Surname changed

[khoney]

I am looking for information regarding a changed surname.

William was born in the early 1900’s in Jamaica. His birth records shows his last name as that of his mother, no father is shown.

In 1924 he immigrates to the United States under a different name, which is uses for the remainder of his life. He filed his first papers in 1931 and the Petition for Naturalization was granted in 1934 by US District, Southern District of New York.

William’s mother married a couple of time but not to a man with the same last name as William was using. She married the first time a man named Arthur when William was a young child. William’s marriage application shows Arthur as his father and referred to Arthur as his father when talking to his children. Arthur however could not have been William’s natural father was he was 14 years old at the time living in England.

William’s date of birth, place of birth and mother’s name are consistent on all of the documents so I am pretty confident I have the correct person.

So the questions are where did the new name come from and how can I track it down? There is no notation on his birth record indicating a later change. Would the Court have required some sort of proof of identity as part of the naturalization process? Any suggestions of where else to look?

Thank you,
Karen

[ffusiak]

My GM immigrated under a neighbor name and documents. It was part of family folklore and she never spoken about the details. At her funeral, one parishioner mentioned some details and it started my seven years search on how she entered the county. She went under an assumed name because of fear of the Nazi's (she was not Jewish) but her family wanted her out of Poland.

I eventually narrow it down and made a FOIA request for her Alien Registration File. Today many are available from the National Archives (https://www.archives.gov). Hopefully the is an A-files for them. My GM folder had over 80 pages.