Zampella ~ Di Costanzo Family Documents

I received the marriage record and documents for Domenico Antonio Zampella and Maria Grazia di Costanzo from Caserta Archives earlier this week. Antonio (as he called himself) and Maria Grazia were married on December 12, 1831. His father was Domenico Zampella who died on September 20, 1802 at the age of 24 when his son was only 2 years old. But that means Domenico was born around 1778! I can now prove that I have gotten back through the barrier of the 1800's. Another interesting thing that came to light after reading a translation of Domenico Zampella's death record was that he was mortally wounded somehow and confessed his sins to a priest. He wasn't in his own town when he died but in a nearby town. Did he die in a battle, was his death a tragic accident, was it a self-inflicted wound? We will never know because the death record doesn't tell us.

For the marriage record itself: Domenico Antonio Zampella, born in Caserta, 30 years old, adult, blacksmith who makes horseshoes, domiciled in Caserta in San't Antonio Street, son of the deceased Domenico Zampella, and the living Maddalena Izzo, spinner. Maria Grazia Di Costanzo, born in Caserta, 21, adult, spinner, domiciled in Caserta in San't Antonio Street, daughter of the deceased Felice Di Costanzo and the living Orsola Ignarra, spinner, domiciled in Caserta.

When the marriage took place, Maria Grazia's father Felice di Costanzo was also deceased. His death certificate says that he had died on March 20, 1823 in the hospital of Caserta, husband to Orsola Ignarra, born in a town called Nola in Naples but living in Caserta and had one daughter named Maria Grazia. Felice di Costanzo was a barber by profession.

I also found out that Maria Grazia's full name was Maria Grazia Carmela Vincenza Sebastiana DiCostanzo Zampella! What a mouthful that name is. She was born on July 21, 1809. Here are the marriage records and death records that I received from Caserta.

Christina Prinzo Famoso - A Wonderful Mother

Christina Prinzo as a young lady around 1906

Christina and her brother Charles 1905

Christina Prinzo Famoso and her son John 1911

Christina Prinzo Famoso

On her birth certificate, her name is listed as Crestina Maria Giuseppa Luisa Prinzo.  Christina was born in Harlem, Manhattan, New York on June 16, 1892.  She was my grandmother.  I never knew her but by all accounts she was a wonderful mother and grandmother.  Sadly, she only got to know one of her grandchildren.  She died on April 24, 1943.  Her life was short and heartbreaking.  She was a beautiful young girl who met her husband to be at a funeral before she was even 16 years old. Luigi and Christina were married on April 23, 1908 when she was not quite 16 years old.  Her parents were from “the other side” but she was a ‘Merican.  Grandma Christine only went to school up to the 4^th grade.  That was probably quite a bit more schooling than either of her parents had. Francesco Prinzo and Maria Giuseppa Luisi were farmers back in Italy. Her father Frank became a laborer to support his family in the United States. When she met and married her husband Luigi she actually gave up her citizenship for him. For a very short period of time, that is what happened when an American woman would marry a foreign-born man. Christina must have thought he was so handsome and well-educated. I’m sure she must have admired him, at least at first. I don’t believe that her love could have lasted too long because he turned out to be a selfish husband. She gave birth to ten children but only 9 survived to become adults. That was pretty good for the times they lived in. Her 4^th child, Joseph, died of enteritis at the age of 7 months. 

I know that Christina could sew and cook. I also know that she worked hard and was a very good mother. She did not have much extra time to tell her children stories or play games with them. She simply had to make sure they would survive in the world. 

According to a story my mother heard at Christina's husband Luigi's funeral, Christina had to go to her sister-in-law Loretta and beg her to get money from Luigi for food. This story was told by Luigi's sister Loretta.

My father told me that he helped his mother wash clothes on a washboard. I can’t even imagine how difficult and time-consuming that must have been. Especially, when you were washing clothes for 9 children and two adults!

Dad also told me that his mother always said that she could put sauce on rocks and her 9 kids would eat them! Her boys were always hungry.

Grandma Christina fought for my father to stay in school so he could get his high school diploma because his father Luigi wanted him to quit school to get a job.

