The ship Chase, Havre to New York, 1856

Source note for the emigration of Luzius Hegnauer (H0001), his wife Anna Margreth Bernet (H0036) and their children Johannes (H0002), Leonhard (H0003), Christina (H0005), Martin (H0006) and Christian (H0007) from Igis, Graubünden. Compiled 2026-09-26 from online research. Each fact carries its source link. Statements marked Inference are my reasoning, not something a document says. "Not re-checked" means the item was found in research but not re-read against the source in the final verification pass.

The passenger list

• Citation: "Passenger Lists of Vessels Arriving at New York, 1820–1897," NARA microfilm publication M237, roll 167 (19 Sep–18 Oct 1856), Records of the U.S. Customs Service, RG 36. The entry is for the ship Chase, from Havre, arrived at New York; NARA and Ancestry date it 30 Sep 1856. The family is on lines 155–161, indexed as "Hegemann". The master's name on the list is illegible.
• Image and index: Ancestry.com, New York passenger lists database (collection 7488), ancestry.com/search/collections/7488/records/1377441
• Free copy of the whole roll: Internet Archive, "Reel 0167", archive.org/details/passengerlistsoo0167unix
• Roll range: NARA's M237 pamphlet gives "167 September 19-October 18, 1856" (archives.gov/files/research/microfilm/m237.pdf).
• The list covers about 6 image pages. That fits the newspapers' figure of about 200 passengers (below), and lines 155–161 fall inside it.

The family as it appears on the list. Names are as abstracted in H0001; ages are as read on the image.

The ages agree with the Igis baptisms (see H0001 and the children's person files). Barbara (H0008) was born in Missouri in 1859.

The vessel

Identification

The Hegnauers' ship was the American full-rigged ship Chace, often printed "Chase". Her master was W. White (probably William) and her owners were G. Bulkley & Son of New York. The newspapers spell the name "George Buckley".

Several vessels named Chase existed, so the identification rests on the Havre arrival of 29 Sep 1856. It is built up in steps:

1. Two independent New York papers print the arrival. The New York Herald of 30 Sep 1856 prints it under the header "Port of New York, September 29, 1856": "Ship Chase, White, Havre 36 days, with mdse and 200 passengers, to George Buckley." (Herald 30 Sep 1856 p.10; I checked the page image. The OCR reads "300", which is wrong.) The New-York Daily Tribune of the same day has: "Ship Chace, White, Havre 36 days, mdse. and 200 passengers to George Buckley." (Tribune 30 Sep 1856 p.8). Ship, port of departure, arrival date and a passenger load consistent with a 6-page list all match the manifest.
2. The Havre end of the voyage is documented under the same master. At Havre on 21 Aug the Chace, White, was in port loading for New York. She sailed on the 22nd, and on 14 Sep another vessel spoke her at sea, "23 days out". See The voyage below.
3. The registers match both master and owner. The New-York Marine Register of 1858 (entry 275) and the American Lloyd's Register of 1859 (entry 347) list the ship Chace with master (W.) White and owner G. Bulkley & Son / G. Buckley. That is the same master as the arrival notice, and the same man as its consignee. In these registers she is the only ship-rigged vessel named Chace or Chase (NY Marine Register 1858, p.22; ALR 1859, p.46; Mystic Seaport register index).
4. Other vessels of the name are excluded:
   • the bark E. A. Chase, master Chase, which arrived from Cadiz on the same day and sits in the same Herald column: "Bark E A Chase, Chase, Cadiz 32 days, with wine and salt, to master" (Herald 30 Sep 1856 p.10);
   • the barks named Chase (masters Chase, Carlton, Raffle) and the schooners named Chase in the 1858–59 registers (Mystic index);
   • a Boston "ship Chase*", master Merrill, which cleared for Calcutta in 1855. The asterisk suggests her name may be longer (Herald 23 Aug 1855 p.8).

Confidence. The voyage (ship Chase/Chace, master White, from Havre, sailed 22 Aug, arrived 29 Sep 1856) is confirmed by several independent printed notices that agree. The link from that voyage to the 625-ton hull built at Warren, R.I. rests on the registers matching both master and owner, with no competing ship of the name. That is strong, and I treat it as confirmed. The one gap is that no single document names both the manifest and the register entry. Reading "White" as the master's name on the manifest itself would close it (see Open questions).

