Queensland Customs House Shipping Index 1852-1885

"Queensland Customs House Shipping 1852-1885 Passengers and Crew" is an exciting new index compiled from Brisbane Customs House records (Shipping Inwards Series J715) held at the Brisbane Office of the National Archives of Australia. It is a vital resource for genealogists and others who are researching merchant mariners or passengers from Europe to Queensland.

Note that this index includes over 90 voyages that are not in the Queensland State Archives online index.

Most voyages were to Brisbane, but there are a few from Brisbane to an overseas port. The ships sailed from Batavia, Boston, Dundee, Glasgow, Greenock, Hamburg, Hong Kong, Liverpool, London, New York, Newcastle on Tyne, Plymouth, Queenstown, Singapore, San Francisco, Sydney, the South Sea Islands and Southampton. (Queenstown is the old name for Cobh, the port for Cork, Ireland.)

For some ships there are two lists, one prepared at the time of departure and another on arrival. Some of the records are for ships that carried passengers but were not specifically migrant vessels.

Each person's entry may include name, title, age, sex, marital status, occupation, nationality, whether passenger or crew, comments, ship, year and port of departure/arrival, etc.

The index is available on CD-ROM from the Queensland Family History Society. It is also online at FindMyPast. Some given names are abbreviated in the records, so you may need to search for an initial or an abbreviation (eg, 'Chas' for Charles). Searching is free at FindMyPast. To see transcriptions you need either pay-as-you-go credits or a one-month or twelve-month subscription.

(This post first appeared on http://qld-genealogy.blogspot.com.au/.)

C is for Cooktown, Croydon and Cunnamulla

For the letter 'C' in the 'Family History Through the Alphabet' challenge, I was tempted to write about cemeteries, churches and family surnames such as Campbell, Capsticks, Clark and Corduex. Instead I decided to list three Queensland towns whose records I have indexed.

C is for...

• Cooktown.  In the 1800s, Cooktown was the main port for the North Queensland gold fields. Local hospital records, which are very useful for family history, give information about people from all walks of life, including miners, sailors and railway workers. Many had spent time in other parts of Australia and in New Guinea and New Zealand. I have indexed Cooktown Hospital admission registers and some local petitions and school records.


• Croydon.  Another North Queensland mining town for which I have indexed hospital admission registers. During the 1880s, 70% of those admitted to Croydon hospital were born in Britain or Ireland, and about 15% were born in Australia's southern states, especially the Victorian goldfields. Some residents of Croydon moved to Western Australia when gold was discovered there. The index to Croydon Hospital admissions is now online, with Archives source location numbers.


• Cunnamulla.  My home town! I have indexed various records for Cunnamulla, Eulo and Thargomindah in southwest Queensland.

You will find more tips for family history in my other articles in this series.

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'Friedeburg' 1878: passengers / crew

These passengers and crew are mentioned in papers of quarantine of the ship Friedeburg (arrived 1878) in Queensland Colonial Secretary's Office correspondence:

Friedrick ANDERSEN (ship's crew)
Auguste CARLSON (died)
Ottilie EBEL
child FROST (born prematurely, died)
Elinore FROST (died)
Jurgen HAHN
Metha HANSEN
Heinrich HEININGER
Oscar HENNEBERG (ship's crew)
Fritz HINSPETER
George HOLST (ship's crew)
Wilhelmina KIRST
Carl LARSSON (ship's crew)
Amalie LINDENBERG
Caroline MADSEN
Fred MADSEN
Elizabeth NIEBELING
Martin NIELSEN (ship's crew)
Ellen NUGENT (died; from 'Scottish Admiral')
Catharina OLIVA
Mrs PETERSEN (re a birth)
Trina PETERSEN (died)
Lauritz PETERSON
Dorothea REICHE
Christian SCHADLICH
Mrs UTZ
Wilhelm WEINKEN
Amalie WEISS
Hulda WEISS
Wilhelm WEISS.

If you need my help to obtain a copy of this document from Queensland State Archives (the cost would be about $20), email me at the address shown in the sidebar here.

If you are not familiar with in-letters, see:

• I is for In-Letters and Invalid Pensions (opens in a new window)


• more examples of information in Col.Sec. in-letters (scroll down on that page).