Lu Muzhen

Lu Muzhen was born on 30 July 1867 to a merchant family in Xiangshan County, Guangdong, Qing dynasty. She married Sun Yat-sen, a young student at the Government Central School, in 1885 through an arranged marriage by their parents. She bore him a son, Sun Fo, and two daughters, Sun Yan and Sun Wan. Due to her bound feet, she rarely accompanied Sun on his revolutionary campaigns. After Sun founded the Revive China Society in Hawaii in 1894, Lu and her children fled to Macao and then to Hawaii to seek shelter from Sun's older brother, Sun Mei, who was a farmer and merchant there. In 1907, Sun Mei declared bankruptcy and moved to Hong Kong, followed by Lu and her family. Lu escorted Sun to Beijing in 1912 after he became the provisional president of the Republic of China, and then to Japan in 1913, where she was injured in a traffic accident. She returned to Macao and lived in a house that is now the Dr Sun Yat-sen Memorial House. Sun divorced her in 1915 to marry Soong Ching-ling, one of the Soong sisters who had worked as his English secretary. Lu became a Christian and remained in Macao until her death on 7 September 1952. She was buried in St. Michael Cemetery in Macao. Lu Muzhen contributed to the Chinese revolution by sparing Sun worries about his family and supporting his activities. She was also a kind and generous woman who helped the poor and the refugees in Macao.