Particulars

Sources.

• 1858 register. Page image l037-r.gif, entry 275: "Chace … White | S. | 1½– | 625 | 15 | 2 | O.C. | C.I. | '53 | 1850 | Warren, R.I. | … | N.Y. | G. Bulkley & Son. | M | Dk. Cabn. O. '56 | Oct.'56". Item page: research.mysticseaport.org/item/l0237571858/#37.
• ALR 1859. Page image l043-r.gif, entry 347: "Chace … W. White | 1½– | 625 | 2 | 15 | o. c. | C. I. | May'51 | 1850 | Warren, R. I. | N.Y. | G. Buckley | Dk. Cabin | Bos. Mar.'59".

Origins (plausible, from Google Books snippets that could not be re-read because of a CAPTCHA). The WPA Ship Registers and Enrollments of Bristol-Warren, R.I. gives the Chace of Warren as 625 41/95 tons and 133 ft × 32 ft 4 in × 16 ft 2 in. Her owners were Philip Chace and Jesse Davis of Warren, with Philip Chace as master. She was enrolled at Warren on 13 Aug 1850, and that document was surrendered at New York on 27 Aug 1850 (Google Books n27NAAAAMAAJ). NARS Special List 22 has a matching New York entry: "Chace 625 Ship 1850 Warren, R.I. … Aug 27, 1850" (Google Books h_kGXz3sfGUC). The dimensions, build year and place all agree with the Lloyd's entries.

Inference: the builder was probably the Chace & Davis yard at Warren. The first owners were the two partners, and the yard was building ships in 1850 (Providence Public Library blog). No record found names the builder outright. The ship's name presumably comes from the Chace family who owned her.

Career and later history

• 1850–55, Charleston packet (plausible). Robert G. Albion's Square-Riggers on Schedule lists the Chace among the New York–Charleston packets. It has index entries "Chace, 286, 343", "White, Capt. W., 343" and "Bulkley, G., 131, 288, 302" (LoC index of Albion). Snippets, not re-read, say she was in that line from 1850 to 1855, that she was the only coastal packet built in Rhode Island, and that White had commanded the packet Sullivan from 1844. She was still clearing New York for Charleston under White in Oct 1855 ("Chase, White, Charleston, Geo Bulkley", Tribune 13 Oct 1855, OCR).
• 1856, cotton round voyage. In late May 1856 she cleared Charleston for Havre: "Cld ship Chace, White, Havre" (Herald 4 Jun 1856 p.8; OCR only, image not viewed). Next came the Havre–New York passage with the Hegnauers. On 3 Nov 1856 she cleared New York for Mobile: "Chase, White, Mobile, Post, Smith & Co." (Tribune 4 Nov 1856 p.8, image checked; the Charleston/Geo. Bulkley clearance in the same line belongs to the ship Hero). Inference: she was working the usual cotton circuit, a Southern port to Havre with cotton and back to New York with emigrants and goods. She was a transient ship, not a scheduled Havre packet.
• 1857: "SAILED—Ship Chase, White, Charleston" (Tribune 31 Aug 1857, OCR).
• 1860–65 (plausible, not re-read). Under master E. Edwards she arrived at New York from Liverpool in Sep 1860 (Tribune 1 Sep 1860 p.8) and from New Orleans in Jan 1864. In 1865 she carried coal to New York from Cow Bay / Morien Bay, Cape Breton, for Geo. Bulkley. Records, 1882–85 says E. Bulkley & Sons owned the whole of her (Google Books c3dQAAAAYAAJ).
• 1865 register (confirmed). ALR 1865, p.21, entry 471: "Chace … E. Edwards | 2 | 625 | … May '64 | 1850 | Warren, R I | New York | G. Buckley | 133 32 18 | NY May'64" (ALR 1865). By then her class had dropped to 2.
• Gone by 1866. In the ALR 1866 (p.21), entries 472 "Chaa Sze" and 473 "Challenge" follow each other with no Chace (ALR 1866). Her fate after 1865 is unknown. No wreck, sale or renaming record has been found.

