Chapter2                            7

York in the 1850s was ridden with crime and squalor. This is not surprising
if one considers the enormous growing pains of a city whose population
increased sixfold between 1820 and 1860-from roughly 125,000 to 800,000,
ending with a 47% share of foreigners, a third of whom were Germans-and
that the bulk of this growth was due to the influx of emigrants. Housing space
was bursting at the seams, creating slums with a disproportionate number of
makeshift basement tenements. Trash removal was sporadic at best; much
waste was left to the ubiquitous pigs. Fire and police protection were rife with
corruption and violent competition. Only the rich could afford clean drinking
water piped down the Hudson Valley from the Croton Reservoir, the others had
to contend with often contaminated city well water, with the constant danger
of contracting diseases and becoming one more among the countless victims
of regularly occurring epidemics.130
What government regulations had been implemented were ineffective, nor
was there, to any degree, federal or state oversight of the immigration process.
It was not until 1855 before there would be a central processing point, Castle
Garden, for immigrants entering the United States through New York City.3'
Until then, there was no system of dealing with the influx of immigrants other
than cursory, shipboard customs and health inspections. In the absence of a
central point where the immigrants could obtain useful information, they were
truly on their own, for better or worse, unless they had wise counsel, followed a
leader who knew the ropes, or sought out the assistance of legitimate "travelers
aid" societies, diplomatic consuls, or charitable organizations. Perhaps this is
why Rudolph Puchner observed that the settlers of New Holstein gladly took
up the offer of their captain to stay aboard ship as long as it lay at the dock
during the time they needed to transact business in the city.'32
The sheer numbers of foreigners descending upon New York City, pouring
out of steerage and the cabins of the emigrant ships, are difficult to imagine,
let alone visualize. In the early 1840s an average of 40 emigrant ships would
anchor off Manhattan Island, disgorging their human cargo onto the wharves
and into the streets of the city.'33 Between 1840 and 1859 an average of 157,000
immigrants per year came ashore in New York. In 1854 alone-the year before
emigration to the United States dropped sharply-New York received 428,000
130. Much of the information in this paragraph stems from Bretting (8-16).
131. See note 147.

132. Puchner 12.
133. Cf. Edwin Burrows/Wallace, Gotham. A History ofNew York City to 1898,737. In 1851
alone, 1,712 emigrant ships anchored in the harbor of New York City (cf. Coleman 171).

71