American passengers arrival records : a guide to the records of immigrants arriving at American ports by sail and steam

"Lured by opportunity or driven by necessity, millions of people made their way to America in the most determined and sustained migration the world has ever known. Initially they left traces of their immigration in scattered records and documents; later, their arrival in this country was documented so minutely that the records resulting from this documentation are among the largest, the most continuous, and the most uniform in the nation's archives. [...] In sheer volume these records are intimading, their contents unwieldy and difficult to use. The object of this book is to cut them down to size, to make them accessible, and to help wring information from them. Thus it examines the records in their historical and legal framework, and it explains what they contain, where they can be found, and how they can be used. In effect, it is a road map through the mass of records and archival resources that document the arrival of immigrants in America from the time of the earliest settlements to the passage of the Quota Acts three centuries later."--Provided by the publisher.