Are you looking for an Italian surname? Do you need more information about your family heritage?
This is the right place to start your genealogy search.
hi guys, this time I am trying to find out about my great grandfather, who - according to family knowledge - emigrated in the early 1920's to the US to seek for fortune... but unlike many others, he didn't find fortune, so he headed back a few years later
Here's all I know about him:
Giuseppe Santoro
Birth date: 6th March 1885
Birth place: Casolla, Caserta, Campania, Italy
Migrated after 1920
Giuseppe was married (to Mariantonia Farina) and had 3 daughters, but he migrated alone, so I am not sure any of this info would show up on the migration papers.
I know this is probably like looking for a tiny needle in a huge haystack, but hey, you guys know your stuff, so maybe you'll succeed!! Best of luck....
What are the daughters names and who did they marry and where did they live?
Is this your grandfather Giuseppe Santoro son of Gregori Lorenzo Santoro and Maria Zupo
on 1885 Mar 6th?
2 Carmela, born in Casolla (?) between 1909 and 1920
3 Lucia (my grandmother), born in Casolla (?) 14 Dec 1920
Couldn't find Carmela's and Lucia's certificates, because they were born later than the archive shows.
As well as finding the two missing birth certificates, I would really love to find out about Giuseppe's stay in America... where and when did he go? how long was he gone for? did he actually do anything while out there??
hi all... bumping back an old post, since I think there's a development.
I did find a Giuseppe Santoro who sailed to the US in 1912, which is earlier than I thought... though his age (26) and his wife (Antonietta) match the other data in my possession (born 1885, and married to a Mariantonia, which would easily be called Antonietta as pet name). So here's the manifest: https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:JJTH-CY6
but I wonder:
first, what does the fact that some entries have an "admitted" stamp on, and some don't?
secondly, how do I track how he came back to Italy (which I am sure he did)?
The word "admitted" stamped on a passenger list means that the person was detained or temporarily denied admittance to the U.S. Sometimes there was a hearing; other times, no hearing was necessary. When you see the word "admitted" stamped by an individual's name that means you should search for a list of detained aliens, or aliens held over for special inquiry, which normally are at the end of all of the pages of a particular ship's manifest. Sometimes though these lists are at the beginning. Some of these immigrants just had insufficient funds to reach their final destination by train, for example, so a phone call to the relative who would supply the funds would then remedy the situation and allow the person to be admitted to the U.S. Sometimes the person had a contagious disease such as the measles and had to be quarantined for a certain amt of time before being formally admitted to the U.S. Not all held over, however, were admitted. Some were deported, if they were, for example, deemed likely to become public charges.
Unfortunately, there are no passenger lists from the U.S. back to Italy. Some towns though did keep track of the goings and comings of their native citizens. You would have to contact your ancestral towns to see if they kept such registers with specific dates when an ancestor left or returned to the town.
on the manifest, as I realised just now, there's a contact name, his brother in law Vincenzo Foresta.
searching through the archive, I think I found the manifest of his Vincenzo's arrival to the US, to join his wife Maria Giuseppa Ferrajolo: https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903 ... cc=1368704
the final destination is the same (Phoenixville) which makes me think this is the right guy. What doesn't match, however, is the fact that neither Foresta nor Ferrajolo are related to "my" Santoro...
so, either "my" relative is not my relative at all (could still be the case), or the concept of brother in law was quite broad... or he lied :p
so my question is, did people have to prove the existence of their contact, and/or their relation to them? or, so long as the immigration officers could verify the existence of a guy called Vincenzo Foresta, then it could have well been a friend, rather than a relative?
The ship manifests were actually created in the country of origin at the ports there. When an immigrant arrived in the U.S. in the early 1900s, he/she was asked a series of 29 questions. The inspectors here were just looking to see if the answers matched what was originally written on the manifest. The entire screening process, excluding the "many hours" waiting period caused by the long lines during the mass migration period, only took a matter of minutes. There was no proof given that the person to whom the immigrant was destined was, in fact, a relative. Many used others from their native towns who had already immigrated here as their destination contacts. So, even if a former neighbor, or friend, or just someone else from the same native town, that person might have been listed as a cousin, uncle, etc. Others who had previously immigrated from the native town would send letters back to the native town and such "destination" arrangements were made before an individual even left his native town to head to a debarkation port. My paternal grandfather who arrived in 1907 referred to someone from his native town as his "uncle," yet he and both of his parents, who later reclaimed him, were foundlings and of unknown parents. A year after he arrived, another male from his native town was destined to him, and my grandfather is referred to as a "cousin" on that person's manifest, yet these people weren't even related to the wetnurse or her husband to whom he was initially assigned, or to the families of the wetnurses to whom his abandoned parents had initially been assigned. Of course, only by going through the Italian records for the native town can you determine with any degree of certainty whether the person listed as a destination relative was, in fact, a relative or not.
