Passenger Numbers

Between 1864 and 1886, the clipper City of Adelaide made 23 voyages to South Australia bringing many hundreds of immigrant families to settle in South Australia. This page is a summary of the number of passengers that we know of.

As recently as 8th July 2007 we 'discovered' another 21 passengers and another 18 were 'discovered' a day later on the 9th July 2007. Those discoveries are included in this summary. If you are aware of any anomolies or additions please send us an email.

We also have some of the crew lists for the City of Adelaide and anticipate publishing that data in the near fuure.

Except for the official passenger lists of 1873, 1874 and 1876 that include large blocks of assisted migrants, all the other passenger records are based on newspaper accounts.  Letters and diaries reveal that sometimes names were omitted by reporters.  Where a newspaper report lists only passengers in the "cabin" or in the "saloon" we do not know whether there are second-class or steerage passengers who were disregarded.  Where first-class passenger names were obtained from letters in the newspaper, we do not know whether the passengers listed were merely those contributing to the cost of the having the letter published in the newspaper.

Not all passengers were new immigrants, some obvious non-immigrants include:

• 1865 included Mr & Mrs Fotheringham returning to Gawler.
• 1866 included Archdeacon Woodcock & Mr Hawker returning from a trip to England
• 1869 included a party of 15 with the Governor of Western Australia
• 1877 included Capt Alston's wife
• 1879 included Capt Alston's wife + child + nurse
• 1880 included Capt Alston's wife + child + nurse
• 1881 included Capt Alston's wife + child + nurse
• 1882 included Capt Alston's wife + child
• 1883 included Capt Alston's wife + child
• 1884 included Capt Alston's wife + child
• 1886 included Capt Alston's wife