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Archival family tree · South African Tamil roots

Veera Pillai

Thalavapatty, Salem

Father
Arunachella Pillai
Thalavapatty, Salem
Indentured ancestor
Veera Pillai
male · Thalavapatty, Salem
The crossing
Origin
Thalavapatty
Salem
Ship
PONGOLA LXI
no. 131862
Year
1878
Arrived
Natal, South Africa
The origin village

Veera Pillai’s family came from Thalavapatty, Salem 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 Veera Pillai or Arunachella Pillai?
  • Did family ever mention coming from Thalavapatty, Salem?
  • Do the dates line up with when your family arrived in Natal? (Record: 1878)
  • Any family memory of a ship named PONGOLA LXI, or a passage to Natal around then?
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Is this your ancestor?

Claim this record to start your family tree — Veera Pillai and Arunachella Pillai 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 Thalavapatty

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

Veera 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.