She worked in a factory making snowsuits for a few years to make money so she could support her family. 

She saved pennies in a cup for insurance for each one of her boys. When they grew up she was able to give each of them $500 which was a whole lot of money in those days.

Her sons liked to think they protected her from their father. I asked my dad if Luigi was a violent person and he said they didn’t know because he would not have taken on any of his sons who were all bigger than him.

Christina taught my father how to sew and use a sewing machine to turn a collar. That was a good way to save money on clothing at the time. When your shirt collar wore out, then you could turn it and get several more years of wear out of it without looking like a hobo.

In her later years, when her kids were all grown up she would sometimes sit outside on their front stoop (porch) to watch the neighborhood kids play. My dad says that she knew all their names and would try to make sure they did not get hurt. I guess that proves she was a mother at heart and was taking on the village approach to raising kids.

Her death was probably not sudden or unexpected.  She had gotten hit by a trolley car and sustained injuries from that accident.  The actual cause of her death was congestive heart failure.  She was only 51 years old but looked at least a decade older than that due to her hard life.  I know she would be happy to know that all her kids got married and most of them had children of their own. 

Christina Prinzo Famoso, Luigi Famoso, Sam Famoso and Catherine Prinzo
Wedding 1908

Christina and her mother Josephine Prinzo - 1940

Christine Prinzo Famoso - 1940

Christine Famoso Prinzo 1940

Open Letter to My Ancestors

My Dear Ancestors,

First of all, I want to thank you for making the very long and dangerous voyage from Italy to America. It  had to be extremely difficult to leave everything you knew to go to a completely foreign place. You had no knowledge of the language or customs here. I call that brave. Some of you came over by yourselves or with a friend who is unknown to me. Others came with family members. Either way, it had to be very scary. You left your friends and family to come here. I know you all thought you would have better lives in the United States. I hope that your lives did get better when you got here. I have no way of knowing if that happened for you because I don't know anything about some of your lives. I do know that all of your descendants are happy we live in the USA. We have lived good lives and hope to continue to do so for many years to come.

Now, with that said, I want to tell you that you haven't made things easy for us when it comes to finding information about you. There are many documents that I would love to find but can't because your names are spelled wrong or you aren't even listed on any documents. Some of  your documents have completely "disappeared". Did you really get naturalized in 1901, Frank Prinzo?  I'm beginning to wonder.  If you did, someone did an excellent job of hiding or misfiling your naturalization documents. I know it isn't all your fault. There wasn't a great desire to keep records back then. It seems like sometimes it was pure luck that a document was even filed or survived for over 100 years.

Another thing, I don't like the custom of not talking about your past or passing down stories about your lives. For most of you, I have had to make stuff up just to form an opinion about you.  I would prefer if you had talked a blue streak about yourselves, left lots of neatly written and properly stored papers and took lots of photos.  I know photography was expensive back then but you should have been thinking ahead.  We all want to know what you guys looked like. Oh, why didn't any of you keep a journal? I could have tried to translate it or even learned Italian to do just that.  I also never found that Bible you were all supposed to have. Actually, I never heard of an Italian genealogist finding a family Bible.  Okay, okay, you were all busy working, cooking, cleaning, and all that stuff.  I know everything took lots longer to do back then than it does now. But some of you could have been thinking ahead a little bit and left us some breadcrumbs to follow. I know many of us would have been appreciative. Please feel free to do whatever you can from wherever you are now to help us find out some things about you.

Thank you.

Your loving descendant...

