Featuring Pennsylvania Ships Passenger Lists - The pre 1820 Baggage Lists

Pennsylvania Ships Passenger Lists begin in 1800 instead of after the Federal Legislation requiring ships Passenger lists to be kept after 1819. The arrival port of Philadelphia kept lists of names of arriving passengers whos personal luggage was over the limit set for exemption from taxes. This gives genealogists a nice set of ships passenger lists from 1800-1820 when full ships passenger lists began.

These Philadelphia Pennsylvania Baggage Lists can be found online.

They include images of the actual manifest and a transcription of the names of the passengers on board. Philadelphia Baggage Lists contain the names of passengers who had to pay taxes on excess baggage. It does not contain the names of passengers who were exempt because their luggage was not over the limit.

This is an ongoing project and currently only Baggage Lists from 1809 are online. All names have been indexed, not just passenger names, but also the names of those shipping luggage or goods, and the names of those where the goods were being shipped.