Australia Emigration and Immigration

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Australia

Emigration and Immigration

Ship Bega of the Illawarra Steam Navigation Company

Online Records

• Ireland-Australia transportation database National Library of Australia
• Genealogical Index To Australians and Other Expatriates In Papua New Guinea at FindMyPast - index & images ($)
• Australian Contingents To South Africa at FindMyPast - index & image ($)
• Australia Passenger Indexes archived on the Wayback Machine
• Australia's First Fleet
• Australia's Second Fleet
• Australia's Third Fleet
• 1786-1849 Australia Convict Ships 1786-1935 at FindMyPast; index & images ($)
• 1788-1968 Ozships: Australian shipping 1788-1968
• 1788–1868 Ireland-Australia transportation database National Archives of Ireland

Guide to penal transportation records: Ireland to Australia, 1788–1868

• 1811-1856 Australia, Assisted Emigration at FindMyPast - index & images ($)
• 1824-1874 Australia Convict Tickets of Leave 1824-1874 at FindMyPast - index & images ($)
• 1826-1972 Australia, Inward, Outward, & Coastal Passenger Lists 1826-1972 at FindMyPast; index & images ($)
• 1848-1850 Famine Orphans from Cork to Australia 1848-1850
• 1848-1850 Earl Grey Irish Female Orphans in Australia Passenger Lists
• 1850 Irish Orphan Girls who sailed on the Eliza Caroline The “Eliza Caroline” arrived in Port Phillip on 31 March 1850.
• 1852-1857 List of emigrants, 1852-1857 at FamilySearch Catalog; images only
• 1873-1924 Alphabetical register of all inward passengers to Albany, 1873-1924 at FamilySearch Catalog; images only
• 1890-1960 Passenger Lists Leaving UK 1890-1960 at FindMyPast; index & images ($); includes those with Destination of Australia
• 1904-1914 Germany, Bremen Passenger Departure Lists, 1904-1914 at MyHeritage; index & images ($); includes those with Destination of Australia
• 1946-1971 Free Access: Africa, Asia and Europe, Passenger Lists of Displaced Persons, 1946-1971 Ancestry, free. Index and images. Passenger lists of immigrants leaving Germany and other European ports and airports between 1946-1971. The majority of the immigrants listed in this collection are displaced persons - Holocaust survivors, former concentration camp inmates and Nazi forced laborers, as well as refugees from Central and Eastern European countries and some non-European countries.
• Immigrant Ships Transcribers Guild Choose a volume and then choose Australia under "Listed by Port of Departure" or "Listed by Port of Arrival".
• Immigrant Ancestors Project

The Irish Ancestor

There are many Indexes in The Irish Ancestor, of convicts requesting wife and children to be sent out to Australia, at the government's expense.

• Indexed in PERiodical Source Index at FindMyPast ($)
• FIGRS Index to the The Irish Ancestor ($)
• WorldCat listing of libraries holding The Irish Ancesor collection
• The Irish Ancestor 1969-1986 Digital Download ($)

New South Wales

• 1791-1816 List of convict ships and prisoner's names from Ireland to Sydney, 1791-1816 at FamilySearch Catalog; images only
• 1816-1825, 1898-1911 New South Wales, Australia, Departing Crew and Passenger Lists, 1816-1825, 1898-1911 at Ancestry; index & images ($)
• 1828-1842 Australia, New South Wales, Index to Bounty Immigrants, 1828-1842 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index & images
• 1828-1890 Australia, New South Wales, Assisted Immigrants Inwards, 1828-1890 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index & images
• 1828-1890 Assisted immigrants inwards to Sydney, 1828-1890 at FamilySearch Catalog; images only
• 1839-1896 Index to Assisted Immigrants 1839-96, Moreton Bay, 1848-1859, Port Phillip 1839-1851
• 1842-1851 Index to unassisted Immigrants 1842-1851
• 1846 New South Wales, Australia, Passengers Arriving at Port Phillip, 1846 at Ancestry; index & images ($)
• 1850-80s Mariners and Ships in Australian Waters - primarily New South Wales, unassisted records from the 1850-80s, incomplete
• 1853-1900 New South Wales, Australia, Immigration Deposit Journals, 1853-1900 at Ancestry; index & images ($)

Queensland

• 1848-1912 Assisted Immigration 1848-1912
• 1848-1912 Queensland Assisted Immigration 1848-1912 at FindMyPast; index only ($)
• 1848-1912 Queensland, Australia, Passenger Lists, 1848-1912 at Ancestry; index only ($)
• 1848-1972 Queensland, Australia, Immigration Indexes, 1848-1972 at Ancestry; index only ($)
• 1851-1904 Queensland, Australia, Naturalisation Index, 1851-1904 at Ancestry; index only ($)
• 1852-1885 Queensland Customs House Shipping 1852-1885: Passengers And Crew at FindMyPast; index only ($)
• 1864-1940 Australia, Queensland, Immigration indexes, 1864-1940 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index only
• 1885-1917 Queensland, Brisbane Register Of Immigrants 1885-1917 at FindMyPast; index only ($)
• 1913 Queensland, Australia, Index to Aliens, 1913 at Ancestry; index only ($)
• State Library of Queensland