Also the link below may help you with notations on the manifests
many thanks for taking your time to provide me with such an exhausting answer, Erudita!
I'm reassured now that I found the right Giuseppe after all then... now I wonder why on earth he came back home, rather than begin a new life like many have done... unfortunately, there's no way to tell, over 100 years later, oh well.
grazie mille once again!
Silvio
No problem, Silvio. Didn't even notice your mistake. BTW, you're wondering why your ancestor would have returned to Italy rather than staying in the U.S.. The subject of return migration is interesting. I will threw out some ideas concerning this subject to you soon.
Erudita
I just want to briefly address an issue, raised by Silvio in his post above, concerning Italian immigrants permanently returning to their country of origin. Just because an Italian immigrant to the U.S., or anywhere else, decided to permanently return to his native county, does not mean that that person was a failure. In fact, many who returned permanently actually did so because they were successful. They had come to America with the intention of staying here only temporarily. They had just wanted to make money, which they could then bring back to Italy, to ensure a better quality of life for themselves and their loved ones. Some who returned were able to buy small businesses, a tract of land, a bigger house-one which even had two floors and, in which, the family would no longer need to house their animals. Some could now pay off their debts. Some could purchase a vineyard or orchard. Some could even have money for retirement which would allow them to, at least, reduce the number of hours they would have to work in old age, if they even had to work at all. Those who did fail, however, did not necessarily do so due to their own shortcomings. They had discovered that life in America was not always filled with abundant employment opportunities and regular wages. They had lost their jobs in the U.S. and then had to use their savings to sustain themselves while living there. Some became the victims of industrial accidents, in the factories and mines where they worked, and some contracted life-threatening diseases like tuberculosis, while living in the crowded tenements in the big cities like New York, and chose to return home because they, and their families in their native country, did not want them to die in a foreign land. Some returned permanently to Italy simply because they were homesick or even because the burden of caring for elderly parents there fell on them. Some chose not to invest in land upon their return to Italy, even if they had accumulated enough money to do so, as they had witnessed earlier returnees invest in land and not survive there as independent farmers.
There actually was pressure on Italian immigrants here in the United States to remain true to their native Italy. There were organizations such as the San Raffaele society which, not only worked to keep the Catholic faith of the immigrants alive, but which also worked to keep alive their sentiment concerning nationality and affection for their mother country. Also the Italian government itself played a role in encouraging immigrants to return permanently back to Italy as, for example, when it passed a law on June 13, 1912, which allowed for the easy redemption of Italian citizenship to those who had become citizens of another country. It would now not cost these permanent returnees any money to renew their Italian citizenship. All they had to do was reside back in their native country for a period of two years, and they could then become Italian citizens once more.
Of course, my comments above are only touching upon a subject what is otherwise rather complex. To delve further into this subject, I’m recommending the following books, the last of which is not Italy specific:
The National Integration of Italian Immigration 1970-1929 by Dino Cinel.
Italian Repartriation from the United States, 1900-1914 by Betty Boyd Caroli
Round-Trip to America: The Immigrants Return to Europe, 1880-1930 by Mark Wyman
such a great post, thank you so much Erudita for taking your time to clarify this for all of us. it's true, "fortune" means different things to different people, and perhaps to my ancestor coming back to Italy was the best thing that happened to him... maybe not vastly rich, but with enough money to look after his wife and three daughters, and live a decent life until the end of his days, in the village where he was born.
Thank you also for suggesting further reading, I'll try to find those books in the local library at the earliest opportunity.
Mille grazie, e buona Pasqua.
November 2nd is All Souls' Day,a Catholic feast dedicated to the memorial of the dead which, according to tradition, can be dated back to ancient times. This day, in almost every country, the dead are remembered with different rituals and customs, yet the aim is just one: give some consolation to th...
