Hello Charles, It sounds like you have done a lot of research on your families. None of my families traveled that way (i.e. Switzerland, through Germany to England), so I have really not studied that area. Mine went from the canton Glarus through France always traveling to the NW, and then to Le Havre. Totally different trip. Yours went NE. If you google I am sure that you can get lots of information (a lot more accurate than I could ever give you) about that trip. I do know that there is a section along the river in central Germany - that your ancestors would have seen - that holds the most castles of any area in Europe. They are located on both sides of the river and were there then. I would imagine that the trip from Zurich and Bern was by horse and wagon north down the mountains to Basel, where they could pick up the barge boat that took them down the foothills north to central (flat) Germany where they could get a larger boat. In those days, you probably know that the passenger steam ships were not built yet, so everyone who emigrated left on sailing ships. They should have had a capital "i" next to their names on their ship manifests, because they did not come direct - they came indirect. Meaning that they went to England first. The ships dropped the passengers off on the east side of England and they walked or buggied (depending on their money and the weather) to the west side of England where the large ships departed. It was a dangerous trip; many people died from lack of money, exhaustion, or from murderers. Hull, England was very instrumental in processing the European emigrants. A sail trip would usually take 45 days...unless they hit really bad weather. Of course, once the passenger ships were built (the first from a German designer) they could make it in 14-16 days, weather permitting. Even though my German grandparents came over in a passenger ship, they kept their sails because many times the engines would fall into the sea and they had to rely on sails for the rest of the trip. Mine came from Hamburg Port also, and stopped to pick up more passengers at Le Havre, but their German trip was still considered "direct" same as my Swiss gr grandparents - who earlier came directly from Le Havre. Nellie, a 68-yr-old root digger _http://www.militaryindexes.com/worldwartwo/_ (http://www.militaryindexes.com/worldwartwo/) WWII index - free for today _http://www.militaryindexes.com/worldwarone/_ (http://www.militaryindexes.com/worldwarone/) WWI - free until 25 Nov 2005