Tag Archives: San Diego

Elsie Chung Lyon – International Registered Nurse and Lecturer

Lecturer,, obituary, Permit to Reenter, Photographs, Ports on Entry, Registered Nurse,, Traveler, Wife of U.S. Citizen, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Elise Chung Lyon was born in Stawell, Australia, about one hundred forty miles from Melbourne. She first come to the United States in 1923 from China with her husband Bayard Lyon. They lived in Elkhorn, Wisconsin with their three children, Marguerite, Hugh, and David. Her brother Fred Mowfung Chung also lived in Elkhorn.
Elsie’s exempt status was “wife of citizen, admitted to U.S. prior to July 1, 1924.” She had reentry permits from 1928, 1929, 1930, 1931, and 1934, each with her photograph attached. When she arrived in 1934, she was forty-seven years old. Her file does not have much personal information. Elsie’s 1929 Form 505, Certificate of Admission of Alien, lists her occupation as lecturer.

“Elise Chung Lyon Reentry Permit Photo,” 1932, Chinese Exclusion Act case files, Record Group 85, National Archives at Seattle, Elsie Chung Lyon (Mrs. Bayard Lyon), Box 879, File 7032/263.

Elsie’s file does record a confusing incident with immigration authorities upon her arrival in Seattle from China via Vancouver, B.C. on Saturday, 10 November 1928. She was returning from a three-month tour of China. Mrs. Lyon, a lecturer on international relations, and nine other Chinese passengers were threatened with being locked up by immigration authorities for the weekend. David Young, a representative of the Seattle Chinese consulate, managed to get Mrs. Lyon released to his custody as a matter of courtesy.

A 13 November 1928 newspaper article titled, “Chinese Wife of American is Held Here”1 is included in her file. The article quoted Elsie Chung Lyon, “I’m rather sorry now that I did not suffer myself to be locked up because I would be better able to understand the indignation my countrymen feel on entering this country.” She noted that her papers were in order and she had been admitted two times previously without a problem. She promised that she would take the matter up with Secretary Kellogg in Washington, D.C. [Frank Billings Kellogg served in the U.S. Senate and as U.S. Secretary of State.] The article or the 1928 forms in her file do not say exactly why Lyon was being held or what happened to the other Chinese passengers.

In September 1929, Mr. J. J. Forster, Steamship General Passenger Agent of Vancouver, British Columbia wrote a letter to Mr. Luther Weedin, Commissioner of the U.S. Department of labor in Seattle concerning a compliant of Mrs. Elsie Chung Lyon about the ports of entry for readmittance to the United States. Mrs. Lyon was complaining that she had not been told the requirements covering her entry. Forster explained:

1. All Chinese ports of entry are not advised when return permits are issued.
 2. The Vancouver office did not know where the permit was issued or which port she departed to China from.
3. Chinese with return permits are entitled to admission to the U.S. through any port designated as a port of admission for Chinese.

Rules of October 1, 1926, governing the admission of Chinese gives the following on Ports on Entry:
“No Chinese person, other than a Chinese diplomatic or consular officer, shall be permitted to enter the United States at any seaport other than at the ports of Port Townsend or Seattle, Wash.; Portland, Oreg.; San Francisco, San Pedro, or San Diego, Calif; New Orleans, La.; New York, N.Y.; Boston, Mass.; San Juan or Ponce, P.R.; and Honolulu, Hawaii.”

According to her file, Elsie Chung Lyon continued traveling without any problems. The last entry notes that she left from San Francisco on 19 October 1936. “See Imm. File 117/9/36.”

Other information not included in the file:
On 12 September 1947, Elsie Chung Lyon’s letter to The New York Times criticizing General Wedemeyer’s statement on China was published. Lyon had recently worked seventeen months with the Chinese Nationalist Army in China and thought she was more able than Wedemeyer to evaluate the miserable and dehumanizing condition of the Chinese people and their need for honest leadership. She did not want America to continue “to grant aid to the present tyrannical regime…”

Death Information and Obituary for Elsie Chung Lyon:
Elsie Chung Lyon, the daughter of Mow Fun Chung and Mow Fung Huishe of China, was born in Australia in 1887. She died at Fort Worth, Texas on 16 Dec 1963 at age 76 years.2
Elsie graduated as a registered nurse from London School of Nursing and Medical Administration in England and was a registered nurse at the American Bureau for Medical Aid to China. She served as a lieutenant colonel in the Nationalist Chinese Army during World War II. After her return to the U.S., she translated English language nursing texts into Chinese. Her translation of Midwifery for Nurses (Hu shi jie chan xu zhi ) by Henry Russell is listed in the National Institutes of Health library catalog.3
Elsie Chung Lyon became a U.S. citizen in 1947. She was survived by a son David in Missouri, a son Hugh in Virginia and a daughter, Mrs. Margaret McHarg of Bellevue, Washington.4

