Jᴇᴍ ᴀɴᴅ ᴛʜᴇ ʜᴏʟᴏɢʀᴀᴍs ᴄʜᴀʀᴀᴄᴛᴇʀs

Kieu Chinh

Kieu Chinh is a mentioned character in the Jem animated series. She was Ba Nee's mother.

SERIES
Jem
ROLE(S)
Villager during war time
PERSONAL INFORMATION
SPECIES
Human
GENDER
Female
PLACE OF
ORIGIN
An Lộc, Vietnam
DIED
(date unknown)
STATUS
Alive
RACE
Asian
HAIR
Black
RELATIVES
Martin O'Carolan (husband)
Ba Nee O'Carolan (daughter)

APPEARANCES
FIRST
APPEARANCE
A Father Should Be... (1988)
APPEARANCES
A Father Should Be...

History

Kieu Chinh lived in a small village located in An Lộc during the Vietnam War. After a battle that took place in a nearby jungle, she found an injured American soldier and brought him to her home. Kieu took care of him and treated his wounds. When the soldier, named Martin, finally regained consciousness, a special bond emerged between both. Soon after, they fell in love and decided to get married.
Happiness was not going to last for the young couple, tough. One day, the village was under attack; Martin and Kieu barely made it out alive from her house before it was destroyed. He managed to get Kieu, now pregnant with his baby, on a carriage and sent her somewhere safe, promising that no matter what, he would find her. However, as soon as the carriage started to move, a group of Viet Cong soldiers took him captive. Martin was never able to reunite with his family, as he became an amnesiac from a concussion he received in the head when he was captured.

Sometime later, Kieu gave birth to Martin's daughter, who she named Ba Nee. Unfortunately, Kieu's health started to deteriorate a few years later and soon she was facing her impending death. Nevertheless, she was able to tell Ba Nee to look for her father, an American ex-soldier who had red hair.
Kieu finally passed away and Ba Nee was eventually adopted by the Bentons, thinking every day about what her mother told her and wondering if her father was still alive somewhere. Ba Nee and Martin would finally be reunited years later.

Trivia

• Kiều Chinh is a real life Vietnamese-American actress. She portrayed a character named Thuy in the 1980 TV film, The Children of An Lac, a project Christy Marx worked on early in her career.