Review: “The Great Migration Directory”
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The Great Migration Directory: Immigrants to New England, 1620-1640: A Concise Compendium
By Robert Charles Anderson, FASG
Published by the New England Historic Genealogical Society; 2015
99 – 101 Newbury St., Boston, MA 02116
Available on Amazon or at American Ancestors
If your research involves ancestors who immigrated from England to New England during the early part of the 17th century, then this book is a must-have for your genealogy bookshelf. Author Robert Charles Anderson, FASG, spent the past almost three decades at the helm of The Great Migration Study Project in an attempt to document every individual who settled in New England during the Great Migration. The resulting Great Migration Directory is the compilation of this precise and painstaking research.
About This Book
According to Mr. Anderson, “The Great Migration” is the term used for the movement of Europeans, mostly English men, women, and children, to New England between the sailing of the Mayflower in 1620 and the outbreak of the English Civil War in 1640.” During that time period, it is thought that approximately 20,000 immigrants crossed the Atlantic, with the majority of them traveling between 1634 and 1640.
The twelve volumes previously published for The Great Migration Study Project included detailed biographical and genealogical profiles for about half of those immigrants, covering the time period of 1620 to 1635. The Great Migration Directory takes a different approach, providing concise entries for every known immigrant during the entire period of the Great Migration. Each entry gives the immigrant’s name, English origin (last known residence), year of arrival in New England, New England residence(s), citations (best available sources), and additional comments, when relevant.
A Look Inside
The Great Migration Directory is divided into three sections.
The Introduction begins with a detailed explanation of the three-step process used to create individual entries for The Great Migration Directory. The first step was to compile a list of “all available records generated in New England between 1636 and 1640. This resulted in a five-page list of records, from which all names appearing by May of 1641 were extracted and entered into a database.
In the second step, the database was merged with the list of sketches already created for the previously published Great Migration volumes, covering the years 1620 to 1635.
The third step required creating concise entries for each head of household or “isolated individual” in the merged list, including those who arrived between 1636 and 1640 and were not covered in previous volumes.
The Introduction also includes detailed explanations of how to read the entries, the author’s scope of research, a complete listing of sources, and maps of the Great Migration Towns included in the study.
The second part of The Great Migration Directory is a bibliography of all books used as secondary sources for the individual entries, as well as a key to the abbreviations used for each. If an individual immigrated between 1620 and 1635 and was included in the previous Great Migration volumes, then that information will be noted, along with any contemporaneous records in which the individual was found, and any useful secondary sources located since the previous Great Migration volumes were published.
For individuals who immigrated between 1636 and 1640, contemporaneous records will be noted. Every effort was made to find secondary sources for these individuals, although this was not always possible. The author notes that only those secondary sources thought to be the most beneficial to researchers are included in The Great Migration Directory.
In the third part of The Great Migration Directory, 390 pages of individual immigrant entries are listed in alphabetical order of surnames. One special page titled “Africans” names the only three identified immigrants to New England thought to be of African origin.
The book includes an index section, which lists supplemental names (those that appear with other entries), European place names, American place names, and ship names.
Completeness
While every attempt was made to document all known immigrants who were part of the Great Migration, it is possible that an individual may have been missed.
If you believe that a Great Migration ancestor for whom you have reliable documentation is not included in The Great Migration Directory, contact the author, Mr. Anderson, at [email protected]. He will be collecting additions and corrections for a future publication.
Note: This article first appeared in the Federation of Genealogical Societies FORUM magazine (Summer, 2016); reprinted with permission.
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