Annie the Amateur Genealogist

Giovanni Famoso - International Man of Mystery

Now that you have met Brasso, it is time to meet his father Giovanni Famoso. If Brasso is a mystery to me, well then Giovanni is a complete enigma. He was my great grandfather and a musician. That is almost all I know about him. I have no photos of him. I have no idea what instrument he played [I recently found out that he played the cornet] and I don't know where he may have worked while living in Italy or the United States [I have a photo and some information that indicates he may have been in Giuseppe Creatore's Italian Marching Band but this has not been confirmed]. Wait, I do also know that Giovanni was an orphan who was abandoned at the Santissima Annunziata Maggiore in Naples. The Annuziata was famous for their ruota or wheel where unwed mothers would leave their babies. I found Giovanni's original birth record.  It is written in Italian, of course. I think it says he was 8 pounds and 12 ounces at birth. Certainly, that would have been a good weight for a healthy baby.  His birth date was in July of 1853. The document say that he was sent to live with a couple named Carmela Vaccaro and Luigi Cimino in Cardito, Italy. It also says that Luigi was a painter.  It is interesting to note that the Annunziata had a very high rate of child deaths. Giovanni was very lucky because he was sent to live with a couple right away. It doesn't seem like he spent any time at all living at the Annuziata.  The address of this couple is even on the document but I can't make out the street name. All I can read is that it was at No. 613. Even more interesting to me is that Giovanni became a musician. I imagine that Carmela and Luigi must have taken good care of Giovanni and sent him to a music school. I found an orphanage in Naples that also taught orphan children a trade but my inquiry into that orphanage came to a dead end. I would love to know where Giovanni studied music. I would also love to know who Giovanni's birth parents were.  It is interesting to note that on Giovanni's death certificate, his parents are listed as Luigi Famoso and Concetta Armando. Who were these people? I want to believe that they are his birth parents but I have no way of knowing if that is true. These names could be made up or they could be real people.  Here is his official birth record that I obtained from the Naples Archive after then sent me the wrong one which was for a boy with the same name and abandoned at the same place but died shortly after his birth. This second official birth record says something about a church called St. Francis and Matthew in Naples. I don't know if he was baptised there but somehow this church is involved.

The next thing I know about Giovanni is that somehow he grew up.  Against all odds for abandoned babies at that time. He made his way to a town called Marcianise.  Somehow, he met and married Anna Vincenza Sebastiana Pirolli in March of 1879.  How did they meet? Why did they get married? Did they fall in love or was it an arranged marriage?  Anna's story is for another day. I have so many questions about their union. Their marriage record tells me that Giovanni was a "bandista" which meant that he was a musician in a band. I would absolutely love to know what instrument he played but I probably will never know the answer to that question [cornet].  The marriage document also tells me that both Giovanni and Anna could read and write.  Their signatures appear at the bottom of the document. Pretty cool, I think.

I also know that Giovanni and Anna lived in Marcianise at least until 1882.  She gave birth to two sons in Marcianise that I know of.  Their oldest child Domenico and my grandfather Luigi Arturo were both born in Marcianise.  I have documented that with their birth records.  Giovanni and Anna's next oldest son Sossio was born in another town. According to Sam's WWI registration card, he was born in Frattamaggiore on March 24, 1886.  I can't prove it but it is probably true.  In all likelihood, the couple had another child in 1884 that died very young or at birth. I will go ahead and make the assumption that they also had a baby between 1888 and 1890 but the next baby that I have a record of is Biagio who was born on October 1, 1891 in Bari, Italy.  I really don't know why they moved around so much or if Biagio was born while they were visiting or at a temporary assignment in Bari.  It is definitely out of character for them to be living anywhere outside of Campania.  Biagio grew up to be Brasso our WWI hero.  The next baby they had was Alphonso who was born on February 9, 1896 in a town called San Savario in Bari according to his WWI registration card.  I can't find any town by that name in Bari but there are towns called Sanmichele di Bari, Sannicandro di Bari and Santeramo in Calle.  I have not found Alphonso's birth record yet.  Their next child, Colomba Rosa was born in Sansevero in April of 1898 according to her birth record.  Rose was their last child born in Italy (that we know of who lived ~ more on this later).

