research strategy in messina sicily

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mezzogiorno62
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research strategy in messina sicily

Post by mezzogiorno62 »

i've posted this question several times.to date i've recieved no concrete responses regarding possible research options.maybe there are none.but i'll try again.my paternal grandmother,maria costante(surname given in the tradition of surnames like esposito,trovato,etc.to children born of unknown parents),was born in barcellona pg messina in 1883.ignoti genitori.that kills any chance of finding her birth parents.maria bonarrigo(b.1847 in gaultieri sicamino),my grandmother's wetnurse,applied for custody and upbringing,becoming her virtual mother.maria was the wife of francesco landino(b.1851 in palermo).maria bonarrigo accompanied my grandmother to boston in 1902-and died there soon after arriving.so i have birth records for francesco and maria-and a death record for maria.what i don't have,and can't find after 15 years of research,are the marriage record for them,and a death record for francesco landino.he never accompanied his wife,maria,to boston in 1902,and to my knowledge,never came over.so most likely he died in sicily,probably somewhere in palermo or messina.francesco and maria most likely married ca.1869-1872(as oldest child salvatore was born in barcellona in 1872,when francesco was barely 21).but i checked marriages and deaths in barcellona,gaultieri,palermo,and many other comuni in the area around barcellona,with no results.i have both francesco and maria's original birth records,hoping that francesco's death information as well as marriage information would be noted.nothing.could there be any other records or resources that i'm not aware of that may lead me to this information.i'm a virtual master researcher,but i'm fresh out of ideas and strategies after 15 years.any concrete help would be most appreciated.
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Re: research strategy in messina sicily

Post by carubia »

Since you've been researching this a while and I've seen that you've contacted Gaultieri Sicamino' probably you've already tried what I'm about to suggest. Have you tried contacting churches in Messina and Palermo? Have you tried asking Palermo (who have the birth record for Francesco) or Barcellona (where I presume Maria was born) if they have a marriage record for them?
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Italysearcher
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Re: research strategy in messina sicily

Post by Italysearcher »

Do you have the original birth record from Messina for Francesco? NOT the microfilm copy. Often the original has a notation of the death date and place which is not always found on the microfilm copy.
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liviomoreno
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Re: research strategy in messina sicily

Post by liviomoreno »

Italysearcher wrote:Do you have the original birth record from Messina for Francesco? NOT the microfilm copy. Often the original has a notation of the death date and place which is not always found on the microfilm copy.
My understanding is that the "microfilm copy" is a photo of the original and therefore any notation must be there. Am I missing something?
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Re: research strategy in messina sicily

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The LDS copy of my GGF's birth record from Barcellona does not have any marriage info for him. When I obtained his birth cert from the comune, it had the marriage info for his 2nd wife on it, which I hadn't mentioned at all when I requested his birth cert. (I gave them only his name, exact date of birth, and parents' names.) After receiving the birth cert, I further requested his marriage cert to his 1st wife (my GGM). The only additional information I had was my GGM's name, not the year of the marriage, and yet they came back with their marriage cert. So the comune was able to look up his 1st marriage record without knowing the year of the marriage, presumably because the marriage info had been added to his birth record.

However, he was born in 1881. Maybe 1847 is too early.

I assume you did a search through Sicamino' and Soccorso records for their marriage record, too, as per our previous discussion.
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Re: research strategy in messina sicily

Post by carubia »

liviomoreno wrote:My understanding is that the "microfilm copy" is a photo of the original and therefore any notation must be there. Am I missing something?
The LDS microfilms are often photos of the duplicate records that were sent to district "capitals" and later stored in courthouses and state archives. (The districts were subdivisions of provinces.) The original records that were kept by the individual comuni are different and generally more detailed.
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liviomoreno
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Re: research strategy in messina sicily

Post by liviomoreno »

Thanks, Carubia, however I am still convinced the two copies of the registers kept by the comune had the same content and notations, unless the notation was added after one of the copy was sent to the courthouse.
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Re: research strategy in messina sicily

Post by carubia »

liviomoreno wrote:I am still convinced the two copies of the registers kept by the comune had the same content and notations, unless the notation was added after one of the copy was sent to the courthouse.
Of course. I'm suggesting that the marginal notations were added after the records were copied. For example, if you look through the microfilms of Ribera birth records from the 2nd half of the 19th c., you'll see many of them with marginal notations for deaths and marriages added by Sciacca (the place where records from Ribera were stored) after the record had been copied. You can tell that there were added by Sciacca because they are stamped "Sciacca" with a date that is generally a few months to a few years after the event in question. The marginal note is also of the form of a stamped template with the details filled in. Presumably these notes were independently added to the records in Ribera.

Now, you may doubt whether there were any notes added to Ribera records that weren't also independently copied into the books for Ribera held at Sciacca. But consider the case of my GGF: His birth record held at the Messina courthouse has no marginal notations for either of his marriages, both of which took place in Barcellona, where he was born. However, when I wrote to Barcellona asking for his birth record, somehow they knew about his marriage to his 2nd wife, which occurred when he was 57 and I didn't mention at all. I didn't even mention her, or my GGM, or said that he had been married more than once, or at all. I also didn't, at that time, request any marriage info for him. I can see only 2 explanations: Either there was a marginal note about the marriage on his birth record, or they have digitalized the civil records, so that searching under his name brings up both his birth and marriage records. Do you know if comuni have done this?

Either way, this shows that the comune can give you marriage info for someone for whom you have only located the birth record and for whom there is no marginal information in the microfilmed birth record.
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Re: research strategy in messina sicily

Post by liviomoreno »

Carubia, thanks for the explanation!
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Re: research strategy in messina sicily

Post by mezzogiorno62 »

francesco landino,the husband,was born in palermo in 1851.i have a copy of his original birth record from the lds film.no notations of any kind on it,which i was hoping for.i already had the extract sent to me from the civil records office,stating there were no notations-but i still wanted to check out the original for myself.same with the birth record of maria bonarrigo,his wife,who was born in gualtieri sicamino,messina in 1847(actually soccorso,a frazione of gualtieri).i had the extract sent from the civil records office,but they recently sent me a photocopy of the original document,which i've posted here.no notations of any kind.so i have both original birth records for this couple.no notations on either regarding their marriage or francesco's death.i've seen such notations on other documents-usually the birth act-but unfortunately nothing on these.i've also checked,besides the comuni of palermo and gualtieri,many of the surrounding comuni around and including barcellona pg,where this couple resided and had 2 natural children(i've posted the birth act of their son,salvatore,under my post for registri di leva translation request),who was born in 1872.a daughter,mattia,was born there as well,in 1880.no marriage or death found in any of these comuni.just wondering if there may be other sources i might have overlooked in my search.i contacted the diocese of both palermo and messina as well,several times,with no response.as there are too many churched in palermo,it would be impossible to check them all.but i did check the index of palermo marriages,available online,which covers the years 1820-1895.not there.and i contacted the parish of s.sebastiano in barcellona pg-the chiesa madre-where my grandmother was baptized in 1883.nothing there.i did that many years ago.it appears i've covered all the bases.its like theyve dissapeared from every official record available.
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