Skip to content
Archival family tree · South African Tamil roots

Iya Pillai

Voonyipothy, Tinnevelly

Father
Michael Anthony Pill
Voonyipothy, Tinnevelly
Indentured ancestor
Iya Pillai
male · Voonyipothy, Tinnevelly
The crossing
Origin
Voonyipothy
Tinnevelly
Ship
CONGELLA XXII
no. 63937
Year
1896
Arrived
Natal, South Africa
The origin village

Iya Pillai’s family came from Voonyipothy, Tinnevelly district. Living relatives may still be there — a voter-roll lookup can name them, and the modern village page shows land records and families we already track.

Verify with your elders

Colonial ship-clerks often mangled Tamil names. Before treating this as your ancestor, ask the oldest person in your family:

  • Was there a great-great-grandfather named Iya Pillai or Michael Anthony Pill?
  • Did family ever mention coming from Voonyipothy, Tinnevelly?
  • Do the dates line up with when your family arrived in Natal? (Record: 1896)
  • Any family memory of a ship named CONGELLA XXII, or a passage to Natal around then?
Ask elders on WhatsApp
Is this your ancestor?

Claim this record to start your family tree — Iya Pillai and Michael Anthony Pill are added instantly, ready for you to extend with living relatives.

This is my family — build my tree

Two paths: build your tree if this is your ancestor, or submit evidence to help a South African family verify their village link. See the Village Verification Project.

More families from Voonyipothy

Source: theiii.in Natal indenture register (digitised ship record). Names and places are the colonial spellings as recorded; verify against family memory before treating a lineage as certain.

Privacy — no living person’s details are ever shown in public

Iya Pillai appears here only because this is a historical indenture record (1860–1911) — the person named sailed over a century ago. Family trees, voter matches and any living-relative data sit behind a login and are visible only to the account owner they belong to.