The story that we have heard from my father and he confirmed with Domenico (Giovanni's oldest son) was that Giovanni decided that Domenico (aka Mimi) would go to the United States to study and play music.  The story goes that Giovanni took Mimi's passport and papers and gave them to his next oldest son Luigi and told the boys that they were to change identities so that Mimi could go to the United States with Giovanni and Luigi would go into the military in Mimi's place.  My grandfather Luigi became Mimi and went into the Italian ski patrol.  The rest of Luigi's story is also for another day. So, Giovanni and Mimi traveled together to the USA.  They either landed in New York City or Philadelphia depending on whether you believe a story told to my cousin by Mimi or Mimi's naturalization papers that I found filed in Atlantic City, New Jersey in 1903.  Mimi's naturalization states that he came to the USA through the port of New York on December 15, 1897 (could be 1887 ~ it is hard to read).    I have never found Giovanni or Mimi on any manifest in 1897 coming through either New York or Philadelphia.  I have to wonder if they used false names so that they could get into the United States without problems.  I don't know how easy that would have been but I imagine that they needed passports.  I have also never found any Italian passports for either of them or any of my other relatives for that matter.

The next time we see Giovanni is on a manifest for the ship The Aller in June 1899.  On that manifest, he says he is going to see his son Domenico in Philadephia and he has been in the United States once before. There is an "X" next to his name which I am told means that he was detained.  I can't find any record of why he was detained but he did eventually make it to the United States as we all know.  I don't know if he ever reached Philadelphia to visit his son or where he lived when he first arrived in the USA. The first evidence of him that I have found is on the 1903 birth record of his youngest daughter Liberata Tosca (Loretta) Famoso. But first, I have to mention that he left his oldest son in the United States by himself while he goes back to Italy and returns to the United States perhaps 2 or 3 years later! I can't find any record of what Mimi or Luigi or whoever is doing in the Philadelphia area during that time.  Is there a name change involved, probably.  When Giovanni returned to the USA, he left his wife and remaining children behind.  They did not come to the United States until late in 1901.  I can just imagine poor Anna traveling alone on a ship with her four young children.  It appears that they all met up again in 1903 and were living at 13 North Mississippi Avenue in Atlantic City, New Jersey. I found that address on Loretta's birth record as well as on Domenico's naturalization papers. Sadly, that building is long gone and the property is part of a parking lot for a large hotel and casino now.  I have a goal of somehow finding out where Giovanni was in 1900-1902. Was he traveling with a band?

By 1905, I find Giovanni and family living in Harlem, New York at 314 East 101st Street.  It looks like the family is all together John, Anna, Mimi, Louis, Sossio, Biagio, Alphonse, Rose and Lebi (Loretta) but I have also found my grandfather Luigi living in Atlantic City, NJ for this same census.  It is always possible that Giovanni did not understand the questions he was being asked or that a neighbor provided the information for this census.

Sadly, his wife Anna dies in 1908 and is buried at Calvary Cemetery in Woodside, Queens, NY in the pauper (or cemetery owned) section at the very young age of 50 leaving a 4 year old daughter and a 9 year old daughter.  What does Giovanni do?  He promptly moves his family into the same building where his second oldest son Luigi and his wife and family are living.  They are all now living a 322 East 109th Street. Yes, we now have Giovanni the widower along with his young children living in the same apartment building as his two married sons (Luigi and Sam) along with his sons' in-laws!  This is probably a good time to mention that Luigi and Sam married two sisters thereby keeping it all in the family. I guess that wasn't very unusual at that time and in that place for Italian families to all live together in one apartment building. Giovanni probably got free or very inexpensive child care that way. To me, it sounds something like the plot of a 1980's situation comedy.

I have found Giovanni and his family on the 1910 census in New York City, the 1915 census, and the 1920 census. There are definitely mistakes on these census reports but I'm sure they are due to the language barrier. I have also recently found a Petition of Intent filed by Giovanni in 1918 when he was 65 years of age. On that Petition he states that he is 5 feet tall and 190 lbs. and that he is a music professor.  I am starting to think that Giovanni may have married another woman named Anna since  his Petition of Intent states his wife's name as Anna and "she lives with me."  Really?  His wife had been dead for over 10 years at this point. Maybe I should look for a marriage between Giovanni and another woman named Anna.  It is also worth mentioning that there seems to be some sort of rift between Giovanni and his older sons.  If not, then why didn't my grandfather ever talk about his parents?  No one in the family knows anything about Giovanni probably because they had a falling-out over something.  It saddens me that we don't know more about Giovanni's life but I will keep digging.

