Newspapers
A search of local newspapers where your immigrant ancestor settled can provide much information, such as obituaries, ship arrivals, immigrants being treated for illness, lists of indentured servants or apprentices (did your ancestor arrive as one?), queries on missing friends or relatives from family in the originating country, marriage announcements, notices of estate and will probates.
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Search billions of historical records and family trees on Ancestry, including immigration records, passenger lists, naturalization records, census records, and other documents that can help trace your ancestors' journey.
Start your Ancestry free trialNewspapers hold a great deal of immigrant information. You should search newspapers for the immigrant’s port of arrival on a ship, and for areas where your ancestor settled, as well as ethnic newspapers
Following are some items you might expect to find in newspapers
- Ship Arrivals
- Lists of passengers
- Immigrants who were ill and hospitalized
- Immigrants arriving as indentured servants
- Queries from relatives or friends for missing persons
- Marriage Announcements
- Birth Announcements
- Death Notices, Obituaries (Often the native town or country of an immigrant is noted in an obituary. Friends, family, year of immigration are also frequently mentioned)
- Notices of divorces
- Notices of Probate of estates
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