Victoria

• 1839-1871 Index to Assisted British Immigration 1839-1871; index only
• 1839-1871 Australia, Victoria, Assisted Immigrant Arrivals at Victorian Ports, 1839-1871 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; images only
• 1839-1923 Australia, Victoria, Inward Passenger Lists, 1839-1923 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index & images
• 1839-1923 Victoria, Australia, Assisted and Unassisted Passenger Lists, 1839-1923 at Ancestry; index & images ($)
• 1851-1928 Victoria, Australia, Index to Naturalisation Certificates, 1851-1928 at Ancestry; index & images ($)
• 1852-1915 Outward Passengers to Interstate, UK, NZ, and Foreign Ports 1852- 1915
• 1852-1915 Web: Victoria, Australia, Outward Passenger Index, 1852-1915 at Ancestry; index only ($)
• 1852-1923 Inwards Unassisted Passengers to Victoria 1852-1923 at MyHeritge; index only ($)
• 1852-1923 Index to Unassisted Immigration to Victoria between 1852 - 1923
• 1852-1924 Australia, Victoria Coastal Passenger Lists, 1852-1924 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index & images
• 1852-1924 Australia, Victoria, Outward Passenger Lists, 1852-1924 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index only

South Australia

• Passenger Lists Immigration South Australia, index. Immigrant passenger arrivals in South Australia (usually at Port Adelaide) from Australian ports up to 1847, UK & Ireland up to 1850 and Germany up to 1858, totaling more than 2,000 voyages.
• 1836-1841 Emigrants Seeking Free Passage To South Australia 1836-1841 at FindMyPast - index ($)
• 1836-1849 Chronological list of passenger lists for ships arriving at South Australian ports from overseas 1836-1849 at FamilySearch Catalog; images only
• 1837-1866German Emigrants to South Australia, 1837-1866, index
• 1849-1940 Australia, South Australia, Immigrants Ship Papers, 1849-1940 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index & images
• 1853 - South Australia, Australia, Passenger Lists, 1853 at Ancestry; index & images ($)

• 1888-1893, 1896-1940 Australia, South Australia, Lists of outgoing passengers departing from Port Adelaide for overseas ports, 1888-1893, 1896-1940 at FamilySearch Catalog; index & images

Tasmania

• 1829-1957 Tasmania, Australia, Passenger Arrivals, 1829-1957 at Ancestry; index & images ($)
• 1834-1837, 1841-1887 Tasmania, Passenger and Crew Lists, 1834-1837, 1841-1887 at Ancestry; index & images ($)
• 1841-1884 Tasmania, Australia, Immigrant Lists, 1841-1884 at Ancestry; index & images ($)
• 1854-1887 Tasmania, Australia, Immigrant Applications and Bounty Tickets, 1854-1887 at Ancestry; index & images ($)
• 1920-1943 Australia, Tasmania, Correspondence of the Immigration Office Concerning the Nomination, Arrival and Settlement of Migrants, 1920-1943 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; images only
• 1945-1968 Australia, Tasmania, Migrant Files, 1945-1968 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; images only

Western Australia

• 1852-1930 Western Australia, Australia, Crew and Passenger Lists, 1852-1930 at Ancestry; index & images ($)
• 1897-1963 Fremantle, Western Australia, Passenger Lists, 1897-1963 at Ancestry; index & images ($)

Australia Offices and Archives to Contact

National Archives of Australia
National Office
Kings Avenue
Parkes ACT 2600
Australia

Phone:02 6212 3600

• Ordering digital copies of records
• Fact sheets

• Immigration records - Fact sheet 227
• Records relating to Italian migration held in Sydney – Fact sheet 100
• Records relating to Italian migration held in Brisbane – Fact sheet 236
• Records relating to Italian migration held in Brisbane – Fact sheet 207

• Research Guides

• Chinese immigrants and Chinese-Australians in NSW, by Julie Stacker and Peri Stewart, revised 2003
• More people imperative: immigration to Australia, 1901–39, by Dr Michele Langfield, 1999
• Good British stock: child and youth migration to Australia, by Barry Coldrey, 1999
• Safe haven: records of the Jewish experience in Australia, by Malcolm J Turnbull, 1999
• Chinese–Australian journeys: records on travel, migration, and settlement, 1860–1975, by Paul Jones, 2005
• Citizenship in Australia: a guide to Commonwealth Government records, by David Dutton, 2000

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State Library of South Australia
North Terrace and Kintore Avenue
Adelaide, Australia

Phone us: +61 8 8207 7250
Toll free for regional SA: 1800 182 013
Email us: slsainfo@sa.gov.au
Family History FAQ's

• Guide: Immigration to South Australia: Home

Finding the Town of Origin in Australia

If you are using emigration/immigration records to find the name of your ancestors' town in Australia, see Australia Finding Town of Origin for additional research strategies.

