“AND IN THY MOTHER TUAN”
Maa Tuan was the elder daughter of Kee-Eng. At the time the family moved to Bangkok she was about five years old, according to Dr. House. She early became a member of the girls’ class in the home of Mrs. Stephen Mattoon, and was intimately associated with the girls whom Mrs. Mattoon had adopted. After the father died the family returned to their former home at Bangpa near Ratburi, where they were separated from Christian influences except for an occasional visit of a missionary. Here Maa Tuan married Chin Boon Sooie. To this marriage three children were born, Boon Itt, Boon Yee, and Prasert, a daughter who died in infancy. Concerning Chin Boon Sooie little is to be found recorded, aside from what Dr. House states in the letter quoted below. His nationality is there given as Siamo-Chinese, and this is confirmed by his son, who also is the authority that his father never made a profession of Christian faith. Chin Boon Sooie died in 1873.
Concerning Maa Tuan the first important mention by Dr. House was in a letter to Mrs. House in 1872, who was then in America:
“Among those present [i.e., at the communion service] were some of your old pupils: one, speaks of you with much affection, Tuan the eldest daughter of Sinsay and Maa Hey, her mother. Tuan is now making her first visit to Bangkok since she left our command. She evidently has made an efficient and intelligent woman; reads English quite well yet; has rather a superior husband, a kind of a headman (man of property at least) at Bangpa—unfortunate in business of late but credit unimpaired.
“Poor Tuan since her last babe was born has been running down and is poor and sallow just now—she always was short in stature.... Had not Tuan married a well-to-do trader her knowledge of books, arithmetic and sewing might be utilised to the good of the cause. She might be hired to get up in her native village a day school.”
In the following year, probably after the death of her husband, we find her moving with her children to Sumray, near Bangkok, where the mission school was located, in order that she might have educational advantages for her children, for at that period the mission school was the only means to a modern education. In November of 1873 she united with the Church upon profession of faith.
When Mrs. House opened the girls’ boarding school at Wang Lang, Maa Tuan was engaged as matron and teacher. Concerning her work in this school Miss M. L. Cort writes in her book on Siam:
“This school has had the advantage of the faithful and constant services of Maa Tuan who is an exceptional Siamese woman and was educated and trained for her position by Mrs. House.... She has been the chief native teacher and matron for the school ever since it began, and the interpreter between the new missionaries and the old pupils, as she understands English very well. It is through her influence that many of the pupils have been secured and retained. She is dignified and kind; and each year adds to her wisdom and usefulness.”
Maa Tuan spent the summer of 1880 teaching women in the royal palace by request. For some years she conducted a private school at Wang Lang, and so far as records show she was the first Siamese woman to conduct such a school.
While her son was in America, Maa Tuan wrote to Mrs. House that she often rose at midnight to pray that Boon might become a good Christian and become a preacher to his own people. When the news came to her that her son had been converted and had united with the church in far away America, her cup was overrunning with joy. She died in 1899.