Biography
Ferdinand Christopher Smith was a Jamaican-born co-founder and national secretary of the National Maritime Union and the first Black member of the CIO executive council. Immigration authorities arrested him in early 1947 under the Alien Registration Act and confined him at Ellis Island during deportation proceedings before he made bond. After a 1949 deportation order, authorities confined him again at Ellis Island until supporters raised bail. He left the United States in 1951 and later returned to Jamaica, where he died on August 14, 1961. Exact detention and release dates were not located.
The Dispatcher reports that Ferdinand C. Smith was arrested and taken to Ellis Island on February 16, 1948, and names him among the detainees temporarily released on March 6, 1948. This documented episode is recorded separately here because the existing case lists a 1947 start and later confinement is also reported. These dates do not resolve the complete custody history.
