Hudson County was created on 22 February 1840 and was formed from Bergen County. The County was named for Henry Hudson, the famous explorer, who landed his vessel the Half Moon at what is now the City of Hoboken in September of 1609. The County Seat is Jersey City. A peninsula totaling 46 square miles, and the smallest and most densely populated of New Jersey’s 21 counties, Hudson County is located in the state’s northeast corridor on the western shore of the Hudson River. The county’s water boundaries are the Hackensack River on the west, the Kill Van Kull on the south, Newark Bay on the southwest, and the Hudson River on the east.
There are 12 municipalities in Hudson County. They are the City of Bayonne; Borough of East Newark; Town of Guttenberg; Town of Harrison; City of Hoboken; City of Jersey City; Town of Kearny; Township of North Bergen; Town of Secaucus; City of Union City; Township of Weehawken; and the Town of West New York. See also County History for more historical details.
Hudson County Cities Include Bayonne, Hoboken, Jersey City, Union City. Townships Include North Bergen, Weehawken. Towns Includes Guttenberg, Harrison, Kearny, Secaucus, West New York. Boroughs Include East Newark. Communities Include Exchange Place, Greenville, Liberty State Park, Newport, Paulus Hook
PLEASE READ!! Please call the clerk's department to confirm hours, mailing address, fees and other specifics before visiting or requesting information because of sometimes changing contact information.
All Departments below are in the Hudson County Administration Building, 595 Newark Avenue, Jersey City, NJ 07306; (201) 795-6000, unless otherwise noted below. The Official County website is located at http://www.hudsoncountynj.org/. NOTE: The record dates below are from the earliest date to present time.
Hudson County Clerk has Land Records & Marriage Records from 1840 and is located at 583 Newark Avenue,
Jersey City, NJ;
Tel: (201) 795-6112;
Fax: (201) 795-2581 New Jersey county clerks are responsible for land records, including deeds and mortgages, naturalizations, marriages (usually 1795-1840s), and various county court records. A few original county justice of the peace dockets are at the New Jersey State Archives. Estate matters are handled in the surrogate's and orphans' courts.
Hudson County Surrogate Court / Orphan's Court has Probate Records from 1840 and is located at the courthouse. Phone Number: (201) 795-6377 ,
Fax: (201) 795-5488 By virtue of laws enacted since 1844, the responsibilities of the County Surrogate have been expanded. The County Surrogate now has two major functions:
As Judge and Clerk of the County Surrogate's Court, the Surrogate is responsible for settling the estate of every county resident who dies individually owning any assets in New Jersey--whether or not that resident dies leaving a will. Therefore, the Surrogate reviews and probates wills and appoints Executors, Administrators and guardians of minors. In addition, the Surrogate administers and invests monies (now more than $30 million in Bergen County) primarily for minor children who receive judgments in the courts in Bergen County; and
As Deputy Clerk of the Superior Court, Chancery Division, Probate Part, the Surrogate dockets, reviews and schedules all actions pertaining to will contests, estate matters, accountings, mental incompetencies, guardianships of incompetents and all adoptions occurring in Bergen County. In addition, all documents involved in all County Surrogate Court matters are recorded, stored and maintained by the County Surrogate's Court.
Below is a list of online resources for Hudson County Court Records. Email us with websites containing Hudson County Court Records by clicking the link below:
New Jersey Immigration & Emigration Records - Immigration records help the family historian to understand the movements of their ancestry as they relocated to different parts of the world.
Click Here to Search New Jersey Birth, Marriage & Death Records! - Birth, marriage, and death records are connected with central life events. They are prime sources for genealogical information. Look also for baptism, christening, and burial records in this collection.
New Jersey State Department of Health and Senior Services, State Registrar Search Unit, PO Box 370, Trenton, NJ 08625-0370; (609) 292-4087, Fax: (609) 392-4292. It can take up to 4 months to get a vital record from New Jersey.
Vital records from May 1848 - May 1878 may be obtained from the State Archives. The Archives also holds microfilm copies of births from 1878-1923, marriages from 1879-1940 and deaths from 1878-1940. These materials are available for in-person use only.
Birth, Marriage & Death Certificates:
Cost: Initial search and one certified copy or certification of the record or No Record Statement is $25.00 per certificate.
