Naturalization Papers
Federal Court
Western District of Tennessee
at Memphis
Transcribed and formatted
by Lynn Franklin
May 2007
This is a partial
index to the records of Naturalization from the Federal Court, Western
District of Tennessee, located in Memphis. To enter the files, click here: Naturalization Records.
These records are in two parts, first a Declaration of
Intention, generally followed some years later by a Petition for
Naturalization. After the two filings, a judge would grant
citizenship, or not. Frequently there is
a form showing these results. At some points
in time, the naturalization process could include the wife and children, if
any. There are instances of people
filing only one of the two parts in this court.
The information that might be available in these records
includes some of, but not all in every instance, of the following: Name(s) including some name variations and changes,
addresses at the time of application, age, birth date and place, occupation,
date of immigration, manner of immigration (vessel usually), country of prior
citizenship, wife’s name, birth date, and place, children’s name, birth date
and place, name, occupation, address and signature of witnesses for the
Petitioner, photo of the petitioner in some later applications, height, weight,
color, complexion, color of hair, color of eyes, other visible distinctive
marks, signature and date of
application.
The first Declaration of Intention listed was dated 3
December 1906, the last March 1946. The
first Petition was dated 4 January 1907, the last, 15 December 1967. There is a gap in the Petitions from March
1938 to November 1954, that hopefully will be filled in soon. There is also a separate ledger of
naturalizations for US
soldiers dated from 15 June 1918 to 8 March 1919.
This index is designed to help you locate the record for a
particular person. The columns are last
name, first name, volume number, record number, page number and (if containing)
a photo. Any cell with a period simply
means that no information was listed in the index. For optimum results, be sure
to check all possible spellings, variations and versions, of any name.
These records are held at the National Archives and Records
Administration (NARA), Southeast Regional Branch, outside of Atlanta,
in Morrow, Georgia. To obtain a copy of a record, there are two
possibilities. You can either write to
this branch, or go in person and view and copy the records.
The address to write to is:
NARA, 5780 Jonesboro Road, Morrow, Georgia
30260. Their phone number is
770-968-2100. They do charge a nominal
fee for their time for copying and mailing these documents (currently $10). If you are planning to go in person to the
archives, you can call or e-mail to request to have the documents you want to
view retrieved and waiting. There is a
small per page fee for using the copier at the Archives (currently twenty cents
a page). Viewing the records is free.
This is an uncorrected, preliminary draft of this
index. I will be double checking it, and
filling in the gaps as I’m able to travel to Atlanta.
I hope that you find the people that you’re searching for! If you do, please feel free to email me, as I
have copies of some of these documents, perhaps 20%. I wish that I had copies of all of them, but
I don’t yet.
To enter the files click here: Naturalization Records.
Contact: Lynn Franklin at lafranklin1@cs.com.