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| A tiny portion of my newly downloaded vital record collection. |
Seems like every day I read that a new genealogy document collection is coming online. Some are available through subscription services, but plenty is out there for free.
If you stay tuned in to social media, you can learn about these new collections early. That's how I discovered a document collection I needed badly was coming online this past week.
Finally, a branch of my family tree that's been a dead end was opening up. And I was ready.
Even before the vital records from the town of Santa Paolina, Italy, were fully published, I was downloading them to my computer. I now have all the available records from 1809–1945 to comb through offline. I stored the documents in 386 folders—separating births, marriages and deaths by year. I have no idea how many thousands of documents there are.
Imagine this is you. Imagine these documents hold the missing information about your great great grandmother Colomba.
Where do you begin?
A little background:
- Colomba's 1920 New York City death record shows her last name was Consolazio and she was born around 1845, somewhere in Italy.
- Her son's World War II draft registration card said he was born in Tufo, Italy.
- Last year I looked at microfilmed records from Tufo. I found two sons for Colomba plus a few Consolazio babies who were her nieces and nephews. It was their records that told me the Consolazio siblings were from the next town—Santa Paolina.
I've been waiting impatiently for the Santa Paolina documents to show up online.
Here's how I'm surgically extracting the most important records first.
Find That First Birth Record
Hoping that her death record was correct about her age, I went straight to the 1845 births. I found Colomba! Though her name is a little different and her father's name isn't what I expected, I know it's her. On her birth record is a note of her marriage to my great great grandfather, Antonio Saviano.
This is unusually lucky, but her birth record say my great great grandparents married in Santa Paolina on 1 June 1871.
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| This 1845 Italian birth record includes the addition of her husband and marriage date. |
Go After the Marriage Record
Your ancestor's marriage record can provide tons of detail, including:
- Bride and groom's birth dates
- Death dates of their deceased parents
- Death dates of their deceased grandfathers if their fathers are dead (this won't be true everywhere)
- Names and death dates of any previous spouses
Santa Paolina's marriage records are a different format than I'm used to. But they gave me important facts I'd been missing: My great great grandfather Antonio's parents' names, occupation, and town of birth. It also confirmed his year of birth.
Start Collecting the Babies
Knowing my ancestors married in June 1871, I started looking for babies beginning in 1872.
I also know from earlier research that this couple had baby boys born in the town of Tufo in 1875 and 1877. So I needed to check the birth indexes only for 1872, 1873 and 1874.
I found one baby girl, Maria Grazia, born on 26 April 1872. She and the two boys born in Tufo are my great grandmother's siblings. So I knew this little girl must have died. We simply have no Maria Grazia in the family. I was sad to find she died 4 days later.
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| Maria Grazia Saviano, the first-born child of my 2nd great grandparents, died at the age of 4 days. |
These were Colomba's earliest babies. The rest of her children are well known to my family. They were born in another town called Pastene. And now I know that's where their father Antonio was born!
But we can't stop there. We need to find Colomba's grandparents, and maybe her great grandparents.
Hunt for the Parents
Colomba's birth record gave me names for her parents, but not their ages. Luckily Santa Paolina had a very small population. I subtracted 25 years from Colomba's birth year, bringing me to 1820. I began checking the birth indexes for 1820, 1819, 1818. I found my 3rd great grandmother, Rubina Maria Censullo! Now I have her parents' names—my 4th great grandparents.
Keep going. 1817, 1816. There he is! My 3rd great grandfather Semblicio Fiorentino Conzolazio. Now I have his parents' names—also my 4th great grandparents.
Getting close to the earliest records, I searched for Semblicio's parents' marriage. He was born in 1816, so I looked at 1815, 1814. Oh my gosh, I found it! His parents, Gaetano and another Colomba, were married on 29 December 1814.
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| The paragraph at the bottom includes the names of 4 of my 5th great grandparents. |
Now I have each of their parents' names. That's 2 sets of my 5th great grandparents. I can't find Rubina Maria's parents' marriage because they were quite a bit older. I'd need church records to find them.
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| With one document collection, boom! 3rd, 4th and 5th great grandparents. |
That's a Great Start
Using targeted searches, I got the juiciest information out of this record collection in no time. But there's a ton more to find. I want to find the births of Colomba's siblings, their marriages and their babies. I need death records for the 3rd, 4th and 5th great grandparents.
I hope you'll try this methodical approach. First looking for very specific records, then expanding to the related records. Be logical and you'll go far. You can do this!
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