Orphan Trains of Illinois

Joseph C. Eninger was born in Connecticut in 1855 and sent to Illinois in 1868. He wrote a letter in 1885, when he was working as a...

Benjamin F. Coburn (1858 - 1918), like other letter writers in 1880 related the story of how he came to be at the New York Juvenile...

Matilda Kimmel (1879 - 1967) was sent to Illinois in 1896 where she lived with the J. F. Meyer family in Cabery, IL. She married John H....

The Sterritt brothers, Edward (1880 - 1973), George (1876 - 1948), and James (1874 - 1950) were the sons of George and Margaret/Mary...

Kate Miller (1876 - 1948) was sent to Illinois in 1884 and placed with the Oliver family In Chatsworth, IL. When she wrote to the asylum...

Freda (1873 - 1941) and Frank (1875) Reichardt ​ Freda Reichardt lived with the Gillespies, along with her brother, Frank, after coming...

William A. Garrett came to Illinois in 1880 at the age of 9. In the letter he wrote in 1897 he reported having steady employment, but the...

Fred Heine (1868 - 1939) wrote to the asylum in 1895, at the age of twenty seven. He had come to Illinois in 1878 along with an unnamed...

Ludwig (1880 - 1967) first came to Armington, Tazewell County, Illinois on the orphan train in 1889 and was living with the McLellan...

Elizabeth Van Hove came from England before her second immigration to Illinois. She had two brothers, Samuel and Harry, who were also...