TransPacific Records Research Guide

British Columbia has been the gateway to the Pacific for hundreds of years. Records of trans-Pacific crossings date back to the 1700s. Indigenous or mixed-race inhabitants from the Pacific Northwest traveled to Asia in the 1840s, and sailors from China and Japan landed in the Pacific Northwest from earliest times. Chinese settlers arrived in the 1850s and were among the original settlers in the unceded territories of the Coast Salish peoples. This research guide provides a brief overview of some of the trans-Pacific holdings of the BC Archives: holdings related to Asia- Pacific Coast relations including migration, immigration and settlement, travel records, transportation, trade and diplomacy. 

The guide was produced with the assistance of TransPacific History students from the University of Victoria, and their instructor John Price.