THE FORGOTTEN OF ELLIS ISLAND
Deaths in Quarantine, 1909-1911
Deaths in Quarantine, 1909-1911
This page was last updated: Monday, 21-Feb-2005 09:01:07 MST
Table of Contents
Over time, this site will be slowly expanded to include additional information and links relating to the Quarantine Station of New York Harbor as well as Ellis Island.
- The Forgotten of Ellis Island; The listing of those who died in Quarantine from November 1909 through June 1911 in New York City while en route to Ellis Island. This is for those who would prefer browsing through the list instead of using the search engine below.
- My Search for Apollonia Spiegel
- Sign our Guestbook!
- Read the Guestbook
- Quarantine Station for Ellis Island and the Port of New York
- Some Resources to Use in Tracing Your Immigrant Ancestors
- A Short Bibliography for Quarantine and Ellis Island This lists some books and periodicals which relate to both Quarantine at New York Harbor and Ellis Island. Many of these articles found in periodicals have been transcribed and links are provided to them.
- Photographs and Pictures
- Listing of some Repositories or Archives containing Information related to Quarantine and Immigration.
- Links to More Sites related to Quarantine and Immigration At present, this list is not categorized.
Introduction
The attached list contains the names and information of 418 individuals — 85% of whom were children under the age of 13 years old — who died in Quarantine at the two hospitals located on Hoffman and Swinburne Islands in Richmond County, New York. Most of these individuals were new immigrants en route to Ellis Island and, since they were ill with contagious diseases, they were removed from the ships in the outer harbor of the port of New York by the Medical Inspectors and transferred to these two hospitals. Their families would likely have continued on to Ellis Island where they were probably detained while awaiting the sick child. Eventually, their families would have been released from detention on Ellis Island and traveled on to their new homes, never knowing where their children or family members were buried.
To compile this list, I reviewed the Death Certificates from November 1909 through June 1911 registered in Richmond County (Staten Island), NY, for those deaths having occurred on either Hoffman or Swinburne Island. Both islands are located east of Staten Island and south of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge in the outer harbor of the port of New York. Also included on the list are two or three deaths registered as having occurred on either the Quarantine Landing or the Health Officers' Boat.
Since the original certificates were written by a number of different people, it was often difficult to decipher their handwritings as well as the exact spelling of the names of those who died. However, as I hope to eventually trace these individuals back to their respective Ships' Passenger Arrival Records, I intend to verify their names from this second set of records while at the same time establishing their family connection. If you can identify the ship's passenger arrival record for any of the individuals on the attached list, I would greatly appreciate your contacting me with the specific information for that record. Cathy Horn
If you are interested in any of these individuals, I've included in the listing both the year in which the death was registered and the Death Certificate number. Using both of these pieces of information, you can then obtain the individual's Death Certificates by mailing your request to the NYC Municipal Archives/DORIS. For their address and information concerning their fees, see the DORIS web site located at: New York City Archives
If you saw the second PBS television series, ANCESTORS, which was shown during the summer of 2000, you may remember the episode relating to Immigration Records in which I was portrayed and told of my research to locate my own relative who died in quarantine on Hoffman Island. Both this list and any subsequent research into New York's Quarantine Station are the results of my own family history research. If you haven't see the program, check out their web site at http://byubroadcasting.org/ancestors/ and you may wish to request that your local PBS station run the series.
To Search the List
There are two ways you can view the list. You can either
- browse the list showing the full details taken from the Death Certificate
or
- use the RootsWeb Search Engine (see below) which includes only part of the details. Then after locating a record of interest to you, come back here and browse the list to see the additional details of the individual you found throught the search engine.
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