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Simplified naturalization documents

Last activity 30 December 2023 by fluffy2560

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jgreenspan02

Hi everyone,


My great-great-grandparents were born and raised in Hungary, and I’m trying to pursue simplified naturalization based on this connection. I’ve been trying to find their original birth certificates, but have been unable to find them. However, they immigrated to the US and died there. I have their death certificates through New York City, as well as census records where they designate themselves as Hungarian.  Additionally, I don’t have their marriage certificate, but I have the birth certificate for my great-grandfather, which lists them as mother and father.


Will US death certificates + census information be sufficient to prove Hungarian nationality? Will the birth cerificate of their child be sufficient instead of a marriage certificate?

zif

When were they born? Civil records in present-day Hungary are nearly complete for those born 1895 and after.

fluffy2560

I'm using the familysearch,org website (from the Mormons*) family tree programme. It's quite OK and above all else, it's entirely free. 


I don't know if it has any Hungarian document uploads but it covers the USA, Canada, UK etc quite comprehensively, so it might have some linked data to other records to give a bit of a leg up.  I know it cannot reach German records - not that I've found anyway. Maybe it won't get as far as Hungary.



*I'm not a Mormon, just somewhat of a freeloader.

jgreenspan02

@zif they were born in the 1860s and 1870s unfortunately

jgreenspan02

@fluffy2560 thanks! That's where I found the census documents. It doesn't seem like they have Hungarian documents, though

zif

-- Church records are official birth records in Hungary before 1895. Family Search has most of these. Look for church baptism records.


-- You don't say where in Hungary your ancestor was born. Prior to 1918, "Hungary" was much larger than present-day Hungary. If your ancestor wasn't born in present-day Hungary you need to search in the present-day country where he was born.


-- Marriage records are important not just to show lineage but legitimacy.


-- I'm exceptionally doubtful you'll get far without a Hungarian starting document. If you can't get a birth record, perhaps an old Hungarian passport might do, I don't know. But you need something from Hungary (as it then existed) to start your lineage.


-- Remember that for Simplified Naturalization you must have reasonable conversational Hungarian.

fluffy2560


    @fluffy2560 thanks! That's where I found the census documents. It doesn't seem like they have Hungarian documents, though
   

    -@jgreenspan02


You might be able to nail down other information like dates of birth, parents names, village names, original names etc.


I was just today trying to find my ancestor born early 1800s in Hamburg, Germany. 


I think I'll have to ask the government there but it was Prussia back then. 


They only seem to have records from late 1800s.

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