Ads for Irish Immigrants in Boston Pilot

Boston College has a free online database of Advertisements for Irish Immigrants. These ads were published in the Boston Pilot in the 19th century and sometimes contain the name of the ship the immigrant travelled on.

I've put together an index, with links, of the names of passengers on ships arriving in Canada, since before 1865 the ships passenger lists were not kept. It is a challenging time period to find passenger lists! However there ARE alternate records - shipping agent records, emigration agent ledger books, newspaper extracts to name but a few. 

My book Filling in the Gaps: Finding Pre-1865 Ships Passenger Lists to Canada is available on Amazon and is another resource for these early years. There is a  Paperback version and an e-book version available.

Mary Buttler (nee Slatterly) and husband William Buttler, from Clare, on Ship Maria, Limerick to Quebec June 1847

John Hogan, from Limerick, 1849 to Quebec on Ship Anna Maria

Mary Keanes, nee Monaghan, from Mayo on Sarah Maria, Kilalla to Quebec 1846

Mary Reaney born ca 1824, from Mayo, on Ship Sarah Maria from  Kilalla to quebec 1844

Patrick Cahill from Tipperary, son of Patrick, July 1847 on board Admiral, Waterford to Quebec

John Mullin from Tipperary, April 1844 on board Admiral, Waterford to Quebec

John Quillan from Tipperary, Waterford to Quebec on Admiral, before 1856

Michael Quillan from Tipperary, Waterford to Quebec on Admiral, before 1856

If you want to see more listings for immigrants arriving in USA and Canada go to Missing Friends on Olive Tree Genealogy

Removing Clippings to Preserve Ledger Book Pages from the 1890s

My fingers are prunes. Yesterday saw me with my hands in warm water as I soaked ledger pages from the 1890s in order to remove newspaper clippings from the 1928 Boston Globe.

My readers may recall that I bought a new toy, a Fujitsu ScanSnap iX500 Scanner for PC and Mac (PA03656-B005)and that one of my plans was to scan the pages of old ledger books that I have purchased over the years.

One of the ledgers I was scanning was from a delivery service of some kind. Every page had names, street addresses, item(s) purchased, cost of delivery and a delivery date. But the first dozen or so pages had been glued over on both sides with clippings from newspapers dated 1928.

While it's always interesting to read old newspaper tidbits and articles, there were no births, deaths, marriages or obituaries so I decided that the names and details underneath were of more value to genealogists. That led me to the decision to try to remove the clippings. I am pleased to say that my idea worked extremely well!

Soaking each ledger page in water

First I put a bit of warm water in a dishtub, then I gently soaked the pages, one at a time. Most of the clippings were easily removed and the ledger pages did not tear, nor did the ink disappear.

The words underneath becoming visible

After peeling off the clippings I hung the wet pages on my antique drying rack. Within a few hours they were dry. My next step was to lay them flat on a hard surface and place a heavy ream of paper on top to help flatten them.

The ledger pages drying on my antique rack

I will scan the pages today, save them as PDF files and the project will be ready to upload to my husband's website Ancestors At Rest All in all there were over 300 pages of names in this ledger book so I am excited to bring it online for all to see