If your ancestors came to New Hampshire in the 1800s to work in Manchester's millyard, information on them could be waiting for you in an archive.
People arrived in Manchester from all over the world to work in the Amoskeag Manufacturing Company’s mills in the 1800s, and some of their descendants still live in New Hampshire.
The Manchester Historic Association has nearly 500 boxes of documents on the textile mills' employees and operations going back centuries.
Ashley Holm, who manages the collection of records, said their files from the manufacturing company can reveal a lot about people's lives. The company’s employee cards include descriptions of the workers, their family life, and addresses.
“You can watch them get married, have children — because you can see the number of dependents change,” Holm said. “You can watch them move through several areas of the city.”
Holm said researchers want to make the archive more accessible to families, and are eager to help them find genealogy documents in the collection. So far, that means digitizing their records and putting them online. But Holm also wants people to feel they can come in to the archive for help on their family research projects.
She said people have come in to confirm family lore passed down over the years. One man told her about a story passed down in his family, about his grandmother who started working in the mills as a child.
“She stood at the window and cried watching other children go to school,” Holm said. “[He knew] that she worked from the time she was 13 to the time she was 60, and met [his] grandfather in mill number four.”
People can get in touch with genealogy and historical questions by going to manchesterhistoric.org.