Additional copies of the same record ordered at the same time are $2 are per copy
Additional years searched (genealogy records only) are $1 per year.
Make Check or Money Order payable to Treasurer, State of New Jersey. If no record is found or no copy is made, state law requires that we keep $25.00 for a searching fee. Please do not send cash in the mail.
Dates: from 1878 to the present
Processing Time: 14-16 weeks when ordered by MAIL or 2-5 Days when you order ELECTRONICALLY
Divorce Certificates: Divorce records for 1900-1989 are kept by the Records Information Center of the State Superior Court. For records after 1989 contact the NJ County Court that issued the divorce decree.New Jersey divorce decrees are available through the Superior Court of New Jersey Records Center. For more information on obtaining a certified copy of a divorce decree, call the Records Center at: 609-777-0092
Cost: Include a fee of $10.00 per 10 year search per last name with request. Make check or money order payable to Clerk of the Superior Court.
Superior Court of NJ, Public Information Ctr, 171 Jersey Street, CN 967, Trenton, NJ 08625-0967
Order Online: You can also order Order Electronically and get the certificates within 2-5 days by ordering below
Below is a list of online resources for Hudson County Vital Records. Email us with websites containing Hudson County Vital Records by clicking the link below:
Search the Social Security Death Index for FREE - Search over 82 million death records and get genealogical information crucial to your family research. New content added weekly! Most comprehensive SSDI site online!
Research Death records In The World's Largest Newspaper Archive at NewpaperArchive.com! - Find thousands of historical New Jersey newspaper articles about deaths. Search for local articles about an old family friend that died many years ago or a celebrity that committed suicide. Historical newspapers contain a wealth of information about the deceased.
New Jersey Marriages, 1684-1895: This database update adds marriage records for Salem County, in addition to records for Warren County, Atlantic, Bergen, Cape May, Cumberland, Gloucester, Sussex, Hunterdon, and Somerset counties.
New Jersey Marriages, Colonial Era, 1665-1800: In addition to the 45,000 names in this database, included is an historical introduction on the early marriage laws of New Jersey ,and the precedents on which they were founded.
Below is a list of online resources for Hudson County Census Records. Email us with websites containing Hudson County Census Records by clicking the link below:
New Jersey Census, 1772-1890: This collection contains the following indexes: 1772-1822 Tax Lists Index; 1800 Cumberland County Federal Census Index; 1824-1832 Bergen County - Paterson City; 1830 Federal Census Index; 1840 Federal Census Index; 1840 Pensioners List; 1850 Federal Census Index; 1850 Slave Schedule; 1860 Federal Census Index; 1870 Federal Census Index; 1890 Veterans Schedule; Early Census Index.
Genealogy Atlas has images of old American atlases during the years 1795, 1814, 1822, 1823, 1836, 1838, 1845, 1856, 1866, 1879 and 1897 for Ohio and other states.
You can view rotating animated maps for New Jersey showing all the county boundaries for each census year overlayed with past and present maps so you can see the changes in county boundaries. You can view a list of maps for other states at Census Maps
You can view rotating animated maps for New Jersey showing all the county boundary changes for each year overlayed with past and present maps so you can see the changes in county boundaries.
Below is a list of online resources for Hudson County Maps. Email us with websites containing Hudson County Maps by clicking the link below:
Click Here to Search New Jersey Military Records! - Military and civil service records provide unique facts and insights into the lives of men and women who have served their country at home and abroad.
The uses and value of military records in genealogical research for ancestors who were veterans are obvious, but military records can also be important to re-searchers whose direct ancestors were not soldiers in any war. The fathers, grandfathers, brothers, and other close relatives of an ancestor may have served in a war, and their service or pension records could contain information that will assist in further identifying the family of primary interest. Due to the amount of genealogical information contained in some military pension files, they should never be overlooked during the research process. Those records not containing specific genealogical information are of historic value and should be included in any overall research design.
Below is a list of online resources for Hudson County Military Records. Email us with websites containing Hudson County Military Records by clicking the link below:
New Jersey Pensioners, 1835: This database identifies thousands of New Jersey soldiers who were covered under various pension acts in the early 1800s.
