The following information comes from an article titled "Chinese in Gulgong" from the Mudgee District History website and is reproduced here with the permission of Diane Simmonds. Where not otherwise credited, the information was written by Barbara Hickson.Ah Lum's store, Gulgong, date unknown
Mr. And Mrs Ah Lum had come to Gulgong in the 1870s and bought an existing Chinese store in Herbert Street in 1875, the store of
Sun Tong Lee.
Sun Tong Lee, along with other Chinese storekeepers, had set up business in Gulgong in June 1871. His store was considered exceptional for a goldfield town and was described in the Gulgong Advertiser, Issue 25, August 5th, 1871, as follows:
“Gulgong differs in a business way from any goldfield we have seen opened in this Colony since 1861, by reason of the enterprise exhibited by the Chinese Traders in competing with the Europeans. In Herbert Street there are 2 Chinese stores owned respectively by Sun Tong Lee and Co. and On Lee & Co, which in size and stock compares very favorably with their European rivals. The site of the latter is the largest store under one roof on the goldfield, being 70ft long x 30ft wide. It has plate glass windows and is neatly fitted inside with counters and shelves.”
Mr. Lee sold this business four years later in September 1875 to Ah Lum. At this time Ah Lum was already in business in Gulgong. In the Gulgong Evening News of 21 November 1874 under the heading "Practical Joke", the following was reported:
"At the Police Court, this morning, a youth named John Bourke was charged with stealing a silver watch chain, value 8/-, from a chinaman named Ah Lum. It appears that a lad named Welsh and another went into the shop of Ah Lum, to purchase a chain, the accused put the chain in his pocket and refused to pay, left the shop and lost the chain. Snr. Sgt. Keenan made a search and the chain was recovered. In the absence of a second magistrate, the case was remanded.”
Mrs Ah Lum carried on the business until the end of 1903. In the Gulgong Advertiser of May 14, 1903, she advertised a clearing sale of products at "cost price" in preparation for leaving the district.
Mrs Lum only moved as far as Mudgee, however, and in the Gulgong Advertiser of January 7, 1904, it was reported that "Mrs Ah Lum is doing a nice little trade at her store in Church Street Mudgee and is quite satisfied with her change from Gulgong.".
The grave of the son of Mr and Mrs Ah Lum, Shopkeepers, Gulgong
George Ah Lum died 14 Mar 1889. The gravesite was restored in the 1990s through the efforts of local members of the community with an interest in local history.
A simple half sandstone stele with rounded top and two vertical lines of Chinese character writing. The headstone was broken and fallen, and has been repaired. Included in the repairs was a new fence constructed of simple painted flat steel members, and a plaque at one end reading: “
Geo Ah Lum”.
George Ah Lum was the son of local storekeepers Mr. and Mrs Ah Lum.
Upon the death of their son, George Ah Lum, his body was conveyed to the
Gulgong Cemetery where he was buried. This newspaper article of the period describes the ceremony associated with a Chinese funeral:
Chinese Funeral
We witnessed the burial of Ah Ching, The undertaker is supplied with about 3000 slips of paper, on which, is written in Chinese characters, an invitation to any person who may obtain one of them to pay a complimentary visit to the deceased man’s friends in China, should he ever visit the land. These slips are thrown by the undertaker broadcast along the road to the cemetery. The clothes, bed and bedding and all other personal effects of the deceased are taken with him in the hearse to the burial ground and there destroyed or thrown away. His body is then lowered into the grave, not waiting to see it filled in, as is customary with Europeans.
Source: The Gulgong Miner No 9 December 31 1873
