More than 133,000 immigrants disembarked at the port of Galveston, Texas, between 1846 and 1948. The Great Galveston Hurricane of 8 September 1900 destroyed much of the city, including the buildings that housed the immigration records. There are very few records surviving between 1871-1894.
1846-1871: Quarterly Abstracts are the only passenger lists available and are on microfilm
1872-1895: No federal or state Ships Passenger Lists Arrival Records except for a few for 1892, 1893
1896-1951: Passenger Lists available on microfilm
How to Find Ancestors on Ships Passenger Lists to Texas from 1844 to 1954
1. Search online ships passenger lists. The best sites for these early ships passenger lists to Galveston are:
- Galveston Passengers 1844-1954 database on Seaport Museum (Steve Morse’s One Step)
- Ships to Galveston Texas (Olive Tree Genealogy)
- Index to names of passengers on Ships Passenger Lists arriving at Galveston Texas between 1846 and 1871 (TheGenealogySpot)
- Ships Passenger Lists to Galveston Texas 1846-1871 [$]
- Texas, Indexes and Manifests of Arrivals at the Port of Del Rio, 1906-1953 (familysearch)
- Galveston Passengers 1893-1948 [$] (Steve Morse’s One-Step Search for Ancestry.com)
- Galveston Passenger Lists, 1896-1948 [$]
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