Revolutionary War Rolls, 1775-1783 from the State of New Jersey (The National Archives): View, Print Copy & Save Original Documents in NARA publication M246 include muster rolls, payrolls, strength returns, and other miscellaneous personnel, pay, and supply records of American Army units, 1775-83.
Southern Claims Commission from the State of New Jersey (The National Archives): View, Print Copy & Save Original Documents In the 1870s, southerners claimed compensation from the U.S. government for items used by the Union Army, ranging from corn and horses, to trees and church buildings.
Because New Jersey's pre-1830 federal censuses have not survived, tax records are quite an important substitute for placing persons and families prior to that time. Tax lists arranged by township are available for 1773-1822. The originals, at the New Jersey State Archives, show heads of households, landowners, and single adult males, with information about their property that was taxable, including land, horses, cattle, slaves, and mills. Only about half of the 1773-4 lists are extant, and for some places, such as Sussex County, coverage is very slight. Microfilms of these records are at the state archives, the New Jersey Historical Society, Rutgers University, and the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society. The 1784 tax lists for thirty-eight municipalities (predominantly in southern New Jersey) are the only ones to indicate the size of a household, with a column for number of whites and a column for number of slaves.
Later tax records are found in the counties starting about 1869-70. Tax lists for some extinct New Jersey municipalities are at the state archives.
Below is a list of online resources for Hudson County Tax Records. Email us with websites containing Hudson County Tax Records by clicking the link below:
The Repositories
in this section are Archives, Libraries, Museums, Genealogical
and Historical Societies. Many County Historical and Genealogical
Societies publish magazines and/or news letters on a monthly,
quarterly, bi-annual or annual basis. Contacting the local societies
should not be over looked. State Archives and Societies are
usually much larger and better organized with much larger archived
materials than their smaller county cousins but they can be
more generalized and over look the smaller details that local
societies tend to have. Libraries can also be a good place to
look for local information. Some libraries have a genealogy
section and may have some resources that are not located at
archives or societies. Also, take a special look at any museums
in the area. They sometimes have photos and items from years
gone by as well as information of a genealogical interest. All
these places are vitally important to the family genealogist
and must not be passed over.
Below is a list of online resources for Hudson County Genealogical Addresses. Email us with websites containing Hudson County Genealogical Addresses by clicking the link below:
Hudson County Register's Office,
Administration Building,
595 Newark Ave,
Jersey City, NJ
Tel: (201) 795-6577 ,
Fax: (201) 795-5179
HUDSON COUNTY DIVISION OF CULTURAL AND HERITAGE AFFAIRS,
114 Clifton Place,
Jersey City, 07304;
Phone: (201) 915-1212
Department of State Division of Archives and Records Management
Bureau of Archives and Records Preservation State Library Bldg, 185 West State Street, CN-307, Trenton, NJ 08625-0307 The New Jersey State Archives has many of the basic research materials for the state, such as federal and state census records; probate, land, and court records; newspapers; and vital records.
New Jersey State Library, State Library Building, 185 West State Street, CN-520, Trenton, NJ 08625-0520
Genealogical Society of New Jersey,
PO Box 1476, Trenton NJ 08607-1476
The Genealogical Society of New Jersey has published The Genealogical Magazine of New Jersey since 1925. The society houses its collection of genealogical materials, including cemetery transcriptions, family Bibles (over 4,800), military records, notes of genealogists, and so forth, in the A. S. Alexander Library at Rutgers University.
New Jersey Newspapers & Periodicals Records - Newspapers and periodicals are the diaries of local communities. They are excellent sources of family history details - often recorded nowhere else. Look for obituaries, marriages, legal notices, and more found in our Historical Newspaper Archives.
Click Here to Search New Jersey Obituary Records! - This database is a compilation of obituaries published in U.S. newspapers, collected from various online sources. Obituaries can vary in the amount of information they contain, but many of them are genealogical goldmines, including information such as names, dates, places of birth and death, marriage information, and family relationships.
The important work of grave marker transcribing has been the goal of the Genealogical Society of New Jersey, which was originally formed by "Tombstone Hounds." Their core collection is at Rutgers University, where there is a card index by county and name of the cemetery as well as a "master index" arranged alphabetically by surname but only for selected cemeteries. Many of the society's transcriptions have been published in their journal, The Genealogical Magazine of New Jersey. Another large collection of cemetery records is that gathered by the New Jersey DAR chapters, with copies deposited at the New Jersey State Library and the New Jersey Historical Society. Both these places have other cemetery records, as do the Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania and the New York Public Library. Some individual books of cemetery inscriptions have been published, and some are found in The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record.
