In the 19th century, more than 20,000 people emigrated from the region Emsland / Grafschaft (county) Bentheim, situated in the Northwestern part of Germany, to the United States of America.
In the beginning, a close contact between the “Old” and the “New World” was established, mostly by writing letters. Over the years and decades, the relationship broke more and more.

The website http://www.german-immigrants.com would like to revive this connection and will provide data and tools to enable interested people on both sides of the “salt-water curtain” doing research and taking up contact again or for the first time.

A free-of-charge database with records on currently more than 15,000 German immigrants is the centerpiece of this website.