The voyage

Chronology

Departure

The Chace was at Havre on 21 Aug 1856, loading for New York alongside the Zurich, Exchange and Russell. She sailed on 22 Aug 1856 (Herald 11 Sep; Herald 12 Sep). The Clinton's "23 days out" on 14 Sep gives the same sailing date.

Inference: under the French decree of 1855, emigrants could board the day before sailing (see The journey in context). So the Hegnauers were at Havre by about 21 Aug, and probably left Igis in the first half of August.

At sea

• Length of the passage. Both papers report "36 days" from Havre. The calendar gives 38 days (22 Aug to 29 Sep). Inference: the 36 days were probably counted from dropping the pilot or losing sight of land.
• Weather. The ship "has had light winds and calms the entire passage" (Herald).
• The drowning. The Herald reports: "Sept 8. Henry Henrickson, a seaman, a native of Holstein, fell from the bowsprit overboard, and was drowned." The Tribune prints the same report.
• Spoken at sea. On 14 Sep, at lat. 44°30'N, the brig Clinton (Thompson, from Nantes 1 Sep) "spoke ship Chace, from Havre for New-York—23 days out—reported having lost a boy overboard, named Harry, on the 8th." In the print the first longitude digit looks like a 5, but the brig's own positions (about 15°W on 5 Sep, about 36°W on 17 Sep) require 27°04'W (Tribune 30 Sep 1856 p.8; image crop). Inference: "Harry" is the seaman Henry Henrickson (same ship, same date). Inference: after 23 days the ship was only about a third of the way across in longitude, which fits the calms.
• Passenger deaths. Neither newspaper reports deaths, births or sickness among the passengers. The same Herald column does record them for other ships (the Rock Light "had two deaths on the passage"). Inference, weak: there were probably no passenger deaths worth reporting. The manifest itself should be checked, since lists often note deaths at sea.

Arrival and landing

• Arrival date. The Chace arrived at New York on Monday 29 Sep 1856. The Herald's arrivals column containing her is headed "Port of New York, September 29, 1856" (image crop), and the same page says the steamer Baltic reached the bar "yesterday morning". NARA's date of 30 Sep is probably the date the list was filed with the Collector.
• Passengers and cargo. She carried merchandise and 200 passengers, consigned to George Buckley (Bulkley). Both newspaper images read 200; the "300" in the Herald's OCR is a misreading.
• Cabin passengers. The Tribune's "Passengers Arrived" list for 30 Sep names cabin passengers for the Baltic, Meta, Emerald, Flash and Mary Frances, but none for the Chace (Tribune 30 Sep p.8). Inference: the Hegnauers, like almost all her passengers, travelled steerage.
• Other arrivals the same day. They included the mail steamship Baltic from Liverpool, the Meta from Bremen, the Rock Light, the Raleigh from Hamburg (165 or 166 passengers), the bark Elbe from Hamburg (172 passengers), the brig Clinton from Nantes and the bark E. A. Chase from Cadiz (Herald 30 Sep p.10).
• News from home. The same Herald page carried "Trouble in Switzerland" and "The Revolution in Switzerland". This was the Neuchâtel royalist rising of early September 1856, which broke out after the Chace had sailed. The family would have learned of it only in America.

Landing at Castle Garden. New York State's Emigrant Landing Depot at Castle Garden had been open for just over a year. The Commissioners of Emigration give its formal opening as 1 Aug 1855, and the National Park Service gives 3 Aug 1855 for its opening to the public (Commissioners' Annual Reports 1847–1860; NPS). The Commissioners' report for 1856 (archive.org b2168974x) says:

• 141,625 people were landed at Castle Garden in 1856 from 579 vessels. The table total is 141,525, a small inconsistency within the source itself.
• 78 of those vessels came from Havre. The Chace was one of them.
• Only 1,064 people landed that year gave Missouri as their destination.
• Arrivals from Aug 1855 to 1856 carried on average about $63 in cash each.
• The yellow-fever and smallpox wards at the Quarantine hospital on Staten Island were "unusually full" in 1856.
• The Commissioners made small advances on pledged baggage so that families could travel inland at once.
• A grand-jury visit printed in the same report describes railroad clerks laying route maps before newly landed emigrants. The research notes date the visit 9 Sep 1856, three weeks before the Chace arrived; that date was not re-checked.

