Anyone who is lucky enough to have their Grandfather’s Italian passport would expect that the name, parents’ names, date and place of birth would be as accurate as it could get.  And yet, in the past couple of years I have found this not to be the case.

From 1869, passports were required to leave Italy. This was so the Italian government could exert control over their male population and prevent men who had not served their required military duty from leaving the country and could also ensure that anyone who had been convicted of a crime there did not leave the country. From 1901 through 1904, men were also required to have written consent to leave the country, if married, from their wives; if unmarried, from their mothers. In 1901, Italy even passed a law requiring a medical certificate before a passport would be issued for transoceanic travel. This was to ensure that countries in North and South America, such as the U.S., did not reject emigrants for health reasons, or because they were likely to become public charges. This law remained in effect until 1967.

I omitted to give credit for the researching of the above information since I only know the person’s on-line pseudonym. Erudita74.  Erudita has since added the following interesting information. 

Post unification though, external passports were still issued, but upon request and with exceptions. A married woman, for example, could not request a passport to emigrate out of the country, even if her husband had left the country years before and had stopped supporting her and her children. She needed his authorization to emigrate and her passport request was denied. This was true until 1919.

Since the unification of Italy (1861), passport applications have been made at the local police station (questura). The records kept by the questura (in the archives of the headquarters of the internal police in each province) are not available to the public. Registri dell’Emigrazione e Passaporti from about 1800 through WWI are preserved in the archivi di stato (unfortunately not all survived), with those dated 1869 and later being among the records of the Polizia (police) or Prefettura (Prefect). Passport records since WWI are still in the custody of the questura, where the applications were made. (from John Colletta’s book; Italian Roots)

When applying for a passport, the Italian citizen had to submit a copy of his birth record and a penal certificate showing that he was in good standing with Italian law enforcement. Copies of the documents presented when applying were often brought with the emigrant and usually contain the name of the emigrant, town of birth, age or birth date, the date when applying to emigrate or the date when emigration would be permitted, the port of departure and destination.

So if you have a copy of your ancestor’s passport, your application for citizenship should be without issues, right?  You have all the names and dates you need to get the documents from the town of birth.  Let’s see what happened to these people.

FIORINDO.

When Fiorindo left for America with his uncle in 1901 he was just 16 years old.  His passport was valid for only 3 years (to ensure he returned for his military service).  It was also issued ‘free of charge’ indicating that the family were poor.

He never returned to Italy but when he married in 1918 the names of his parents on the American marriage certificate were the same as those on the passport.   Citizenship for his children should not be a problem.  Civil records for this area are on line but when William couldn’t locate his Grandfather’s birth record he turned to us for advice.

We were just as puzzled.  Fiorindo could not have been the child of this couple as they had registered a child ‘born dead’ just 4 months earlier. Fiorindo’s birth record just wasn’t there.  We contacted the town office and were told the same thing.

Our client and his family had a DNA test.  The results are interesting.

Giambattista and Maria Grazia gave birth to Ascenzo on 17 May, 1882.   Fiorindo’s passport lists the same two people as his parents and a birth date of 11 Jul 1890.  Giambattista’s brother also came to the United States after marrying Maria Grazia’s sister. Each had several children.

One of Fiorindo’s sons has DNA tested, as well as 2 grandsons, and 3 great grandsons.

Additionally 3 of Ascenzo’s great granddaughters have DNA tested

A total of 14 measurements between people on each side of the pair of brothers.  There are 3 possibilities.  (A few other options might be possible, but are substantially less likely)

1) Fiorindo and Ascenzo are full siblings

2) Fiorindo and Ascenzo are ½ siblings (Based on other matches, and historical prospects, I would say that if this is the case Giambatista is the common parent, and he had a child with a different woman. 12 of the 14 DNA measurements work with this possibility (marked *)

3) This is the same as #2, but the woman would have to be related to Maria Grazia (like a sister or near cousin) Most all of these measurements are higher than average, and a 2^nd common thread for the families would account for the additional shared DNA.

Will William get his citizenship?

Domenico and Maria Teresa

Martin has an even bigger problem.  He has passports for BOTH His Grandparents, and neither of their birth records cannot be found on line and are probably not at the town office either.  His Grandfather’s passport was issued by the Consulate using the information from the original as he needed it for a temporary return to Italy.  Still, that shouldn’t change the information. Martin has found all the birth records for all the children of the parents of his Grandfather but not Domenico.  The birth records in the town show a birth record for Domenico born in 1844 and who died in 1850.  It is logical that the next child would be named Domenico and it appears he was since the one we are looking for was born in 1851.  Of course, we should write to the town in case he was registered late and is entered in another year.  (They don’t always remember to make a note in the index of the book of the correct year of birth 1851.  i.e. Domenico Valente  see anno 1867.  They wouldn’t have entered it the second copy that we look at on line either.

The same applies to the Grandmother; the birth record is simply not there.  Her passport was also re-issued in 1930 and the year of birth and town of birth are in faded ink compared to the rest.

Antonio

Antonio was born in Calabria and emigrated to Argentina. According to the rules above he must have has a passport in order to travel.  The client no longer has it and we haven’t found it.  Now his granddaughter wants her Italian citizenship.  She has a letter of citizenship for Antonio from 1916 and she believed he was from San Lucia in the Province of Cosenza.  Since there is no town named San Lucia in Cosenza we pulled up a list of towns for the Province and decided that San Lucido was the best match since it also has a ‘frazione’ named Santa Lucia.  However, there was no birth record in the on line records.  Next step was a search of the military records in the State Archives.  A foglio matricolare was found, with the right name, right parents, matched birthdate and the town was San Lucido.  Back to the on line records, the birth record HAD to be there, but it wasn’t.  His father’s death record was found but the birth record eluded us. Even a call to the local priest couldn’t produce a baptism record!

Chiara is lucky, we can get a certified copy of the military record and a letter from the town saying the record was not found.  Hopefully that will get her citizenship.

So, are these clerical errors?  Did the parents’ ‘forget’ to register the birth of their child? Maybe, in the case of Antonio and Domenico.

Were these passports issued with a ‘busta’ under the table or issued so that these people could emigrate and cease to be a burden on the town.  We may never know.