SCOUSER HALLE...THE VERY BEST OF BRITISH

The genealogy of the celebrities has been unearthed thanks to the release of passenger lists for voyages from the British Isles to America between 1820 and 1960.

Millions of people set off for a better life in the New World. Many, particularly those from Ireland, were forced to flee because of poverty and starvation.

By 1860, so many had arrived in New York that it became the largest Irish city in the world, numbering more than 200,000 of its 800,000 residents.

Such was the exodus of Britons across the Atlantic that now one fifth of America's 300 million people can claim to have British ancestry.

Records released by Ancestry.co.uk trace Hollywood star Tom Cruise's roots to Flint in North Wales, from where his paternal great-great-grandfather Dylan Henry Mapother emigrated in 1850, ending up in Louisville, Kentucky.

Oscar-winning actress Halle Berry's maternal grandmother was nine months old when she set sail from Liverpool with her mother and five siblings on board the Merion in 1912, settling in Philadelphia. Halle's mother Judith was also from Liverpool.

Tycoon Donald Trump is of Scottish origin thanks to his mother Mary MacLeod, who was born on the Isle of Lewis and set sail for the US in 1935.

The lists reveal how First Lady Laura Bush's great-great grandparents sailed on board the Southampton from London to New York in 1865. Actor Michael Douglas has roots in Ireland. Action hero Clint Eastwood can trace his family tree back to England, Scotland, Ireland and Holland.

And there is even evidence to suggest that he is a direct descendant of Plymouth colony governor William Bradford, who was one of the first settlers in America, travelling on the Mayflower in 1620.

Access to the Ancestry Passenger Lists will be free until November 30.