[This file is the combined effort of the Chinese Exclusion Act Indexing team at the National Archives at Seattle. Rhonda Farrer indexed the file. She was intrigued by the story and shared it with Joyce Liu. Joyce found the NYT’s article. They gave me a copy of their findings. From there I obtained Elsie’s death certificate and obituary and wrote it up for the blog. THN]

  1. Alice Elinor, “Chinese Wife of American is Held Here” Seattle Post Intelligencer, Seattle, WA, p3. ↩︎
  2. Elsie Chung Lyon, 16 Dec 1963, Texas Department of State Health Services; Austin Texas, USA; Texas Death Certificates, 1903–1982, Ancestry.com ↩︎
  3. Henry Russell Andrews, Hu shi jie chan xu zhi [Midwifery for nurses], (Shanghai : Guang 1941), National Library of Medicine, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/101541743. ↩︎
  4. “Native of China: Pioneer in Nursing Dies Here,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Fort Worth, Texas, 17 Dec 1963, p.32. Newspapers.com ↩︎

Chon Chow Ling – Born on the High Seas Enroute to China

Birth at sea, Birth Report, El Paso files, Seattle Times, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Chon Chow Ling Seattle Times article headline

On board the S.S. President Madison, between San Francisco and Victoria, British Columbia, near the Port of Seattle, a baby girl was born to a Chinese couple. Immigrant officers came on board to interview the father. A statement was taken from Jung Fat, also known as Carlos Chon, on 14 October 1932, His wife, Maria Adelelma Ley was present during the interrogation.

Jung Fat was born about 1901 in Gow Gong City, Nam Hay District, China. In 1914 he sailed from Hong Kong to Mazatlán, Mexico where he was lawfully admitted and eventually became a merchant. He married Maria Adelelma Ley on 28 December 1929 at Comolote, State of Sinaloa, Mexico. Both were “full-blooded Chinese.” Maria was born at Acoponetto, State of Durango, Mexico. Her parents died when she was young, and she was adopted by a Spanish woman. She grew up speaking Spanish and a little Chinese. Jung Fat had never been back to China and Maria had always lived in Mexico. They were not deported from Mexico, but the Mexican government appropriated their grocery and merchandise business. They used all their money to cross the border from Mexico to the United States near Nogales, Arizona. Their daughter, Jung Hong Lin or Auchalina Chon, about age two, was with them. The family was taken into custody by immigration officers, taken to San Diego, and put on a ship to San Francisco. From there, they boarded the S.S. Emma Alexander. Maria gave birth to a baby girl at 10 p.m. on 5 October at Latitude 44° 24’ North, Longitude 124°, 51’ West, on the high seas enroute from San Francisco to Victoria, B.C., Canada.

A few days later after interviewing the family, T. W. Lynch from the Seattle Immigration office sent a letter to the office in San Francisco giving them information on the birth and the El Paso file numbers of the parents and their older daughter, Jung Hong Lin.

[Because of the birth at sea near Seattle, I thought there might be a newspaper article on it. This is what I found:]

On Friday, 7 October 1932, page 14, the Seattle Daily Times published a dramatic account of the birth:
“Father Neptune to Guide Destinies of Little China Emma.”
      “There is an old legend which says that Father Neptune and the guardian spirits of the sea          watch over the destinies of those mortals who are born on shipboard, protecting them               through storm and tempest and guiding their voyages safely to port…”

Daniel McLellan, M.D., a passenger from Vancouver, B.C. delivered the baby. Mrs. Alice Hooker and Mrs. Grace L. Steward arranged to have Mrs. Chon moved from her third-class cabin on the after deck to a roomy stateroom. It was suggested that the baby be named Emma Alexander Wong [sic] but the document certifying her birth gives her name as Chon Chow Ling.

Back to the file:Chon Chow Ling Birth at High Seas

“Chon Chow Ling, Certification of birth” 1932, Chinese Exclusion Act case files, RG 85, National Archives-Seattle, [name not listed on case file], Seattle Box 853, file 7031/450.
[It is very unusual to have a file without a name listed.]

On October 15, the family left for China on the S.S. President Madison. Jung Fat left China as a child and Maria had never been there. They were penniless with a toddler and a new-born infant. China was just recovering for the Han–Liu Civil War. They planned to reside with relatives in Gow Gong City.

