Identifying Your Mexican Immigrant Ancestor’s Hometown

This post is part 2 in a new series I am doing on Mexican Catholic Church and Civil Registration records. Please read part 1 (“The Two Main “Go-To” Record Types for Researching Mexican Genealogy“) if you have not already done so.

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Before you begin digging into Mexican records, you need to first identify your ancestor’s hometown in Mexico. The reason for this is twofold: it narrows down the geographic scope of your search, and it helps you identify the right collections to use.

When I first started researching my father’s paternal Mexican line, nobody in our very large branch of the family knew where specifically in Mexico the family came from. We only knew a state name…San Luis Potosí. That did not make my search for their Mexican roots an easy one. Even with so many of these collections now digitized and indexed online, it can be very difficult to locate your ancestors in a search if you do not have something more to go on than the state name, such as the city, town, or village in which that ancestor lived.

This post will walk you through some of the U.S. records that researchers often use to try to locate their ancestor’s hometown in Mexico, and explain a bit about how to mine through those records for clues.

U.S. Federal Census Records

Federal census records are NOT going to be of help in determining your Mexican ancestor’s hometown or home state. They can be of help (depending on the census year) with identifying when your ancestor might have immigrated to the US., but not with identifying a specific place of birth in Mexico.

Following is the 1920 U.S. Census record for my immigrant-great grandparents José Robledo and Maria Nieto, their two oldest children Guadalupe and Refugio Robledo (who immigrated with their parents), and my grandfather Benjamin Robledo (the first child born in the U.S.). This record only notes the country where the immigrant family members were born, no specific locality.¹

When asking the place of nativity for individuals counted in the census (and their parents), enumerators had very specific instructions on what to write in each census field. For foreign nationals born in Mexico (as well as most other foreign countries), enumerators were told to simply record the country name. You can and should verify this for each relevant federal census year on the U.S. Census Bureau’s website, in the Census Instructions section.²

U.S. Vital Records

For my immigrant ancestors, I have not found U.S. vital records to be helpful for identifying a specific hometown or former place of residence in Mexico. These records usually simply note the country name as the place of birth.

The death certificate below is for my great-grandfather José Robledo, who died in Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, California in 1937. The record notes José’s place of birth as just “Mexico” (marked in red), despite the standardized form asking for a specific city or town. The same is true for his father’s birthplace (marked with the blue arrow) and his mother’s birthplace (the orange arrow). Although the section of the cropped record I included does not show it, José’s oldest son Refugio “Raphael” Robledo served as the informant. Refugio was an infant when the family immigrated, so it is very possible that he did not know where his father or his paternal grandparents were born back in Mexico. It is also possible that the clerk who actually filled out this form chose to just go with “Mexico” as the place of birth for all three.³

The same situation is found on the 1978 death certificate for my 2^nd great-uncle Juvenal Nieto (the brother of my immigrant great-grandmother). The place of birth for Juvenal (marked in red) and both of his parents (marked in blue and orange) is simply noted as Mexico. His wife—who I believe is from the same hometown as Juvenal—served as the informant, and she would have known her husband’s hometown. But the form used by February 1978 no longer asked for a specific city or town. For the deceased, it just asks for a state or foreign country and for the parents it simply asks for “birthplace”.⁴

However, it is still important to carefully check these records for hometown clues. There are no doubt exceptions to my observation. You might be more fortunate than me, and come across a birth, marriage, divorce, or death record that does identify a more specific locality in Mexico.

U.S. Obituaries & Newspaper Articles

Obituaries, death notices, and marriage records can provide excellent clues about your Mexican ancestor’s hometown or home state.

In this 1963 obituary for my 2^nd great-grandmother Aurelia Nieto in a southern California newspaper, her children (the likely informants), note San Luis Potosí as the place where Aurelia’s family owned a ranch.⁵ San Luis Potosí is both a Mexican state and that state’s capital city. This record corroborates what my father and living family members knew—their ancestors came from San Luis Potosí—but it does not tell us if Aurelia came from just the state, or if she also came from the capital city.

