Family Lam

My mother-in-law was born in Bac Lieu, Vietnam. She was the daughter of Quang Vinh Lâm (1896 - 1966) and Lý Thì Vốn (1900 - 1972). Both are buried in Bac Lieu.

They lived in a tiny village, called Long Thanh, near Bac Lieu. This is where my mother-in-law was born.

We visited the location where the house was located. The house is long gone and the area is now someone's garden. In the front you can still see the foundation of the Lâm - Lý family house. As a child my mother-in-law played on the stones, visible on this picture:

Quang Vinh Lâm was the biological son of mr. Lâm Văn Cẩm and mrs. Huỳnh Thị Mai. Until recently their grave didn't have a gravestone, but a few years ago my mother-in-law met with a distant relative in Bac Lieu who appointed the location of her biological grandparents. My mother-in-law then arranged the gravestone to be made. Now the person who pointed out this grave has passed away. Had she not met my mother-in-law, their grave would have been an anonymous grave.

But mr. Quang Vinh Lâm did not grow up with his biological parents. According to the story his parents were poor and they gave him away for adoption. It could also be that his biological parents had died when Quang Vinh Lâm was still a child. Anyway, mr. Quang Vinh Lâm was adopted at an early age by mr. Lin Li Sheng ̣(Vietnamese name not yet known) and mrs. Đường Thị Qửu.

Mrs. Đường Thị Qửu is buried in the garden of a great-grandson of this couple, who showed us her grave. 

Her husband was buried a short while away in a Chinese grave:

Translation of the Chinese characters:

一九三五年重修 rebuilt 1935

祖考禮勝林公墓 grave of ancestor Lin li Sheng

男孫並奕世全奉 presented by grandson yi si chun

The man who showed us these 2 graves also had a photo of the couple in his house:

Both the biological father as the adoption father of mr. Quang Vinh Lâm was called Lâm ̣(Lin in Chinese), so probably they were related to each other as well. Unfortunately the gravestone of mr. Lin Li Sheng doesn't indicate a home village in China, so the origin of the Lâm family is still unknown.

Lý Thì Vốn was the daughter of mr. Lý Minh Hiến. This was a very wealthy family. I have dozens of pages of documents from this family, including land purchases and a will. I will write more about this later, but mr. Quang Vinh Lâm and Lý Thì Vốn inherited 84 hectares and 26 centiares (approximately 208 acres) of rice fields:

To be continued...

Start of my research

Over the last years I've been doing significant research of my own ancestors. But last year, during a vacation in Vietnam, I decided to do some research on the ancestors of my wife, Tô Kim Phỉ. I want to share all information found with anyone interested. That's why I'll be blogging in English, even though that's not my native language. So this is the start of the quest for my wives Chinese ancestors.

The quest starts in august 2012 when we went on vacation to Vietnam. We visited lots of relatives in Soc Trang, Bac Lieu and Ca Mau (Mekong Delta area). My wives parents where both born in Bac Lieu. The first result was when we visited a cousin of my wives grandmother (from fathers side). He created a significant ancestry book (Gia Phả): descendants of mr. Trương Văn Hòa and mrs. Dương Từ Mẫn. I will publish more information about this later.

In Hộ Phòng we visited an older sister of my mother-in-law. She took us to a distant cousin who showed us dozens of pages of documents from the French colonial time about my mother-in-law's grand parents (mr. Lý), including his will. Here's a picture from that, but as mentioned, I have lots of pages still to investigate. I will write about that later.

In Bac Lieu we also visited several gravesides where ancestors where born. This is a gravestone of mr. Su Kai Zhen, whose Vietnamese name was Tô Nương Quơn:

Translation of the text:

Main line, middle

祖孝開振蘇公墓 grave of ancestor, mister Su Kai Zhen

Right

妣淑德林氏 mother, Shu De, née Lin *

Left

妣隆日吳氏 mother, Long Ri, née wu *

Far left

民國十二年重修 rebuilt 12th year of the republic, 1923

* Note: the stone was made by the children, so they refer to the wives of mr. Su as "mother".

Mr. Su Kai Zhen was married twice. His first wife, Lin Shu De (Lâm Thị Xià) died and he remarried mrs. Wu Long Ri (Ngô Thị Minh). These are the parents of Tô Hửu Đường, my wives grandfather.

The year of mr. Su Kai Zhen's death is not yet clear to me. According to my wives aunt mr. Su Kai Zhen died when Tô Hửu Đường was approximately 7 years old. Mr. Tô Hửu Đường was born in 1909, which means that mr. Su Kai Zhen died in 1916. That could mean the stone itself was (re)built in 1923. Is that the year his second wife died? This is still an unanswered question to me.

Unfortunately the gravestone of mr. Su Kai Zhen doesn't mention the ancestral homevillage. Luckily, a short distance away, there are more graves of the Tô family. There are these two graves:

According to the story, mr. Su Kai Zhen came to Vietnam with 2 nephews. These are most likely 2 brothers (as they have the same generation name), so could these be the 2 nephews? I cannot be sure yet, although they are certainly related. Interestingly, the left stone does refer to an ancestral home village in China. The ancestral home town of the Tô / Su family!

Translation of the 2 graves:

Left picture:

祖

考成山蘇公 ancestor mister Su Cheng Shan

妣秀花劉氏 mother Xin Hua, née Liu *

* Note: the stone was made by the children, so they refer to the wives of mr. Su as "mother".

Right picture:

蘇成大之墓 grave of Su Cheng Dai

The stone on the left picture also refers to a village:

中國 廣東省 揭陽市 普寧市 青洋山村

China, Guangdong, Jieyang, Puning, Qingyangshan village

Location on Google maps: -> here

For the translation of the Chinese characters I got help from the Chinese Genealogy forum.

Now the main question is: Is there more information available about the Su family in China?

To be continued.