Giovanni died at the age of 70 on August 27, 1923 although his death record says he is 50!  He was living at 417 East 106th Street at the time of his death.  His final resting place is also at Calvary Cemetery in Woodside, Queens, NY but he has a plot that he eventually shares with his daughter Rose Puzzuto, her husband Pasquale and his granddaughter Mary Ann.

UPDATE 12/18/2015 - I found out that Giovanni played the cornet. I found this information in the military files I received on his son Brasso.

UPDATE 05/25/2016 - I have a lead that Giovanni may have played in Giuseppe Creatore's Italian Marching Band which was a rival to John Phillip Sousa's Marching Band.

Here is a photo of my Dad
at age 6 for comparson.

Could this be Giovanni Famoso playing a
sousaphone in Creatore's Italian Band?

Intriguing Story...But is it true?

The first story that I uncovered in my genealogy search is quite a compelling one. It is also quite confusing.  We all know that back in the 1800's and for a long time after that, people got married before having children.  What my search uncovered is that my great grandparents may have had their first child before getting married.  It appears that way at first glance, anyway.  My great grandparents got married on November 5, 1891.  That is a fact.  I am waiting (im)patiently for a certified copy of their wedding certificate from the New York State Bureau of Vital Records.  That is not in dispute.  The confusion comes in with their children.  Their oldest son was named Charles and he was born on February 29, 1890.  That is interesting.  The question is whether he is my great grandfather's son or a son from another marriage?  We don't know.  I can't find a birth or baptismal certificate for Charles.  I would love to see that.  Their second child, my grandmother was born on June 16, 1892.  I did find her birth certificate.  I am awaiting the certified copy of it.

I also can't quite figure out when they came to the United States.  I haven't found anything for Frank (my great grandfather) except for on a census he says he came to the United States in 1886 and in another census he say 1887.  He also said on the 1900 census that he was married for 15 years which is obviously not true.  The marriage transcript that I saw states that they were both single.  That means nothing really but if they had been married in Italy and come over to the United States together they would probably have said so.  I wonder if they were married to other people back in Italy.  I can't be sure but they were about 39 and 29 respectively when they did actually get married. That is fairly old for those days.  It would seem that they might have been married to others before.  Maybe they were both widows?  It is so odd.  I have written to at least 10 different churches in Manhattan and New Jersey trying to find out if that was the church they got married in.  I haven't found anything yet.  I have even tried non-Catholic churches.  You never know.

Update:  I found what I think may be my great grandfather Francesco Prinzo and his brother Luigi on a ship's manifest!  The ship was The Burgundia.  It would be hard to believe but both brothers had their last names spelled wrong on the manifest and differently wrong.  How odd is that?  Apparently not that odd.  My mother's friend from Brooklyn says her father and his brother came to the USA on the same ship and had their last names spelled wrong and differently on the manifest.  Pretty common then?  Who knows.

I also found a woman named Giuseppa Luisa (perhaps my great grandmother) on a ship in 1887 called The Brittania.  The mystery continues because if that is her she had a chil

d of age 1 traveling with her.  The child was called Rosaria Luisa.  Is that another of my great grandmother's children?  I have no idea who she was or what became of her.  I only know that on one of the census reports I found, she states that she had given birth to 4 children but only 3 are living.  The plot thickens.  .  .  The ship she supposedly came on seems to have encountered 3 hurricanes on the way to the USA.  It took them 34 days rather than the usual 14 days. I found reports on this sailing from several different newspapers including the NY Times, Herald Tribune, etc.

Luigi Prinzo dressed for Halloween in 1920's on rooftop at 322 East 109th Street, NY, NY

Christine Prinzo Famoso, Maria Giuseppa (Josephine) Prinzo and Katherine (Katie) Prinzo Famoso

This is hand carved pipe that Luigi is wearing in his photo.  Supposedly, it was given or traded to him by a sea captain who sailed a ship on the Hudson River.  The pipe depicts what looks like a Civil War soldier and a naked lady (maybe a mermaid) along with a turtle.  This pipe has been in our family for generations.