Jersey Emigration

Emigration from Jersey

This page contains links to a wide-ranging selection of articles on Jersey people who emigrated to all parts of the globe.

Coeur de Lion, a wooden sailing ship built in Jersey, pictured at Port Adelaide, Australia.The 848-ton vessel had double topsails on the fore and mainmasts. She was built in 1867 at the Le Vesconte shipyard and owned by the Jersey Shipping Company . The date of this photograph is not known. It is in the collection of the State Library of South Australia

Australia

• Emigration to Australia in the 1850s, an article by Jersey Archive highlighting islanders' participation in the Gold Rush
• Lemprieres in Australia and Tasmania, a distinguished artist and his wool trader descendants
• Henry John Aubin
• The journal of Philip John Pinel, an emigrant to Tasmania
• Francois William Balcam, a Jerseyman who emigrated to Victoria, Australia
• A Pallot family tree including emigrants to Australia
• Clement William Hemery, emigrant to Australia and ancestor of Olympic gold medal winner David Hemery
• The migrant Le Couteurs - Introduction, a series of articles on brothers who emigrated to Australia in the 19th century
• James William Filleul, a carpenter who jumped ship in Tasmania and became a farmer
• Transported convict Edward Anquetil
• Philip Laurens, emigrant to Australia
• J A Hamon, a Jerseyman in newspaper reports
• The ''Exact's'' voyage to Melbourne
• John Le Cornu, well-respected council clerk in Australia
• Charles Le Brocq
• George Sinel, deported convict
• Deslandes emigrants' story
• Robilliard sail makers, A guernseyman who moved to Jersey and eventually emigrated to Australia
• William Henry Arrowsmith, an emigrant from Jersey who participated in a gold rush
• Captain Charles Bisson, a seagoing Jerseyman who emigrated to Australia
• Julia Mary Marquand, a Jersey girl who was taken to Australia by her mother after the death of her father, and became the third wife of a 'man' who turned out to be a woman.
• Elizabeth Nicolle
• Isaac and Elizabeth Vincent, a successful New South Wales businesswoman from Jersey
• William and Henry Dumaresq, Army officer brothers who settled in New South Wales
• Death of a Jersey-born fireman in Adelaide Added 2021

Advertisements in Jersey newspapers in the 19th century were encouraging Jersey families to emigrate to New Zealand

New Zealand

• Channel Islanders New Zealand Bound - Olwyn Whitehouse's web site
• Vautier family who emigrated to New Zealand in 1874
• John Hemery and the Bengal Merchant, a Jerseyman's ship and the first Scottish colonists
• William Gosset, the British Major General from Jersey who retired to New Zealand with his family
• Le Breton emigrants to New Zealand
• Sinels in New Zealand
• Amice John Bertram
• John Philip Gallienne, a seaman who emigrated to New Zealand
• Frederic Helleur, a New Zealand emigrant who landed on the wrong island and stayed
• Philippe Dolbel, farmed with his brother and owned 25,000 sheep
• Augustus Philip Samson, an account of his emigration to New Zealand in 1875
• Jean Aubin of Pirongia, New Zealand
• Edward Bartley, prominent Auckland builder and architect, and collector of microscopes
• Journal of A Marjoribanks A journey to New Zealand in 1846
• Life as settlers in New Zealand's remote South Island
• John Helier Vautier, emigrant to New Zealand and second Mayor of Napier
• Migration from Jersey to New Zealand in the 1870's, 2019 paper by Mark Boleat
• NZ Le Gallais siblings in Great War
• Edward and Mary Ann Queree to New Zealand

North America

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This is the area of Canada's eastern seaboard where many emigrants from Jersey settled. At the top of the map is the Gaspe peninsular, part of Quebec province, with New Brunswick province below, and then Nova Scotia. At the eastern extreme of Nova Scotia is Cape Breton Island where many families originating from Jersey were granted tracts of land

The substantial scale of emigration from Jersey to the Canadian eastern seaboard in the late 18th century can be gauged by this table published in Magasin de l'Ile de Jersey in July 1785. It shows 59 ships departing with 957 crewmen and 743 additional passengers. These numbers represented some 8 per cent of the Jersey's population at the time. Although the majority of the crewmen would return to the island at the end of the annual cod fishing season, as well as some of the passengers, most of whom were probably land-based employees of the Jersey businesses operating in Canada, a significant number of islanders probably chose to remain living permanently on the other side of the Atlantic. Click on this image to view full size

