Cooped up in the barge, we waited till the sun got down into the smoke of Bayonne and Elizabeth and was a great red ball only, so dull that the eye could contemplate it pleasantly. Then came the shadows of night, and we began to dread that our turn to be disembarked would come so late that we should either be taken back to the steamer or be kept on the island until morning. Myriads of lights were shining in the great buildings. Each time the old ferry-boat floundered across from the Battery it brought a crowd of friends of immigrants who had been summoned from New York and elsewhere to meet the newly arrived ones. All the races of Europe seemed to be represented in the crowds on the ferry-boat as it passed close to us when bound back to the Battery.
The babies had sobbed themselves to sleep, worn-out mothers sat with their heads drooped on the children they held to their breasts, and among the men mirth and song had died away, though now and then a voice would be heard inquiring if any one knew when or where we would get something to eat.
“All ready for the last Irenes,” sang out a voice somewhere in the darkness up by the buildings, and there was a clatter of feet overhead and on the wharf. The doors of the barge were opened. The barge hands dragged out the plank. The ropes restraining 216the crowd were dropped, and the weary hundreds, shouldering their baggage yet once again, poured out of the barge on to the wharf. Knowing the way, I led those of our group who were with my wife and myself straight to the covered approach to the grand entrance to the building, and the strange assemblage of Old World humanity streamed along behind us, an interesting procession indeed.
When we came to the doorway I halted our section, and we piled the baggage and waited. Antonio had all the papers for the Squadritos, and with him also was Salvatore Biajo, who, thanks to the short-change game worked on him by the draft-sellers at Naples, must have some money advanced to him before we got inside. If the officials there saw me giving him money they would want to know about it, and I did not wish to attract attention to myself.
Antonio and Camela were meantime madly hunting us about the wharf, and just as the official at the doorway had ordered us to go on in, regardless of the others, each party caught sight of the other.
Half-way up the stairs an interpreter stood telling the immigrants to get their health tickets ready, and so I knew that Ellis Island was having “a long day” and we were to be passed upon even if it took half the night. The majority of the people, having their hands full of bags, boxes, bundles, and children, carried their tickets in their teeth, and just at the head of the stairs stood a young doctor in the Marine Hospital Service uniform, who took them, looked at them, and stamped them with the Ellis Island stamp. Considering the frauds in connection with these tickets at Naples and on board, the thoroughness used with them now was indeed futile.
217Passing straight east from the head of the stairs, we turned into the south half of the great registry floor, which is divided, like the human body, into two great parts nearly alike, so that one ship’s load can be handled on one side and another ship’s load on the other. In fact, as we came up, a quantity of people from the north of Europe were being examined in the north half.
Turning into a narrow railed-off lane, we encountered another doctor in uniform, who lifted hats or pushed back shawls to look for favus heads, keenly scrutinized the face and body for signs of disease or deformity, and passed us on. An old man who limped in front of me, he marked with a bit of chalk on the coat lapel. At the end of the railed lane was a third uniformed doctor, a towel hanging beside him, a small instrument over which to turn up eyelids in his hand, and back of him basins of disinfectants.
As we approached he was examining a Molise woman and her two children. The youngest screamed with fear when he endeavored to touch her, but with a pat on the cheek and a kindly word the child was quieted while he examined its eyes, looking for trachoma or purulent ophthalmia. The second child was so obstinate that it took some minutes to get it examined, and then, having found suspicious conditions, he marked the woman with a bit of chalk, and a uniformed official led her and the little ones to the left into the rooms for special medical examination. The old man who limped went the same way, as well as many others. Those who are found to be suffering from trachoma are very frequently sent to the hospital on the Island and are held and treated until “cured.” There is neither space nor excuse for discussing here 218the question of “curing” in a few days or weeks cases of trachomatous conjunctivitis. The powers at Washington have ruled that immigrants may be held and cured, though there are surgeons at Ellis Island who do not believe in it, and the best specialists in New York contend that months or years are necessary to eliminate any danger of contagion, while the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary experiments in Boston have convinced the doctors there that cures are the exception.
Concetta Fomica was the only one of our party whom the doctors examined more than once. Her eyes were inflamed slightly, but she was passed. Just where we turned to the right, a stern-looking woman inspector, with the badge, stood looking at all the women who came up to select any whose moral character might be questioned, and one of her procedures was to ask each party as to the various relationships of the men and women in it. Her Italian was good.