U.S. Military Records

Military records—service records, pension applications, burial applications, and draft records—can be an excellent source for identifying your ancestor’s home state or hometown in Mexico.

Below is the September 1918 World War I draft registration record for my Mexican-born 2^nd great-uncle Juvenal Nieto (the brother of my immigrant great-grandmother Maria Nieto). Nowhere on this record does it directly state a place of birth or prior place of residence in Mexico for Juvenal. But marked in red is a clue. Uncle Juvenal provided the name and address of his nearest relative—Mrs. Aurelia Compian [Compean] at 368 Calzada in San Luis, Mexico.⁶

This record does not state the relationship between Juvenal Nieto and Aurelia Compean; we only know that she is his nearest relative.

Does Aurelia’s name sound familiar? Take a look back at the 1978 death record in Figure 3 for Juvenal. His mother is identified as Aurelia Conpean [Compean], born in Mexico.⁷ Now take another look at the 1963 obituary in Figure 4. The obituary is for Mrs. Aurelia Nieto (the same surname as Juvenal), and it reports that Aurelia was a member of the Compean family, “who owned a ranch in San Luis Potosi in Central Mexico.”⁸ One can infer that the Aurelia in the obituary is the mother identified on Juvenal’s death record, and also the Aurelia that Juvenal reported as his nearest relative on the WWI draft card, who lived in San Luis [San Luis Potosí] when Juvenal registered for the draft in 1918. ⁹

Those combined pieces of information are really strong clues! The Mexican state of San Luis Potosí and/or the capital city of the same name give us a much narrower focus than simply “Mexico.”

These combined pieces of information also demonstrate the importance of correlating information from all possible sources. Taken together, we now have evidence that my 2^nd Great-Uncle Juvenal may have lived in San Luis Potosí, Mexico (city and/or state).

The key point here is that we often have to consult and analyze multiple records to discover that key piece of information—in this case, the Mexican hometown or home state.

U.S. Border Crossing Records

Border entry records can also be highly valuable for identifying your ancestor’s hometown back in Mexico. But as with all types of historical records, some border records are more valuable than others, depending on what information about place of origin was asked, and how the immigrant might have understood the question. Was the border agent asking for the person’s state of origin, or for the city or town of origin? By place of origin, did the border agent mean where the person was born, or the place that person called home?

Figure 6 below is the 1919 Mexican border crossing record for my 2^nd great-grandmother Aurelia Compean, who we have discussed in some of the above examples, which provide evidence that she lived in the state of San Luis Potosí. When her son Juvenal Nieto registered in September 1918 for the World War I draft in the United States, Juvenal identified Aurelia as living in San Luis [San Luis Potosí]¹⁰ Yet this border entry card dated six months later notes Nuevo Laredo in the state of Tamaulipas as Aurelia’s place of last residence. ¹¹

Tamaulipas shares a border with San Luis Potosí, and it is located in the northeast part of Mexico, on the Gulf of Mexico and along the Texas border. Nuevo Laredo, Mexico is situated across the Rio Grande from Laredo, Texas.

The border entry card for Aurelia (Figure 6) designates Laredo, Texas as the border entry point through which Aurelia entered the United States on 14 March 1919. Nuevo Laredo, Mexico—located across the river from Laredo, Texas—is recorded as her last place of residence. That is all we can determine from just this border record.¹²  The border record does not tell us if Aurelia was born in Nuevo Laredo, if she spent part of her life living in Nuevo Laredo, or if Nuevo Laredo was her hometown. Did she move from the state of San Luis Potosí to Nuevo Laredo? Or did she simply stay a night or two in Nuevo Laredo before crossing the border, and perhaps was confused when the border agent asked for her last place of residence (thinking he meant the last place she stayed)?

The 27 October 1915 border entry card (below in Figure 8) for Aurelia’s daughter Maria Nieto—my great-grandmother—notes San Luis Potosí, Mexico as Maria’s last residence before crossing into the U.S. at Laredo, Texas. One cannot tell from this record if that means the state or also the capital. ¹³

Fortunately, sometimes these records note a more specific city or town. This 1915 border crossing record for my great-grandfather (Maria’s husband) José Robledo (recorded under the surname of Sanchez) reports his last residence as Temescal, S.L.P. (for San Luis Potosí). For now, one can infer that Temescal is a locality (a city, town, village, etc.) in the state of San Luis Potosí. ¹⁴ We will discuss researching place names later.

