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The point of arrival at Hull in 1837. Hull from the Humber, c.1837 (Oil on canvas). Painting by John Ward (1798–1849). Reproduced by kind permission of Ferens Art Gallery: Hull City Museums & Art Gallery. An early steamer can be seen to the left of the painting outside of the pub owned by one of Hull’s early emigration agents. During this early stage in the development of North Sea passenger services, the steamers that plied the North Sea berthed alongside Hull’s only landing stage on the banks of the River Humber. Having landed at the Pier area, migrants would have then had their luggage inspected at the Customs House (to the far right of this painting). From 1840 passengers could traverse Britain via the direct rail link connecting Hull and Liverpool - or catch the steamer from the pier (behind the sailing ship) to the nearby port of Grimsby.

Between 1836 and 1914, over thirty million European immigrants entered the United States of America.1 Millions of others arrived in Canada, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and Argentina. They left in search of freedom and opportunity of a degree not found in their native Europe. The Europe they left behind was suffering from the effects of rapid urbanisation, agrarian depression and population increase. Life was difficult enough without the extremes of harvest failure or religious persecution, factors that encouraged would-be migrants into taking the decision to migrate to the other side of the world - when most had never ventured beyond their provincial borders. Theodore Blegen, Irving Howe and Philip Taylor have all produced detailed narratives of the journey from mainland Europe to the US, and described those areas within America in which these European immigrants eventually settled.2 Charlotte Erickson and William Jones have studied the millions of British emigrants who left Britain during this period.3 Others, such as Thomas Appleton, Francis Hyde, Laurence Dunn, and Wilton Oldham, have highlighted the role played by powerful British shipping lines such as Allan, Cunard, Union and Castle, and White Star, in the movement of millions of migrants across the Atlantic and to the southern hemisphere.4 The existing historiographical works provide a detailed explanation of how the majority of European immigrants arrived in New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Quebec, Cape Town, Sydney, Buenos Aires and Auckland and the patterns that emerge through the analysis of their journey to the 'New World’.

The purpose of this paper, and my Ph.D., is to examine those European migrants who made the decision to travel to the US and further afield indirectly via the UK. Such indirect migration represented a sizeable portion of the total number leaving Europe, particularly of those leaving the northern European countries of Finland, Germany, Norway, Poland, Russia and Sweden. Though 30 million European immigrants entered the US between 1836 and 1914, up to five million transmigrants, or 20 per cent of the total number of immigrants, passed through the UK. The migrants entered the UK via the eastern ports of Harwich, Hull, Grimsby, Leith, London, Newcastle and West Hartlepool. From these ports of arrival the transmigrants were then transported by train to the ports of Glasgow, Liverpool, London and Southampton, from where they could embark on the next stage in their journey. Though London served as the main port of entry for the millions of European immigrants entering the UK, it was the Humber ports of Hull and Grimsby that handled the majority of the transmigrants travelling via the UK - because the journey from the Humber to Liverpool was the shortest route in terms of time and distance to travel across the country. Of the five million European migrants who did arrive in the country between 1836 and 1914, over three million (or sixty per cent), did so via the Humber ports of Hull and Grimsby.

The significance of the level of this transient or indirect migration begs two important questions. Firstly, why did so many take the indirect route when it would have made more sense to travel directly rather than having the inconvenience of disembarkation, sanitary inspections, overland transport in the UK, and then the embarkation process for a second time? Secondly, why was the Humber to Liverpool route so dominant in this particular type of international migration?

Various explanations for these questions can be offered. The indirect route split the journey for travel weary migrants who were not used to travelling in ships for up to 24 days, and who had adequate space allocated to them in the 'tween decks (the cramped third class sections of the ship where the transmigrants were usually housed). For those of the Jewish faith, indirect travel allowed them to restock on kosher food for the transatlantic sea journey that traditionally offered limited provision for the kosher diet other than bread and herrings. The dominance of the Humber - Liverpool route could similarly be explained by the Humber’s geographic location as a gateway from northern Europe, the provision of regular train services to London and Liverpool, and in the landing facilities that the two ports had developed since the 1840s when the earliest transmigrants began arriving via the two towns.

But it seems that the key to this unusual trading pattern along the Humber to Liverpool route was the provision and cost of shipping from the Baltic and Scandinavia. In particular, the development of highly competitive and efficient shipping services by British shipowners seems to lie at the core of the business. British shipping companies had provided facilities to traverse Britain as early as the 1770s with the opening of canal boat services between Hull and Liverpool via the Leeds-Liverpool Canal.5 As demand for North Sea passenger services increased, the British steamship companies began to develop links with some of the earliest railway companies. By the 1880s migrants arriving at Leith, Harwich, Hull, Grimsby, London, Newcastle and West Hartlepool were able to travel from the port of arrival to the port of embarkation with relative ease and speed. At each stage in the evolution of European transmigration, as the number of migrants increased, so did the efficiency with which the rail network handled them.