In Madeira, my grandfather used Goncalves de Freitas. Upon coming to the US and joining the US Army, they made Goncalves his "middle name" and the surname became De Freitas. We use it with the space, though we do have cousins using just Freitas; and another cousin whose school teacher told them their name was wrong spelled Goncalves but should be Gonzales! Denise De Freitas D'Antona In a message dated 1/23/2007 8:17:26 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, david-nancy.degrella@juno.com writes: Making the "de" captial and part of the name is true for my name with one additional complication. The "de" before Agrella made it flow so good, that Americans could not hear the "A". The name ended up being written DeGrella. Another note of interest is that my grandfather was married twice. His desendents by the first marriage consistently write the name with a space, De Grella, and the rest of us do not put a space in the name. David DeGrella Tennessee USA