My grandfather legally entered this country using one name and then went through the entire naturalization process, finally receiving citizenship under a different name! How is this possible?

I have a notation attached to his naturalization paperwork to indicate that the court changed his first (given) name, but this does not explain how he was able to falsify his Alien Registration form by entering a different last (sur) name.

To be sure that I was just not missing him on the Departure or Arrival Manifests, I hand searched every page. Then when I couldn't locate him (based on the information he included in his Petition), I requested a search from the National Archives. They could not locate him either. He WAS issued a Certificate of Arrival number. So I know someone from the Immigration office must have checked. The naturalization process was completed through the U.S. District Court in Chicago, IL.

Thank you to ANYONE who can answer this question or who could recommend an agency to speak with.

When someone submit an application for naturalization, he/she has an option to request for name change, which many people did because their names are too long or too difficult to pronounce, etc.

You need to locate him by new name.

Thank you very much for your prompt answer! I am going to request a search of documents from Immigration hoping that using his arrival name will reveal a new file. The file created under his "new" name was of no help.

Thanks again!

Many people changed their names to be or sound more "american" I know our family changed their last name slightly

If this was done prior to the final status of citizenship

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Originally Posted by Fr_Chuck

Many people changed thier names to be or sound more "american" I know our family changed thier last name slightly

If this was done prior to the final status of citizenship

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Thank you for your comment and affording me the opportunity to explain further.

The issue in this instance is that I am trying to prove the lineage back to my grandfather for purposes of obtaining dual citizenship. Aside from getting all the certified copies of birth, marriage, divorce and death (which has been a real pain!), I need to prove that my mother was his daughter... the man who immigrated to the US. I thought I had this in the bag until I discovered that he entered the country with a different (yet legal) name.

Basically it goes like this: Antonio Lucabrazzi is noted on the manifest in 1914. In 1921 he gets married with the name Donato D'amici. He has several children, including my mother, all with the last name D'amici. Now I have a birth certificate from Italy with the name Antonio Lucabrazzi, but I have no papers to prove that my mother's father is the same guy. Ughh!! So frustrating!

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Originally Posted by Dondea

My grandfather legally entered this country using one name and then went through the entire naturalization process, finally receiving citizenship under a different name! How is this possible?

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Hello Dondea:

One possible option might be what they did to lots of Jewish immigrants. The immigration agent didn't speak their native language, wasn't given any direction, and as they crossed, gave them names based upon whim.

I don't know what my family name is, because the jerk at the border gave my grandfather the name of the city he was from - Breslau, Poland.

My uncles' name is Wahl, until his family discovered it was really Minowitz. One of the brothers changed it back, and one didn't...

excon

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Originally Posted by excon

Hello Dondea:

One possible option might be what they did to lots of Jewish immigrants. The immigration agent didn't speak their native language, wasn't given any direction, and as they crossed, gave them names based upon whim.

I don't know what my family name is, because the jerk at the border gave my grandfather the name of the city he was from - Breslau, Poland.

My uncles' name is Wahl, until his family discovered it was really Minowitz. One of the brothers changed it back, and one didn't...

excon

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From what I understand, there is less of a chance that it happened that way. When a person boarded the ship at the port of departure, he/she had to have appropriate travel documents. The person who checked the passengers in, checked the documents and indicated the name on the manifest based on the documents. AND... most shipping lines employed individuals who spoke the native language of the people where the lines traveled to and from.

Now with the eastern European languages, I can see that it would be very difficult to read the language, but since his birth certificate matches the name on the manifest, that just wasn't the case. On the Departure Manifest, the same name is noted and checked.

Thank you to everyone who offered an opinion here. I'm hoping that I'll solve this mystery no matter how long it takes and then I'll be able to write the second part of the story ;-)



IF my grandfather would have