U.S. Naturalization Records

Although not always the case, naturalization records are another source that frequently identifies your ancestor’s hometown back in Mexico.

In the 1954 naturalization record below for my great-grandmother Maria Nieto (married surname Robledo), she reported her place of birth as Tomascal, San Luis Potosi, Mexico (note the red box). She also reported that two of her children—Lupe and Refugio—were born in Mexico as well (note the blue box). However, their place of birth is simply recorded as San Luis Potosi. We cannot tell if Lupe and Refugio were born in the city of San Luis Potosí, or just the state. ¹⁵

Note that this Tomascal in San Luis Potosi seems to be the same place name (Temescal) written down by border officials as the last place of residence for Maria’s husband Jose Sanchez [Robledo] on his 1915 border crossing record. That border crossing record also indicates that José was accompanied by a daughter Guadalupe Sanchez [Robledo], who may very well be the Mexican-born Lupe noted on mother Maria’s naturalization record.¹⁶  So we now have a hometown clue for daughter Lupe too.

My great-grandmother Maria Nieto reported on that 1954 naturalization record that Temascal/Tomascal, in the Mexican state of San Luis Potosí, was her place of birth.¹⁷ We have also identified Temascal/Tomascal as the last place of residence for her husband José, as reported on José’s 1915 border crossing record, which means that it was also probably Maria’s last place of residence in Mexico (not just her place of birth).¹⁶ So although we still do not yet have evidence that Maria’s mother Aurelia Compean or brother Juvenal Nieto lived in Temascal/Tomascal, that is still a good place to start looking for them too. At the very least, we do know from his World War I draft registration that Juvenal thought his mother Aurelia still lived in the state of San Luis Potosí in 1918 (remember, her 1919 border record identifies Nuevo Laredo as her last place of residence).¹⁹ These are excellent clues for us to start locating this family in Mexican records!

Other U.S. Records

The records reviewed in this post are by no means the only records that may contain clues for identifying your Mexican immigrant ancestor’s hometown in the old country. ANY record might yield a clue. Other examples include:

• Family papers and photos

• Oral histories

• Church records

• Court records

• Alien Registration records

• Court records.

Major Takeaways

Let’s think about some of the big lessons learned here.

1) There is no single guaranteed type of U.S. record that will provide you with the name of your ancestor’s hometown in Mexico.

2) Don’t stop at just one record. You need to conduct a reasonably exhaustive search and look at all records pertaining to that ancestor.

If I had stopped at just the obituary for my 2^nd great-grandmother Aurelia Compean (Figure 4), I might have assumed this referred to the city of San Luis Potosí, instead of just to the state. If I had stopped at just the border crossing record for her (Figure 9), I would assume she was from Nuevo Laredo in the state of Tamaulipas. It is still possible that she actually lived in Nuevo Laredo before immigrating to the United States, but Temascal/Tomascal in the state of San Luis Potosí is now a strong candidate as well.

3) Check for records for every member of that immigrant family group…not just your ancestors (your direct line). You need to also mine records for extended family members. This technique is referred to as “cluster” or “collateral” genealogy.

Aurelia Compean, her daughter Maria Nieto, and Maria’s husband José are my ancestors; they are part of my direct line. But Juvenal is not. He is my 2^nd great-uncle, the brother of my great-grandmother Maria Nieto, what is called a collateral relative. But I had to review records for Juvenal to get clues about my 2^nd great-grandmother (his mother) Aurelia in order to identify a strong candidate for Aurelia’s hometown in Mexico.

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Have you had success using other types of U.S. records to identify your immigrant ancestor’s Mexican hometown? We’ll get to clues in Mexican records later. But if you have tips to share for U.S. Records for Mexican immigrants, please feel free to post those as a comment below.

Sources Cited