Australia Emigration and Immigration

"Emigration" means moving out of a country. "Immigration" means moving into a country.
Emigration and immigration sources list the names of people leaving (emigrating) or arriving (immigrating) in the country. These sources may be passenger lists, permissions to emigrate, or records of passports issued. The information in these records may include the emigrants’ names, ages, occupations, destinations, and places of origin or birthplaces. Sometimes they also show family groups.

Immigration into Australia

• Between 1788 and 1900 over 1,000,000 people immigrated to Australia. Most of them were from the British Isles, but some were from Europe and Asia.
  
• Prior to 1900 there were four classes of immigrants to Australia:

• Convicts sent to Australia after they were tried and convicted for crimes committed in the British Isles. Tasmania and New South Wales were the states that received most of the convicts before 1830.
  
• Bounty immigrants were chosen by Australian colonists to come from the British Isles to Australia.
• Assisted immigrants came to Australia through the financial assistance of the government, organizations, or wealthy individuals.
• Paying passengers came to Australia through their own means.

Emigrants Leaving Another Country

Some information about emigrants leaving country were also kept. These outward-bound records include the names of passenger and crew members and sometimes additional information such as an individual’s age, marital status, occupation, and nationality.

Between 1848 and 1850 over 4,000 adolescent female orphans emigrated from Irish workhouses to Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide on the other side of the world. Their emigration has become known as the ‘Earl Grey scheme’ after its principal architect, Earl Grey, Secretary of State for the Colonies in Lord John Russell’s Whig government at the time of the Great Irish Famine.

The Australian Famine Orphan Monument lists lists the names of 400 of the girls brought to the colonies of Australia from Ireland under this scheme.

National Archives of Ireland also has records of Irish who were transported to Australia.  Enter 'Australia' in the search box to discover the many subjects covered www.nationalarchives.ie/ .

Britain Outward Passenger Lists from Britain On-line 1890-1960. Departure records before 1890 have not survived.

From Germany In an article by Karl Werner Klüber were listed emigrants from Hamburg bound for Australia in the years 1849-1851. The lists of passengers can be found in the periodical GENEALOGIE Heft 4, April 1966 page 186, available through the Family History Library, Salt Lake City, Utah (FHL book number  943 B2gf .)

Greek Immigration to Australia

Books about Emigration and Immigration

• Vine Hall, Nick. Tracing Your Family History in Australia: a guide (Family History Library Call Number 994 D23V . There are also several source books about how to find emigration and immigration records. These books are listed in the Place Search of the FamilySearch Catalog under:

AUSTRALIA, [STATE] - EMIGRATION AND IMMIGRATION- HANDBOOKS, MANUALS, ETC.

To find these records at the Family History Library, look in the Place Search of the FamilySearch Catalog for a lengthy listing of sources under:

AUSTRALIA - EMIGRATION AND IMMIGRATION

AUSTRALIA, [STATE] - EMIGRATION AND IMMIGRATION

AUSTRALIA, [STATE], [TOWN] - EMIGRATION AND IMMIGRATION

Indexes of emigration and immigration records are listed in the FamilySearch Catalog under:

AUSTRALIA - EMIGRATION AND IMMIGRATION - INDEXES

AUSTRALIA, [STATE- EMIGRATION AND IMMIGRATION - INDEXES]

AUSTRALIA, [STATE], [TOWN] - EMIGRATION AND IMMIGRATION - INDEXES

A wiki article describing an online collection is found at:

• Australia, New South Wales, Sydney Index to Bounty Immigrants - FamilySearch Historical Records

For Further Reading

• Listen to the podcast: Transportation to Australia Over 162,000 British and Irish convicts were transported to Australia between 1787 and 1868. Roger Kershaw explores the reasons behind the policy of transportation and looks at the experiences of the people who were shipped beyond the seas, using case studies from the archives.
• Bound For South Australia: Passenger Lists 1836-1851

CD

Online Resources

• Oz Ships, Australian Shipping, 1788-1968
• Australia's First Fleet
• Australia's Second Fleet
• Australia's Third Fleet
• Convict transportation registers database
• Ireland-Australia transportation database, National Archives of Ireland

This website requires a paid subscription for full access. Some subscription websites are available for free at your local FamilySearch Center or Affiliate Library.

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Family History Library (FHL); now called, FamilySearch Library (FSL)