In a message dated 5/18/02 1:26:06 AM Eastern Daylight Time, [email protected] writes: > They either were trying to make themselves > appear to be citizens or they had something to gain by claiming to be NJ > born--that is the only thing I can figure. I have never found > naturalization > records for them either. I also figure there was some "stigma" to having > been born in Ireland at that time in history. > This is absolutely true. My ancestors were German and Irish. At one time there was such a stigma to being an emigrant that people would try to hide their "foreignness." My grgrandmother told her children to never speak German outside of the home. There was much prejudice in the late 1800s and turn of the century. Joan