Below is a list of online resources for Hudson County Cemetery & Church Records. Email us with websites containing Hudson County Cemetery & Church Records by clicking the link below:
Find Obituaries in The World's Largest Newspaper Archive at NewpaperArchive.com! - Find thousands of New Jersey obituaries to help you research your family history. Search for a New Jersey newspaper obituary about your ancestor or a celebrity. Begin your search today and find death notices and funeral announcements printed in newspapers from Indiana.
Click Here to Search New Jersey Family Tree Records! - The use of published genealogies, electronic files containing genealogical lineage, and other compiled sources can be of tremendous value to a researcher.
When view family trees online or not, be sure to only take the info at face value and always follow up with your own sources or verify the ones they provide. Below is a list of online resources for Hudson County Family Trees, web forums and other family type information. Email us with websites containing Hudson County Family Trees, web forums and other family type information by clicking the link below:
Genealogy Encyclopedia: General Abbreviations, Early Illnesses, Nickname Meanings, Worldwide Epidemics, Early Occupations, Common Terms, Censuses Explained, Free Genealogical Forms
Nichols and Related Families of Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Florida, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virgina.
New Jersey Family & Local History Records - The Family & Local Histories Collection lets you read journals, memoirs, and other first-hand historical narratives right on your computer. Gathered from some of the world's finest libraries, these materials may provide hard-to-find town, county, and state information; tax records and wills; military, church, and court records; as well as photographs, stories, and maps.
Hudson is New Jersey's smallest and most densely populated county. It's population ranks 4th among the 21 counties of New Jersey. The 2000 census tabulated Hudson’s population at 608,975. Nationally, Hudson is the 8th most racially diverse county in the United States. Approximately 90 different languages other than English are spoken in the homes of Jersey City residents. They include Italian, Polish, Spanish, Tagalog ( Philippines dialect), Egyptian, Hindi, several Chinese dialects, Greek, Russian, Ukrainian, Korean, Creole, and many, many more.
Hudson County ’s 12 municipalities comprise a landmass of 46 square miles. Geographically it is a peninsula, mostly situated on top of a sill on the palisades. The water boundaries are the Hudson River on the east, the Kill van Kull on the south, the Hackensack River on the southwest, and the Passaic River on the northwest.
Hudson County was incorporated in 1840, primarily as a convenience to prevent local residents from having to travel all the way to Hackensack for courts and official business. Prior to this, Hudson’s landmass was part of Bergen County. Our boundaries today have not changed from the original Bergen county layout. At its founding, Hudson’s population was 9,483. In 1875 it stood at 163,000. By 1900 it was 386,048. In 1940, it was 652,000 the highest population total to date.
One can not talk about the history of Hudson county, or indeed New Jersey and our nation, without talking about the history and legacy of Jersey City. To know the history of Jersey City is to begin to understand the character and culture of America.
Before the arrival of the European settlers, the Jersey City area was home to Native Americans from the Delaware nation. They included the Mohawk and Leni Lenape peoples. Two municipality’s names still reflect the legacy of these peoples: Secaucus, which is actually "Siskakes" meaning, "where the snake hides; and " Weehawken" which translates to "land of the big cliffs." These diverse societies were more complex than we stereotypically think. They did not live in tee pees, but in long row huts. They were communal peoples who fished the Hudson, Hackensack, and Passaic rivers for oysters, clams, and shad fish. Piles of clamshells, remnants of their settlements long ago, can still glimpsed among the mounds of dirt currently being unearthed at construction sites in downtown Jersey City.
Before the arrival of Henry Hudson, other European explorers had visited the parameters of our region. They included, Esevan Gomez, a Portuguese, who arrived in 1525 in the Service of Emperor Charles V., Of Spain, and Jean de Verrazzano, a Florentine in the service of Francis I., King of France, who arrived in 1524. Verrazzano actually saw the mouth of the North River or Mauritius, as the Hudson River was known to map makers and navigators of the day, from his anchored berth just off the shore of' what is now the Atlantic Highlands in New Jersey. When Henry Hudson, an Englishman in the employ of the Dutch East India company arrived in New York bay on September 12, 1609, thinking he had found a northwest passage to the Indies, he came upon a thriving, agricultural society of Leni Lenape Native Americans.