Emigrant numbers that week (plausible). The Commissioners' weekly statement gives about 4,977 emigrants arriving from 24 Sep to 1 Oct 1856. The leading digit comes from the OCR only (Tribune 2 Oct 1856 p.7). No landing report names the Chace.

The journey in context

Igis in 1856

• The village. Igis had 637 inhabitants in 1850, including Landquart. It was a farming village with vineyards, orchards and livestock (HLS, Igis). Inference: a family of seven was about 1% of the village.
• Earlier and later departures. The Bürgergemeinde Landquart's notes on the old Igis citizen families record others who left for America (bglandquart.ch):
  • In late August 1845, sending Josef Pfeifer's family to New Orleans cost 1,232 francs, and the commune paid half.
  • Joseph Barfuss left in 1854.
  • The whole Johann Rudolf Florin-Disch family left in 1857.
  • The Hegnauer entry names only Peter Hegnauer (b. 1811), who emigrated in 1872. The 1856 family is not mentioned, and I found no record of whether Igis helped pay their passage.
• Graubünden and Swiss background (plausible, not re-checked). After 1848, emigration from Graubünden rose to as many as 500 people a year, and food shortages in 1848–50 pushed many to leave (HLS, Graubünden). Communes responsible for poor relief often paid emigrants' travel costs (sozialgeschichte.ch). The U.S. recorded Swiss immigration of 7,953 in 1854, 4,433 in 1855, 1,780 in 1856 and 2,080 in 1857, so the Hegnauers left in a low year (Fouché, Émigration alsacienne, ch. III; confirmed).

Igis to Basel

• No railway yet. The first railway into Graubünden, from Rheineck to Chur, opened only on 1 July 1858 (Wikipedia). Inference: the first leg from Igis in August 1856 was by road and lake.

• A neighbours' route, 1855. Emigrants from Untervaz, Fanas and other Graubünden villages took this route to Basel (Untervazer Burgenverein, Jahresbericht 2022):

  • they boarded omnibuses at the Tardis Bridge at Landquart, on the Hegnauers' doorstep, early on 8 Apr 1855;
  • they went on to Walenstadt, Weesen, Rapperswil, Zurich, Baden, Brugg and over the Bözberg to Basel;
  • they left Basel on 10 Apr.

  That group was bound for Brazil. Untervaz advanced Fr. 39,458 to its 23 families, Fr. 348 per adult and Fr. 264 per child. Inference: the Hegnauers probably followed much the same road to Basel.

Basel to Le Havre

• Rail across France. From 1852 the Strasbourg–Basel railway contracted with Swiss agents to carry emigrants "depuis Bâle jusqu'au Havre" (Fouché).
• The French decree of 15 Jan 1855 (Fouché):
  • it set up emigration commissioners at Paris, Le Havre, Strasbourg, Forbach and Saint-Louis on the Basel frontier;
  • it required each emigrant to show 200 francs or hold a through contract;
  • agencies had to be licensed and post bonds;
  • emigrants could board the day before sailing.
• Other Swiss parties (plausible, not re-checked). Rothrist (Aargau) sent 305 people via Basel, Paris and Le Havre in 1855, about seven weeks in all (Swiss National Museum blog). Basel agencies such as Andreas Zwilchenbart's handled bookings (HLS, Zwilchenbart); there is no evidence that the Hegnauers used him. Heinrich Huber of Walenstadt published an account of the trip from Sargans to Le Havre in 1845 (sozialgeschichte.ch).

The crossing

• Length. Sailing ships from Liverpool to New York in 1853–69 averaged 38.8 days, and 38.5 days in 1856 (Hatton, IZA DP 16274). That series covers Liverpool, not Havre, but the Chace's 38 calendar days were plainly ordinary.
• Deaths at sea. On 1,077 ships reaching New York in 1836–53, immigrants died at about 10 per 1,000 per month (Cohn, J. Econ. Hist. 1984). Illustrative arithmetic, not a Chace figure: that rate would mean roughly two or three deaths among 200 passengers on a passage of this length.
• Rules on board (plausible, not re-checked). The U.S. Passenger Act of 3 Mar 1855 set space per passenger, allowed at most two tiers of berths, and required minimum provisions issued weekly, drinking water, cooking ranges and ventilation (Wikipedia). Kapp says that by the early 1850s Havre ships included food and cooking in the fare (Kapp 1870, ch. 2).
• The Chace's accommodation. The 1858 register notes a deck cabin. Inference: the steerage passengers were berthed 'tween decks, as on any emigrant ship of her size.

