Immigrants Looking for Missing Friends & Family

The  Missing Friends Project on OliveTreeGenealogy.com is extracting the names of those who immigrated from UK to America or Canada and who were inquired about by family in various 19th Century newspapers. 

Missing Friends Project starts with Lloyd’s Weekly Newspaper, published in London England and their weekly column (1886-1900) called “Long Lost Relatives”. We also have begun extracting names of those in the Boston Pilot, published in Boston Massachusetts (1831-1921). 

Our Boston Pilot project is only extracting the names of missing Irish individuals who sailed to Canada. It is important to note that many who sailed first to Canada went on to USA and are so noted in the extracts. Many of the relatives and friends seeking them were based in USA and their location is also given. 

We also plan to publish extracts of weekly columns of Missing Friends from The Irish World (1892-1899), published in New York and The Manchester Weekly Times (1891-1893) published in England. We will add other newspapers as we find them and can access them. 

The fields being extracted are name of person in America or Canada who is missing, where they lived in the UK, when they left, where they intended going, ship name if known, when they were last heard from, where they were living when last heard from, who is seeking them and any miscellaneous comments.  

Choose from the following newspaper issues of Missing Friends: 

Lloyd’s Weekly Newspaper: Long Lost Relatives1886 | 1887 | 1888 | 1889 | 1890 | 1891 | 1892 | 1893 | 1894 | 1895 | 1896 | 1897 | 1899 | 1900 

Missing Friends Extracts from the Boston Pilot Newspaper, Boston Massachusetts1830-1840 | 1840-1850 

Links to Missing Friends Data on Other Sites

Information Wanted ! (of missing emigrants) a few notices from 1845-1848 on TheShipsList.com 

Missing Friends Extracts from the Belfast News September 1893

Missing Persons Liverpool Mercury 1899

The Search for Irish Immigrants Through the Boston Pilot, 1847 and 1848 Data files contain records derived from ads for finding missing Irish persons placed in the Boston Pilot during 1847 and 1848. These are very technical and cannot be read or viewed in the usual way. You must download and refer to, a codebook and then the database. Coded variables include date of ad, name of missing person, gender of missing person, county, parish, townland, barony, and poor-law district of origin, description of missing person, ship and port of departure of missing person, name of person placing ad, relationship of seeker to sought.