Arrivals, immigration, and departures

What else is there?

• 1829-1865 Index to passenger arrivals and departures from early Launceston newspapers
• 1841-1889 Index of assisted immigrants to Tasmania
• 1829-1865 Unassisted immigrants & coastal passengers to Hobart, Tasmania (Microfiche)
• 1960-1981 State Immigration Office – Migrant files (M1 – M7371) Files of British migrants arriving under the Joint Agreement between the United Kingdom and the Australian Government (AA59)

Records used for information on immigrant arrivals

• 1827-1833 Register of ships’ arrivals with lists of passengers (CUS30)
• 1912-1924 Immigration and intelligence Branch – Forms of nomination of persons to migrate to Tasmania on assisted passages nos 1-297 (SWD15)
• 1920-1943 Industrial Department/Social Welfare Department – Correspondence of the Immigration Office concerning the nomination, arrival and settlement of migrants (SWD4)
• 1946-1982 State Immigration Office – Index to migrant files (AA344)
• 1965-1966 Index to Swiss migrants (AA78)

Agencies responsible for immigration

• 1841-1855 Immigration Agents Department
• 1855-1885 Immigration Board
• 1886-1910 Chief Secretary’s Department – Immigration Committee
• Immigration Bureaus in Hobart and Launceston took over work from the Immigration Committees from 1908
• 1911-1924 Immigration Branch, Agricultural Department
• 1924-1930 Industrial Department
• 1930-1946 Charitable Grants /Social Services
• 1946-1982 State Immigration Office

Library resources

• Settlers in Tasmania
• Immigration in Tasmania

Notes

People could have arrived in Tasmania as:

• Unassisted passengers – they paid their own way
• Assisted passengers – subsidised or paid for by an immigration scheme
• Crew on a ship
• Military
• Convicts

Finding ancestors in early immigration records can be a challenge, especially if they arrive as free settlers in the 1800s.

Most records are for the Port of Hobart. Few records have survived from other ports. It can be worth checking passenger lists for other colonies such as South Australia and Victoria as ships carrying passengers to Tasmania often called there.

Find out more about the history of immigration to Tasmania 1803-1946