I've got another thread on my (wife's) overall citizenship journey, but I have a specific issue (or three) I'm hoping to find some help with.
My wife's grandfather, Mariano Nicosia, was born 8 Sept 1896 in Gravina di Catania, Sicily. (In America, he went by "Mario," not Mariano.) He arrived in the USA on 08 Nov 1922 (on the ship Colombo from Napoli), and settled in Chicago.
Issue #1: Mariano was married in Sicily when he left for America. Mario passed away in 1940, and the fact that he was married in Italy only came to light recently. Nobody ever spoke about it, for obvious reasons. I don't know if there was ever an official "divorce" in Sicily.
Mario started a new life in Chicago, and at some point, he married Antonia Aprile, born in Orsara Di Puglia, Foggia, Italy on 28 Feb 1910. (That is the birthdate on her social security form. We're in the process of getting her birth certificate from Italy.)
Issue #2: We can find absolutely no record of Mario and Antonia (who also went by Antionetta and Antonette). Based on the births of various children, we believe they would have been married sometime between 1926 and 1927. I've searched all of the various online databases I can think of to search (Ancestry.com, Cook County, FamilySearch, etc.), and have come up empty. I've also emailed the Archdiocese of Chicago in hopes that there might be a church record somewhere.
Is there somewhere else I should be looking? Is there anyone in Chicago that I could reach out to for research assistance? (We're in Texas, which makes research in Chicago tricky.)
Issue #3: Antonia Aprile was married once before she married Mario, to another Italian immigrant named Leo (either Elia or Leonardo) Minervini. They would likely have been married in Butler, Pennsylvania, sometime between 1923 and 1925. Again, I've been unable to find records of their marriage or divorce, either through state or church records.
After Mario passed away in 1940, Antonia remarried twice more, taking the last names of Tisbe and Barbour. When she passed in 1989, it was as Antoinette A Barbour.
In Antoinette's social security records, you can see her various married names.
Now, since my wife is claiming citizenship through her grandfather and then her father, how much information do we need about Antonia's various marriages? What documents might the consulate ask for, given that she's not in the direct line of citizenship?
Grazie!
Help with Marriage Documents
Re: Help with Marriage Documents
Italian citizenship for your wife through an Italian grand-father who abandoned a wife and possibly other children in Italy that you don't know about doesn't sound promising as Italy does not look kindly on this type of behavior. In addition, Bigamy, if indeed he did remarry in America is a crime in Italy and the USA. It's likely that because Bigamy would have been involved, this is the reason there is no marriage certificate for your wife's grand-parents as they were never legally married.
Your issue #3 is also a big problem. It's also likely that the grand-mother, Antonia, was not divorced, particularly if she married her first husband in Italy, and there will be a big question as to who is the father of any children she gave birth to while she was living with your wife's grand-father. In Italy, the father of the children of a married woman is ALWAYS the man she's legally married to, regardless of who's name she puts on the birth certificate. Again this doesn't look promising. Even if you do manage to come up with necessary documents, they aren't likely to be accepted by any consulate that I know of.
Your issue #3 is also a big problem. It's also likely that the grand-mother, Antonia, was not divorced, particularly if she married her first husband in Italy, and there will be a big question as to who is the father of any children she gave birth to while she was living with your wife's grand-father. In Italy, the father of the children of a married woman is ALWAYS the man she's legally married to, regardless of who's name she puts on the birth certificate. Again this doesn't look promising. Even if you do manage to come up with necessary documents, they aren't likely to be accepted by any consulate that I know of.
Re: Help with Marriage Documents
It is likely, since both grandparents were previously married and there is no evidence of divorce, that your wife's grandparents lived together as man and wife but were never legally married.
Try to obtain as much supplemental documentation as you can demonstrating that they lived together and that the grandfather acknowledged paternity (baptism and other church records, letters, affidavits from close relatives).
Try to obtain as much supplemental documentation as you can demonstrating that they lived together and that the grandfather acknowledged paternity (baptism and other church records, letters, affidavits from close relatives).