Hudson first anchored in the North River off what is now the north shore of Jersey City near the southern Hoboken border. His first mate, Juet, an Englishman from Limehouse in London, described this scene:
"The people of the country came aboard brought green tobacco they go in deer skins loose, well dressed. Some in mantles of feathers and sorts of good furs the women came to us had red copper tobacco pipes and other things of copper they did wear about their necks. The people are civil and desire clothes. The country is full of great tall oaks."
A great maize field or corn patch grew just south of what is now the intersection of Kennedy Boulevard and Communipaw Avenue in Jersey City.
Political and economic upheavals and commercial development are the main motives for population shifts worldwide. For example, we know that the pilgrims on the Mayflower came primarily seeking a place where they could find the freedom to practice their religious beliefs. The Dutch, on the other hand, came to our shores mostly for economic gain. The late author and historian Barbara Tuchman likens the 17th Netherlands to Japan of the 1980’s. They bankrolled the world and were aggressive entrepreneurs and traders.
Socially, the Dutch were for the most part a very liberal and tolerant people. They depended upon good relations with all nations and peoples to continue to amass their great wealth. The Dutch West Indies Company, the agency that would colonize and develop the newly acquired property explored by Henry Hudson, practiced these same ideals.
One of the earliest developers and investors in the land Hudson explored, which the Dutch called New Amsterdam, was Michael Pauw, a burgomaster from Amsterdam. He purchased a tract of land in 1630 that extended from the Jersey City shore near the southern Hoboken border to as far south as the Amboy's, in what is now southern New Jersey. Though he would never set foot on his property, he named his purchase "Pavonia," roughly translated to mean land of the peacock in Dutch. Pauw hired patroons or overseers who were sent to develop his investment.
The concept of owning land was not known or understood in the local Native American culture. So, even though the Dutch patroons thought that they legally bought the land rights to Pavonia from the Leni Lenape, the Native Americans, they believed that the land belonged to the great spirits and no one individual or group.
The beginning of the end of the presence of the Native Americans who had lived in the Pavonia area for thousands of years, began on the night of February 25,1643. The then Director-General of New Amsterdam, William Kieft, sent 80 soldiers to massacre those Native Americans still living in the Pavonia settlement near the now downtown section of Jersey City.
Kieft was as despised by the Dutch settlers as he was by the Native Americans. He was a despot who handed out severe corporal punishment for the slightest of infractions. Kieft's raid on the sleeping Native Americans was brutally successful, killing 80 men, women, and children. Legend has it that he caused this raid to punish an Indian maiden who had stolen an apple off of a settler's tree. Kieft’s raid caused a counter raid by the Native Americans, forcing all of the Pavonia European settlers to the New York side of New Amsterdam. Today, it takes a good imagination in the mind's eye to think of a thriving community of Native Americans fishing for oysters and clams in Hudson County's rivers.
In 1646 a new Director-General and a new era came at once in the person of Peter Stuyvesant, still fondly called "Peg Leg Pete" by many of today's Jersey City residents. Stuyvesant immediately instituted many reforms, bringing fairness to bear in the governing of the colony. The Native American Dutch relations did not, however, immediately improve.
In 1658 a group of settlers, lead by a German immigrant named Thielman van Vleck, petitioned Stuyvesant to allow the settlers to return to the Jersey side of New Amsterdam and begin new settlements. Stuyvesant agreed with the stipulation that they enclose their settlement behind the protection of a palisade or fort.
In 1660, Stuyvesant granted Van Vleck and the others the necessary charter. In August of 1661, the Village of Bergen, from the Dutch word "berge," which means hill, was incorporated. The Village of Bergen was, therefore, New Jersey's first, permanent European settlement. The original layout of Bergen’s fort lines can still be seen on a map of Jersey City or by walking to what is now the Bergen Square’s commercial district. Bergen was bounded on the west at Van Reypen Street, Tuers Avenue on the east, Newkirk Street on the north, and Vroom Street on the south. Later, New Jersey’s first municipal government, school, and church, whose congregation has come down to us as the Old Bergen Dutch Reformed Church, now located at Highland and Bergen Avenues in Jersey City, were established at the Village of Bergen. The protection of the fort finally brought the long sought peace and stability that enabled the village to grow.
