re:research with italian parish records

[mezzogiorno62]

it amazes me when i hear of success stories regarding research in italian parish records. i've been doing this for 20 years and i've gotten 2 parish records. an 1803 marriage in luogosano avellino for my paternal grandfathers grandparents (civil records only go back to 1809) and an 1883 baptism in barcellona pozzo di gotto messina for my paternal grandmother (records only go back to 1820).rarely if ever was information regarding the exact parish of origin found amongst our immigrant ancestors possessions. lds has filmed very few of these records so its a matter of locating these records by sheer luck for the most part.and to make matters worse,unless an ancestor came from a very small comune with only 1 parish,there could be many to choose from in a large city like naples or palermo.no way to know. and writing to the parishes,as i've discovered,rarely yields results.with civil records youre fine once you know the comune of origin. not so with parish records. if there were a better way to research these parishes i wish i knew. it appears to be mostly a matter of luck. getting a cooperative priest or working with a comune with only 1 parish. and contacting the dioceses is no better. an excercise in futility.

[MSpinella]

it amazes me when i hear of success stories regarding research in italian parish records. i've been doing this for 20 years and i've gotten 2 parish records. an 1803 marriage in luogosano avellino for my paternal grandfathers grandparents (civil records only go back to 1809) and an 1883 baptism in barcellona pozzo di gotto messina for my paternal grandmother (records only go back to 1820).rarely if ever was information regarding the exact parish of origin found amongst our immigrant ancestors possessions. lds has filmed very few of these records so its a matter of locating these records by sheer luck for the most part.and to make matters worse,unless an ancestor came from a very small comune with only 1 parish,there could be many to choose from in a large city like naples or palermo.no way to know. and writing to the parishes,as i've discovered,rarely yields results.with civil records youre fine once you know the comune of origin. not so with parish records. if there were a better way to research these parishes i wish i knew. it appears to be mostly a matter of luck. getting a cooperative priest or working with a comune with only 1 parish. and contacting the dioceses is no better. an excercise in futility.

One of my DNA matches has a connection in Naples who will be going to Messina province in March. He has had good luck with access to parish records, been taking photos of the complete books. He's been doing this for years and the priests he has worked with have complete trust in him. Just, my match, asked me if I would like to contribute to his connection's expenses for his trip in March. His connection offered to pay for half of the expenses. I haven't yet committed to contribute to part of the other half of the expenses but I'm strongly considering it now. He plans on going to Pozzo di Gotto too. If you're interested, I can give you his contact info.

[mezzogiorno62]

interesting.also surprising as lds has had little success with access to parish records in italy. just getting the rights to digitize all the civil records has been slow in coming,considering the fact that most of the civil records were filmed by lds in the 1980s. i'm curious as to how filming these parishes will translate to accessibility for the rest of us. will they appear as a searcheable online database? will lds be involved? if you have an email contact for him forward it to me. hopefully he'll have the answers i'm looking for. thanks

[MSpinella]

It won't be searchable online. You will have to go through each record at a time. I'll send you his contact info.

[MSpinella]

I sent you a PM but it's still sitting in my outbox.

[mezzogiorno62]

thanks mary. i sent him an email and we'll see what happens.

[rp76226]

I obtained a lot of parish records through a local genealogist, and could have obtained all 15,000 parish records from him for Racalmuto, Sicily, but that is too overwhelming for me. he was able to use the records to trace my family line back to a 1588 marriage. I have never had luck obtaining parish records through the Church. One thing that I did learn was that with multiple churches in the same comune, there is usually one 'mother' church where all the records are kept.

[mezzogiorno62]

i'm aware of that. but in large cities the records could be kept anywhere. small villages are much easier to nail down. palermo is a good example. the city is divided into sections and you must know the section in question in order to proceed. not even easy with the lds films. consider that,at least in my case,we're talking about records created well over 100 years ago. more like 140 or 150 years ago. i'm only 2 generations removed. my dad was born here in 1913. my grandfather in 1870 in avellino and my grandmother in 1883 in messina. for a young genealogist someone born in the 1870s or 1880s would be their 2nd great grandparents. the farther back you go the harder it gets. plus churches closed,wars and earthquakes and floods damaged records as well.

[rp76226]

One of the members here - livio - once posted a spreadsheet that had hundreds of town links to civil and church records, but the one i have doesn't work anymore. I'm not sure if he has updated it. Hopefully, he may read this and respond. I will see if I can look him up and send him a private message.