Imported Americans: The Story of the Experiences of a Disguised American and His Wife Studying the Immigration QuestionBrandenburg, Broughton
History
Imported Americans: The Story of the Experiences of a Disguised American and His Wife Studying the Immigration Question
Brandenburg, Broughton
Italy -- Emigration and immigration; United States -- Emigration and immigration
Concetta Fomica was the only one of our party whom the doctors examined
more than once. Her eyes were inflamed slightly, but she was passed.
Just where we turned to the right, a stern-looking woman inspector, with
the badge, stood looking at all the women who came up to select any
whose moral character might be questioned, and one of her procedures was
to ask each party as to the various relationships of the men and women
in it. Her Italian was good.
Passing west, we came to the waiting-rooms, in which the groups which
are entered on each sheet of the manifest are held until K sheet or L
sheet, whatever their letter may be, is reached. Our party being so
large, and some of the declarations which are used to fill out the items
on the manifest having been made at Messina, some at Reggio di Calabria,
and some at Naples, we were scattered through U, V, and W groups.
We sank down on the wooden benches, thankful to get seats once more. Our
eyes pained severely for some few minutes as a result of the turning up
of the lids, but the pain passed.
[Illustration: Stairway of Separation—Checking into Pens]
Somewhere about nine o’clock an official came by and hurried out U group
and passed it up into line along the railed way which led up to the
inspector who had U sheet, then came V group, and then W. Knowing that
the first into line would be the first passed, and having the task of
gathering our people together out of the crowd as fast as they were
passed, my wife and I hurried to the end of the lane and were among the
first before the inspector. Our papers were all straight, we were
correctly entered on the manifest, and had abundant money, had been
passed by the doctors, and were properly destined to New York, and so
were passed in less than one minute. We were classed as “New York
Outsides” to distinguish us from the “New York Detained,” who await the
arrival of friends to receive them; “Railroads,” who go to the stations
for shipment; and “S. I.’s,” by which is meant those unfortunates who
are subjected to Special Inquiry in the semi-secret Special Inquiry
Court, which is the preliminary to being sent back, though of course
only a portion of “S. I.’s” are sent back.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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