December 4th, 1905

Stella Story

Dear Cousins,

I hope I never have to go back in steerage. Steerage was so crowded that you couldn’t move a muscle without bumping somebody when we were all down there. The smell was a mix of old throw up, rotten food and the bathrooms. There were elderly people huddled together for warmth.There were Mother’s protecting their family’s belongings. Fathers trying to fix the toilets so they worked. Kids running around the deck trying to get as much play time as they can. There were some parts when we had to sleep on the rock hard freezing floor because we couldn’t get to our beds because it was really crowded. When I first got on the the boat I knew I wouldn’t like it, until my sister Charlotte and I met a girl named Sophia Casetan and then the whole boat ride seemed not so bad. When I saw the Statue of Liberty for the first time it took me a little bit of time to realize that there she was up there in her coppery dress falling perfectly into folds. I got up jumped up and down until my feet hurt and screamed and whooped until my voice got hoarse.

I saw the big Island and remembered all the stories about people getting sent back. All I had to carry was a little bag that was threadbare with my little things that I needed most. I walked up some stairs and went into this big big room (apparently called the Great Hall) and I saw a million more people. More people than I have ever seen in my life (and I have seen a lot of people for the past couple of months). The ceiling was taller than anything I have ever seen in my life and it was all tiles in a zig-zagged pattern. It was big and light was spilling in the room and ricocheting of the marble walls, people in uniforms all over the place were talking in different languages and shaking their heads and pushing pleading mothers out of the way. When I realised that those people in the uniforms were inspectors I got really scared because most of them didn’t look very nice. When I walked in my brain melted away into a pile of mush from all the noises I heard: crying babies, inspectors yelling, laughing children and  worried fathers. The smell was… well, interesting. It smelled like stinky feet and clothes, it smelled like old baloney and cheese sandwiches (which was probably coming from me) it smelled like hope and it smelled like sadness from all the people who had either passed or gotten sent back. But the only good thing about the smell was that it was better than steerage.

Inspections are not pretty. I had a lot of people inspect me but first came the doctors. They looked me up and down checked my arms and legs touched my stomach and asked if that hurt. They checked my skin, throat, hands and scalp. They saw my eye and asked why I had a bandage over it and I said that I had just gotten a scratch. They were not convinced. They thought I had an eye disease called trachoma that was very contagious. They looked in my eye by taking a button hook and curling my eyelid so they could see my eye. It had rubbing alcohol on it. AND BOY DID IT STING!!!!! They finally said I didn’t have trachoma and sent me off to the inspectors who did mental tests. They asked me questions that a five and a half year old should know.

“What is one and one?” he asked me.

“Two,” I said without hesitation.

“Count back from ten,” he asked me.

“Ten, nine, seven, six, five, three, two, one” I said with a few pauses. I got an X marked in chalk on my thin coat. I was told that I was to be detained with my whole family because my older sister had a bad heart. I still went to the legal test.

“What is your name in full?” asked a buff looking man in a strong voice.

“Sibina Moore.” I replied.

“Where are you coming from?” he asks.

“Dublin County, Ireland” I said.

“Where are you going and if you are going somewhere what street and who are you staying with?”

“I’m going to New York City, I’m going to live with my two brothers, Sam and John Moore and my dad Declan Moore on Mulberry Street” I said very fast because I wanted to get out of there.

“Off you go.” said the man with a shooing movement. I was sent with the rest of my family to a staircase and I was sent down the middle with the rest of my family to the detention rooms. The rooms had bunk beds with three bunks each. There was a sink with water and a bathroom. There was no stepping stool to get on the top bunk. When nightfall came my mother sent me to get blankets because she was feeling sick and had to stay with my baby sister and my older sister was not breathing well. I went to a special room where they held the blankets and to my luck there were only three blankets left. I snatched up the surprisingly scratchy blankets and almost fell down under their weight. Just one of the blankets was heavier than I was, so carrying three was no easy feat. I finally got back to the room with many drops of blankets and trips of my shoes. I laid down on the rock hard canvas bed. My head hit the place where my head was supposed to go (I had no pillow) and I fell asleep and that was all I remembered until I was released on to the ferry dock.

Come to America.Ok, so, the Ellis Island experience is not the best anyone could ever have. There is rough patches along the way but in the end when you look back on it the whole thing is great. Come To America are my last words to you.

From

Sibina Moore (Stella)

I made this letter in our immigration study in 4th grade and everybody else in the grade made one. I think it is really good and I am hoping you do too!