Passing west, we came to the waiting-rooms, in which the groups which are entered on each sheet of the manifest are held until K sheet or L sheet, whatever their letter may be, is reached. Our party being so large, and some of the declarations which are used to fill out the items on the manifest having been made at Messina, some at Reggio di Calabria, and some at Naples, we were scattered through U, V, and W groups.
We sank down on the wooden benches, thankful to get seats once more. Our eyes pained severely for some few minutes as a result of the turning up of the lids, but the pain passed.
Stairway of Separation—Checking into Pens
Somewhere about nine o’clock an official came by and hurried out U group and passed it up into line 219along the railed way which led up to the inspector who had U sheet, then came V group, and then W. Knowing that the first into line would be the first passed, and having the task of gathering our people together out of the crowd as fast as they were passed, my wife and I hurried to the end of the lane and were among the first before the inspector. Our papers were all straight, we were correctly entered on the manifest, and had abundant money, had been passed by the doctors, and were properly destined to New York, and so were passed in less than one minute. We were classed as “New York Outsides” to distinguish us from the “New York Detained,” who await the arrival of friends to receive them; “Railroads,” who go to the stations for shipment; and “S. I.’s,” by which is meant those unfortunates who are subjected to Special Inquiry in the semi-secret Special Inquiry Court, which is the preliminary to being sent back, though of course only a portion of “S. I.’s” are sent back.
By the kindness of the official at the head of the stairs by which we would ordinarily have passed down and out to the ferry to take us to New York, we were allowed to drop our baggage behind a post, and, standing out of the way of the crowd, pick out our people as they filtered through past the inspectors. Salvatore Biajo came through marked “Railroad,” and was passed along to get his railroad-ticket order stamped, his money exchanged at the stand kept beside the stairs under contract by Post & Flagg, bankers, and in a minute more he had been moved on down the stairs to the railroad room, after I had had but the barest word with him. Antonio Genone, with a ticket for Philadelphia, came through without going over to 220the right to the railroad-ticket stamping official, and he was down the stairs and gone without even knowing that he was separated from us permanently.
We began to see why the three stairways are called “The Stairs of Separation.” To their right is the money exchange, to the left are the Special Inquiry Room and the telegraph offices. Here family parties with different destinations are separated without a minute’s warning, and often never see each other again. It seems heartless, but it is the only practical system, for if allowance was made for good-byes the examination and distribution process would be blocked then and there by a dreadful crush. Special officers would be necessary to tear relatives forcibly from each other’s arms. The stairs to the right lead to the railroad room, where tickets are arranged, baggage checked and cleared from customs, and the immigrants loaded on boats to be taken to the various railroad stations for shipment to different parts of the country. The central stair leads to the detention rooms, where immigrants are held pending the arrival of friends. The left descent is for those free to go out to the ferry.
Our Socosa boys, despite their labor contracts, came through bound for the railroad room, and they were gone, waving their hands and throwing kisses to us. Then the Gualtieri-Sicamino people, even Antonio, who had completely lost control of the situation, came through, marked “Detained.” I was allowed to collect them, that was all; as soon as they were assembled they went down the middle stairs. As soon as the women found they were to be shut up behind the screens of steel, they began to bewail their fortune, and between getting them quieted and getting a proper understanding of just why it had 221happened so, I had a lively five minutes. It seemed certain that all but my wife and myself must go behind the bars.
Having passed the last barrier and got all the information I wanted on Ellis Island from the immigrants’ point of view, it seemed time to declare myself, and so I informed the night chief inspector who I was and why I was there, and requested that he discharge all our people to me, so that I could take them over to New York, as I wanted to get the story of their first impressions on American soil by being with them when they landed in the greatest American city. The officials were highly amused and interested in the whole affair, showed me every courtesy, and in five minutes I was below at the gate of the detention room with a written order for the entire party, except the “Railroads,” to be discharged to me; they were already gone.
I found our people just preparing to sit down at one of the great number of tables to have one of the substantial meals which are served to immigrants; but time was pressing, and so the boys got only a bite and that by grabbing it and taking it with them. Antonio ............