New York to Missouri

• Where they went. By 1860 the family was farming in Boeuf Township, Gasconade County, Missouri, near Hermann (1860 census, cited in H0001). Leonhard's 1916 obituary says the family came in 1856 and first settled in Gasconade County (H0001, source "Passing of a Pioneer").
• How they travelled is not documented. In the week they landed, the Tribune advertised an Erie Railroad "EMIGRANT" train at 6 p.m. to Dunkirk and Buffalo, and Michigan Southern through tickets "for CHICAGO, ST. LOUIS, KANSAS" (Tribune 3 Oct 1856 p.3).
• Routes to St. Louis (plausible, not re-checked). A continuous railroad from Chicago to Alton, on the Mississippi above St. Louis, opened in 1856, with the last miles made by river (Wikipedia, Alton Railroad). Kapp gives pre-1855 emigrant fares from New York to St. Louis of about $14.50 (Kapp, ch. 4).
• Inference, low confidence: the family reached Gasconade County in October 1856, very likely by way of St. Louis and the Missouri River valley.

Images

No painting, photograph, lithograph or plan of the ship Chace/Chase has been found in any collection searched. Searches covered Wikimedia Commons, Mystic Seaport, the Peabody Essex, Penobscot Marine and Maine Maritime museums, and ship-portrait searches under both spellings. All images below are documents of this voyage or period context.

Rights. 1850s newspapers and registers are in the public domain. Library of Congress items carry "No known restrictions" unless noted. Mystic Seaport shows no rights statement on its register scans, so credit Mystic Seaport Museum.

Do not use the Commons file "Migrants alsaciens.jpg". It is a low-resolution crop of image 31, captioned wrongly as a family waiting to embark at Le Havre, and it carries a CC BY-SA licence. The Joconde record for the painting says the emigrants have just landed at a foreign port (Joconde).

Open questions / next steps

1. Read the manifest's first image on the free Internet Archive roll 167 (archive.org/details/passengerlistsoo0167unix). Reading the master's name and signature as White would tie the manifest directly to the register entry. On the same pass:
   • count the passengers against the newspapers' 200;
   • look for notes of deaths or births at sea;
   • record the columns for the Hegnauer lines (origin, occupation, destination).
2. Departure records at Le Havre. The emigration commissioner there kept records under the 1855 decree, and the port and departure registers may survive in the Le Havre municipal archives or the Seine-Maritime departmental archives. Neither was searched. The Journal du Havre for 1856 is not on Gallica (only 1891–92), and the Courrier des États-Unis pages returned errors.
3. Swiss side. Look for Igis commune minutes (Gemeindeprotokolle) for 1856, to learn whether the commune paid or advanced the passage as it did for the Pfeifers in 1845. Also look for passport or emigration records in the Staatsarchiv Graubünden. None of these are online.
4. Re-read the book sources when Google Books or HathiTrust can be accessed:
   • the WPA Bristol-Warren register (p.44) and NARS Special List 22, to confirm the 1850 owners and dimensions;
   • Albion, Square-Riggers on Schedule, pp. 286–288 and 343, for the packet years and Capt. W. White's first name;
   • the American Lloyd's Register for 1857, which is not in Mystic Seaport's digitized set.
5. Builder and fate. Confirm whether Chace & Davis built her. Trace the ship after her Oct 1865 coal voyage: sale abroad, renaming or loss between 1865 and 1866.
6. Check against page images:
   • the Charleston clearance for Havre (Herald 4 Jun 1856), for its exact date;
   • the Castle Garden weekly figure (Tribune 2 Oct 1856);
   • the Charleston items of 13 Oct 1855 and 31 Aug 1857, which have been read in OCR only.
7. Onward journey. Look for any family account, obituary or county-history detail of the route from New York to Gasconade County and the date they arrived there.