name of the ship was not correct? Would the Bureau of Immigration have checked
these details before allowing him to become a citizen?"