Canada

• Emigrants to Canada, a full alphabetical index to emigrants to Gaspé, Newfoundland etc
• Cape Breton Island petitioners
• Pierre Duval: Emigrant to Ile Bonaventure Added 2022
• Janvrin's Island, the story of the Janvrin family in Canada
• Trachy family in Gaspé
• A Pallot family tree including emigrants to Canada
• Descendants of Mathieu de Ste Croix, the family in Jersey and Canada
• Nicolas Francois de Ste Croix, the story of a Jersey emigrant and his family's struggle to establish themselves in Canada
• Viberts in Canada, a descendant's tale of an emigrant family
• Poidevin family emigrants to Canada
• Cape Breton Island, a destination for many Jersey emigrants to Canada
• The Origins of the Béchervaise Family in Gaspé
• My Dear Mary Ann, letters to a Le Marquand in Canada
• A history of the first settlers of Western Bay, (North), the story of 'Jersey Nick' Perry and other settlers in Newfoundland
• The story of Eleazar Bishop, John Bishop, emigrant from Connecticut to Nova Scotia, son of a boy kidnapped from Jersey
• Photographs of Jersey family members who emigrated to Canada
• Elias William Touet, history of a Jerseyman who emigrated to Canada, then the USA
• Oswald Bisson, a Jerseyman who emigrated to Canada and took over his father-in-law's store in British Columbia
• John Janvrin: An island off the Canadian Atlantic coast was named after him
• John Le Boutillier: A Jerseyman who started his own business in Gaspe and became a successful politician there
• Joshua Mauger, sea captain and businessman in Nova Scotia, and then the first Jerseyman to become a member of the British Parliament
• Josue Falle: Ran the business established in Newfoundland by his uncles before returning to Jersey a wealthy man, to become a Deputy, Constable and eventually to follow his father as a Jurat.
• Aubin to Oben in Vancouver, an emigrant family from Jersey
• John Le Breton: Soldier, farmer, mill owner
• Brehm de Gruchy: A Jerseyman who emigrated to Canada at the age of 14 to work in the cod industry*The Sorsoleils of Jersey Cove, the strange story of a Jersey family who abruptly left their Gaspe home to head to the USA
• Early relations between Newfoundland and the Channel Islands

United States

• The Cabot family, a famous name in America
• John Bailhache, American journalist and newspaper proprietor and his sons
• The Besoms of Marblehead
• Balleines in New York
• Deans in America
• Romeril family to Utah, a family of 13 emigrants
• The Jersey Messervys who became Meserve in the USA
• Meserve family in the USA 1
• Meserve family in the USA 2
• The Gossetts of Pensylvania and Virginia, are they descended from two Jersey brothers?
• Descendants of Julien Duchemin (1729-1767), Huguenots who moved to America via Jersey
• Descendants of Edward Poingdestre/Pendexter, the Pendexter family of Maine, USA
• The brothers who emigrated to the USA and were killed by Indians
• The story of Eleazar Bishop, kidnapped from Jersey as a boy with his dog
• The ''Chimborazo'' and Jersey Mormon pioneer emigrants an article with links to a number of articles about Mormon pioneers from the island
• Nicholas Anthoine, 'kidnapped' at the age of ten and taken to America
• Capt Augustine Jean emigrant to Massachusetts
• Abraham Dupre, sea captain
• Elizabeth Adelaide Dolbel - from Jersey to Utah
• Annie Horman, Utah pioneer
• Jean Thoreau, privateer
• A Morman caravan across America
• Jean Laugee, captured by American Indians, a Jerseyman, or was he?: The story of an American immigrant, supposedly from Jersey, involved in a major incident in the country's history. NEW
• Elias William Touet, history of a Jerseyman who emigrated to Canada, then the USA
• Extracts from the register of King's Chapel and Trinity Church, Boston, Channel Island family names in the USA
• Philippe Gavey: 17th century emigrant to New England, founder of the Gavet family

South Africa

• 19th century Payn emigrants in South Africa

Further Reading

• Turk, Marion, Quiet Adventurers in North America (1983)
• Turk, Marion, Quiet Adventurers in Canada (1979)

Three adverts encouraging emigration to Australia in Chronique de Jersey in 1850

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