With the return of prosperity came the return of tolerance for other faiths and cultures. Now, Jews, Catholics, and Protestants lived side by side. But this peace and prosperity lasted for only 3 years. For by 1664, a new conqueror was here - the English. The English, like the Dutch in their dealings with the Native Americans, had a different interpretation of property rights and ownership. Seemingly overnight, 55 years of sole Dutch rule disappeared from Pavonia.
The great American writer Washington Irving was a frequent visitor to the Village of Bergen in the early 19th century. His wonderfully colorful novel, D iedrich K nickerbocker's a History of New York, written in 1809, evokes the ghosts of Communipaw, one of the earliest Dutch settlements in what is now Jersey City:
"Communipaw, in short, is one of the numerous little villages in the vicinity of this most of cities ( New York), which are so many strong-holds and fastness, whither the primitive manners of our Dutch forefathers have retreated, and where they are cherished with devout and scrupulous strictness.
The dress of the original settlers is handed down inviolate,father to son - the identical broad brimmed hat, broad-skirted coat, and broadbottomed breeches, continue from generation to generation... And so critically correct is the village schoolmaster is his dialect, that his reading of a low Dutch psalm has much the same effect on the nerves as the filing of a handsaw."
The American Revolutionary period in our history brought a new wave of immigrants to the Hudson County shores. Many soldiers, both English and mercenary, such as the Hessians, stayed to build homes. But this area was still primarily Dutch and English in its European heritage. But another group of Americans was here, although certainly not here by choice.
The Hudson County African-American population comprised a substantial community. Most were domestic or plantation slaves. New Jersey would be one of the last of the northern free states to abolish slavery in the 19 th century.
The end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century brought many changes to the entire world that began in America. The French Revolution, inspired by the success of the American Revolution, sent thousands of French bourgeoisie fleeing for their lives to the Hudson County area. One such family was the Du Ponts. Now famous for their fortune in chemicals, the Du Ponts first settled in Bergen Neck, which later became part of Bayonne. Their estate in Bayonne, La Tourette, would later become a fashionable resort hotel. A Dupont, son, Irenee, would later migrate to Delaware to found the present day clan.
The earliest beginnings of the Industrial Revolution took hold in Great Britain. For many centuries the British aristocracy, who owned 90% of the land in England, considered manufacturing businesses not to be a fit career for a gentleman. The working class, however, saw manufacturing jobs as a way out of servitude.
Many of the English, Irish, Scot, and Welsh working class headed to the cities where most of the manufacturing jobs were to be had. But sadly, they escaped one form of slavery for another - that of the menial, low paying jobs offered under horrific conditions. Adults and children had to work. To not work, meant a sentence of near banishment from society to the workhouse or Alms House. The brilliant Charles Dickens has written many eloquent novels that evoke the suffering of masses during this period.
The Hudson county area began to receive many British working class immigrants at this time. Many came to seek a better life, or to realize the entrepreneurial dreams that were denied them back home because of their class. Throughout the 19th century many of these immigrants, especially Scots made homes in this area. The copper mines in what is now the West Hudson area of Kearny and Harrison attracted many Scots. Today, the town of Kearny still retains much of its Scots heritage. It has one of the largest Scot-American populations in the nation. Walking down Kearny avenue, the main street shopping district, will reveal butchers and bakers catering to the specific needs of their Scot customers. Kearny has even given our nation many great soccer players, a game, known as football, brought over by the copper mine immigrants.
The more ambitious and entrepreneurial types like the brilliant inventor and engineer Colonel John Stevens had a vision of the potential of this area. In Stevens’s case he simply bought his own land, ensuring that his vision in the guise of Hoboken came true.
At this time in our history, the followers of Alexander Hamilton's vision for an industrial economy in America were winning over the Jeffersonian idealistic vision of an agrarian economy. The key to the success of an industrial economy lay in its location. Hudson County has always had the prime location in our nation.
