Marks of identification

Passenger list forms used from February 1907 to 1924 added a physical description: height in feet and inches, complexion, color of hair and eyes, and marks of identification. Card manifests at the land borders recorded the same kinds of detail.

Years later the description mattered. When an immigrant applied to naturalize, clerks checked the arrival record against the applicant. Small differences were accepted, but a different eye color or a large gap in age could stop them from certifying the record. For a family historian it is a rare physical description of an ancestor.