As you can see from Vincenzo Chiariello’s Declaration of Intention, he was born in Naples, Italy. Except he wasn’t. The hardest part of researching our Italian ancestors is finding where they came from. The second part is finding the records. In this case, I was fortunate since researching in Naples is exceptionally difficult and I leave that to those who are experts in that area.
Vincenzo’s death record was filled out by his son who knew that his father was born in Acerra, Italy, the son of Samuel Chiariello and Josephine Carrera. And thus my journey began. There are lots of Acerra records online and everyone in Acerra is pretty much related to everyone in Acerra by marriage.
To me, family history is not a tree but a giant puzzle that I keep adding pieces to. I laugh when I’m asked how we are related and the answer is the 4th cousin of the 2nd wife of the 3rd cousin of the wife of the uncle of my husband’s 4th cousin three times removed. Or something like that.
I love genealogy and I just can’t stop.