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Immigration Information

An image of a Bark class tall ship similar to the one our family immigrated to the United State on:

Letter received from Gerald W. Block

As you may now know, George Frederick Block and family immigrated to the U.S. aboard the Bremen Bark Constitution, arriving in New Orleans May 31, 1846. I obtained the Captain’s passenger list and the port’s Quarterly Abstract from the National Archives and have now completed transcribing and posting this information on the ISTG (Immigrant Ships Transcribers Guild) website at:

NOTE: Gerald's original link to "geocities" no longer works, so I have changed it to the current link:

https://immigrantships.net/1800/constitution460531.html

You might want to review the site to see the family and their friends from the village of Lassan, Germany who traveled with them: the Witt family and two young men, August Knuppel and August Schunemann. (I located August Knuppel farming in Tyler County in 1850, but haven’t been able yet to trace the others.) You can also find out how many guns the Blocks brought to Texas and other interesting things.

Additional information about the sailing vessel Constitution can be found at "Immigrant Ships" at:

NOTE: Gerald's original link to "geocities" no longer works, so I have copied the paragraph that described the vessel here:

The Bremen bark CONSTITUTION was built at Vegesack/Grohn by Johann Lange, for the Bremen firm of H. H. Meier & Co, and was launched on 7 November 1833, as the successor to the brig of the same name, built in 1820, that had been lost earlier in the year. 127 Commerzlasten; 27,6 x 7,7 x 4,7 meters (length x beam x depth of hold). She sailed for almost 25 years in the packet service between Bremerhaven and New York. Captains (in turn): J. F. Volckmann, G. C. Ahlhorn, J. F. G. E. G. Thormann, Hermann Rothfos, F. G. Schelling, J. D. Luth, W. Lauer, and Jürgen Hake. She was sold in Bangkok in 1859; her later history and ultimate fate are not known.

Source: Peter-Michael Pawlik, Von der Weser in die Welt; Die Geschichte der Segelschiffe von Weser und Lesum und ihrer Bauwerften 1770 bis 1893, Schriften des Deutschen Schiffahrtsmuseums, Bd. 33 (Hamburg: Kabel, c1993), p. 181, no. 121.

On the Lassan Page there is a nice little photo of the village and a map. No hotels, but there are bed-and-breakfast type rooms in Lassan.

If you’d like to see the microfilm of Captain Rothfos’ original handwritten list and the Quarterly Abstract, I have arranged to have these permanently available at the LDS Family History Center in Orange for us and other Block family researchers. The Center is located at the LDS church off highway 87 a few miles north of Orange. They’re open Tue-Thur. Ask for microfilm rolls LDS# 200155 and 200237. You can make printed copies.

By strange coincidence, the ISTG dated my transcription posting as March 18, 1999, the day daddy died. I thought that was fitting, since daddy enjoyed and helped me so much with Block genealogy. Daddy remembered his own Grandpa Charles Block well. Charles, or "Carl", is on the passenger list. He was 9 years old.

Information From Derek Block

There are some interesting notes at the end of the manifest page (immigrant ships link above) by another cousin, Derek Block, which I have loosely transcribed here:

The family resided in Lassan, Pomerania, Prussia, and relocated to Texas via Bremerhaven in 1846. Their entry port was New Orleans. During their journey to America, the outbreak of the Mexican American War delayed their plans to sail to Galveston, Texas, as it was a naval port threatened by Mexico.

Emilie Block, the only daughter of Georg Friedrich from a previous marriage, was nineteen when she married Georg Heinrich Habighorst, a sugar refiner. They married on May 23, 1849, in New Orleans. After the war ended and Emilie's marriage, the Block family proceeded to Texas, adhering to the original plan listed on the passenger manifest of the Bremen barque Constitution.

They settled in Beaumont, TX, in 1849 and later established their homes in Grigsby's Bluff, now known as Port Neches, Texas, and Orange, Texas.