[NARA volunteer Hao-Jan Chang brought this file to my attention. THN]

Tom Chon How – at detention center for almost a year and a half

Affidavit, Letter, Photographs, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Tom Chon How aff photo1939Tom Chon How aff Tom Bing Koon 1939

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Tom Chon How and Tom Bing Koon affidavit photos,” 1939, Chinese Exclusion Act case files, RG 85, National Archives-Seattle, Tom Chon How case file, Seattle Box 799, file 7030/13041.

Tom Chon How arrived at the Port of Seattle on 20 November 1939. She was admitted almost a year and a half later on 10 May 1941. Her file was over 70 pages long. After her father, Tom Ngon Sing, died in China she decided to come to the U.S. to live with her brother, Tom Bing Koon, in San Diego, California. Since she was the daughter of a U.S. native-born citizen she would or should have been considered a citizen. She was born on 20 December 1907 in Seung Sing, Tin Hong, Toy San, China. Her step-mother paid for her passage over. Tom Chon How was a school teacher.

In 1938 her brother, Tom Bing Koon, of San Diego, California, swore in an affidavit that his father, Tom Ngon Sing, was a native born citizen. His citizenship was proved by record #9544 on file at the U.S. District Court of Northern California. Tom Bing Koon was 42 years old in 1939 and came to the United States at age thirteen. He swore that his sister, Tom Chon How, the daughter of Tom Ngon Sing, was coming to the United States to live with him.

During Tom Chon How’s arrival testimony she was asked about her extended family in the U.S. and in China, in particular her nephew Hom (Tom) Tung Hing. She claimed that he died in 1931 on his way back to China. The examiner said that the alleged Hom (Tom) Tung Hing was admitted at Seattle in December 1939.

A warrant of arrest was issued for Tom Tung Hing. He was found in Tucson, Arizona and he gave a statement. He claimed he was the true Tom Tung Hing and Tom Chon How was lying; that the information she gave the investigators was false. Immigration officials began an investigation in Minneapolis (the nephew’s father was living in Minneapolis at some point) and San Diego.

There were huge and small discrepancies in Tom Chon How’s and her brother’s testimony in the description of their native village. The examiner noted that Tom Bing Koon had not been in China for more than twenty-three year. He had never met his nephew so he could not identify him.

Tom Chon How was interviewed again in March 1940. Most of the questioning centered on her home village—how many rows of houses, how many houses in each row, who lived where, and details about the neighbors.

This is a section of a translated letter that Tom Chon How (also known as Tom Jung How or Jung Ho) wrote to the immigration officers after being at the detention center for many months:Tom Chon How letter Apr 1940
“Tom Chon How letter,” 1940, Chinese Exclusion Act case files, RG 85, National Archives-Seattle, Tom Chon How case file, Seattle Box 799, file 7030/13041.

After reading the transcription of the deportation proceedings for Hom Tung Hing, Immigration authorities decided to question Tom Chon How again. By July 1940, a decision had not been reached as to admit or deport her. Her case hinged on Hom Tung Hing’s case. A month later the F.B.I. was comparing the handwriting samples of the Hom Ting Hing who left the U.S. in 1931 with the Hom Ting Hing who was admitted to the U.S. in 1939. Which one was a forgery?

The hearings were resumed on 7 March 1941. Tom Chon How was asked to show the layout of her village. Her diagrams were compared to the maps she constructed in March 1940. She was asked about the differences. She said she couldn’t remember exactly how many houses there were in her village because she hardly ever walked in some parts of the village. [After being in detention since November 1939, she sounded weary.]

The next day she was transferred to Seattle Marine Hospital for examination and treatment. She was suffering from severe nausea.

Immigration decided to interview Yip Shee, the wife of Tom Bing Koon, Tom Chon How’s brother. Yip Shee and Tom Bing Koon married in 1916 and came to the U. S. in 1919. In 1941 Immigration officials interviewed her about her husband’s home village; over twenty years after they left the country. There were significant discrepancies about the village in Yip Shee’s testimony but she gave some helpful information. She remembered that Tom Chon How seriously cut the index finger of her right hand when she was about ten years old. Yip Shee bandaged it for her. The inspectors checked Tom Chon How’s hand. She had a scar that matched Yip Shee’s description. They now believed Tom Chon How was the person she claimed to be.

Inspector J. P. Sanderson, chairman of the inquiry, wrote in his three-page summary of the case that Tom Tung Hing’s arrest warrant was canceled. Although Sanderson did not agree with the determination of Tom Tung Hing’s admittance in 1939, Tom Tung Hing was not deported.

Tom Chon How’s case was delayed considerably because she consistently maintained that Tom Tung Hing died in 1931. The immigration inspectors agreed that if the information on Tom Tung Hing was ignored, the applicant should be admitted. Tom Chon How was admitted at the Port of Seattle on 10 May 1941.