Hudson County ’s ports made it an important hub from which to ship or manufacture goods overseas. Therefore the transportation industry, particularly the railroads, steamship lines, and the ferries were the crucial components in making this industrial hub a reality in Hudson County.
Col. John Stevens received the first United States railroad charter in Hoboken. Not long after his short-lived monopoly, many railroad lines began laying track in Hudson County area. They included the Pennsylvania Railroad; the Morris & Essex line, which later became the Erie Lackawanna; the Delaware & Lackawanna; the Jersey Central; the Paterson & Hudson River Line; and the New Jersey Railroad.
Hudson County, ferry service remains a vital intermodal connection for travelers going into and out of New York. The first Hudson County ferries were chartered during colonial times to bring New York passengers to stagecoach connections to Philadelphia in Jersey City. By the middle of the 19th century ferry service from Jersey City, Hoboken, Weehawken, and Bayonne, became the sole method of getting railroad passengers to New York. In 1855, seven million passengers used the Jersey City ferries at a time when the Jersey City population was only 22,000.
During the civil war Hudson County saw a new migration of African-Americans, once again not as free people but as slaves. The underground railroad, a secret link of blacks and whites who smuggled escaped slaves out of the South in the United States to Canada, had important stops in Jersey City. One of those, the Hilton Holden House, still stands on Clifton Place. Many blacks decided not to go on to Canada, preferring instead to take roots under assumed names in Jersey City, hoping that their loved ones, still held in bondage in the South, would one day join them there.
Toward the end of the 19th century, Hoboken became home to several large steamship lines. They were the North German Lloyd Lines, the Hamburg American Lines, and the Holland American Lines. The crew and office personnel of these companies laid down roots in Hoboken. Almost overnight, Hoboken, which had been a country retreat for wealthy individuals, such as Jacob Astor, became a German community. German schools were established and local government records were kept in German. German-speaking hotels sprang up to serve the steamship customers waiting for passage for Europe.
Toward middle and late 19th century, manufacturing companies grew at a rapid pace in Hudson County, especially in Jersey City. The boundaries of present day Jersey City, which was incorporated in 1873, could boast that it was home to many household name brand consumer products, such as Colgate, Dixon Mills, and the P. Lorillard Tobacco Company. But Jersey City was not alone in Hudson County in capturing major manufacturing giants. Harrison and Kearny were home to Crucible Steel, Otis Elevator, Western Electric, and Worthington Pump. Thomas Edison's first incandescent bulb factory was established in Harrrison. Meanwhile, in Bayonne, Standard Oil, Tidewater, and Gulf Oil took roots, for better or for worse, effectively ending the tourism industry that enjoyed the beautiful Bayonne beaches and yacht clubs that became the sites for oil tank farms.
With the opening of Ellis Island in 1893, Hudson County became the most important waypoint for the first great wave of European immigration to America. World War I brought the next great wave of immigrants, refugees from Italy, Greece, Turkey, Armenia, and East Europe, those hardest hit by the ravages of the “war to end all wars.”
As America geared up for World War II, Hudson County’s location and its plentiful supply of manufacturing jobs reated a new and different wave of immigration.These immigrants came from Pennsylvania and from the once active farmlands of South Jersey.
Young people, seeking relief from the empty opportunities of the Depression, saw Jersey City as source of good paying jobs and a chance to start a new life.
At the end of World War II, Hudson County followed the demographic changes occuring throughout the nation. A great portion of its population began to shift westward and to the New Jersey suburbs. Immigration from West Europe continued, but slowed considerably as most war refugees could not afford the passage to America. Immigration from East Europe had all but ceased, as the beginnings of the cold war prevented individuals from emmigration for economic, political, or religious reasons. In their place came refugees from Asia, the Caribbean, India, the Middle East, and the Pacific Rim nations.
Today, Hudson County, because of its location, is an important link for a new age of ferries, rail transportation, and a highway of a different kind - the information highway. Hudson County now leads the nation in major cellular connections, feeding the world with vital informational links. Development of its waterfront and its factories into hotels, retail parcels, and luxury housing has earned Hudson County the title of the “Gold Coast.” A reputation that Alexander Hamilton, who believed that great cities grew on the west banks of great rivers, would understand and appreciate.
