Lost White Tribes : The End of Privilege and the Last Colonials in Sri Lanka, Jamaica, Brazil, Haiti, Namibia, and Guadeloupe

Over 300 hundred years ago, the first European colonists landed in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean to found permanent outposts of the great empires. This epic migration continued until after World War II, when some of these tropical colonies became independent black nations and the white colonials were forced -- or chose -- to return to the mother country. Among the descendants of the colonizing powers, however, were some who had become outcasts in the poorest strata of society and, unable to afford the long journey home, were left behind, ignored by both the former oppressed indigenous population and the modern privileged white immigrants.

At the dawn of the twenty-first century these lost white tribes still hold out, tucked away in remote valleys and hills or in the midst of burgeoning metropolises, living in poverty while tending the myths of their colonial ancestors. Forced to marry within their own group if they hope to retain their fair-skinned "purity," they are torn between the memory of past privilege and the extraordinary pressure to integrate. All are decreasing in number; some are on the verge of extinction and fighting to survive in countries that ostracize them because of the color of their skin and the traditions they represent. Though resident for generations, these people are permanently out of place, an awkward and embarrassing reminder of things past in newly redefined countries that are eager to forget both them and their historical homelands.

In the remote interior and in bustling Sao Paulo, the Confederados of Brazil linger on, the descendants of Confederate families that fled the American South to rebuild their society here rather than face victorious Yankees. Wrenchingly poor then and now, these would-be genteel planters cling to their romanticized memory of a proud antebellum past. In Sri Lanka, once Ceylon, the children of Dutch Burghers haunt their crumbling mansions, putting on airs and keeping up appearances. In the steaming jungle of Guadeloupe, the inbred and deformed Matignons Blancs scrape out an existence while claiming the blood of French kings in their veins. On the beaches of Jamaica, a young man with incongruously blond dreadlocks -- the destitute descendant of a shoemaker from the Duchy of Saxony who became an indentured servant to earn passage from Germany to the new world -- still gazes out at the Caribbean over a century and half later. The Poles of Haiti are descended from troops lured over by Napoleon to quell slave rebellions. His promise of independence for their homeland went unfulfilled; they persist in hidden valleys in the island's interior. In the desert expanses of Southwest Africa, the famously devout Basters, the green-eyed, mixed-race Afrikaners, still doggedly pursue vast territorial claims as the continent's new power brokers sweep them aside. These are the lost white tribes.

More than an entree into a world we are unfamiliar with, this amazing chronicle opens up a world that we did not even know existed. In his masterful report, Riccardo Orizio has written the final chapter in the history of the postcolonial world, and in him these forgotten peoples have found their unique historian.

And once he finds his subjects, their stories are fascinating. Americans will probably find the chapter on Confederates in Brazil the most interesting. This tells of the thousands who fled the South after the Civil War, rejecting Reconstruction in favor of a new life in Brazil. Their stubborn "rebel" identity and annual carnival in full Confederate costume is rather bizarre. My own favorite chapter is about small pockets of Polish genes in Haiti. These are the descendants of soldiers sent by Napoleon to assist in quelling the rebellion of 1803. When the rebels led by Toussaint Louverture won, the remaining French were systematically killed but the Poles were spared, as their country was also under Napoleon's boot. Orizio also tracks down pockets of inbred French in Guadeloupe whose reasons for settling in remote parts of the island in the late 1700s are lost to history, the remnants of indentured German laborers imported to Jamaica in the 1830s, Boers who left South Africa and mixed with a local Namibian tribe to become the Basters in the late 1860s, and the remnants of Dutch colonial rule over Sri Lanka/Ceylon.

The communities share some characteristics: most are, if not desperately poor, living on an economic razor's edge. Almost all retain some disturbing notions about race and the superiority of their own genes compared to others in their country. The past is clung to in bizarre and fantastic ways, such as the French on Guadeloupe insisting on their connection to French royal blood, and the Haitian Poles waiting in vain for their Polish Pope to help them. They're pathetic figures in many cases, as they seem unable to break free of their tight communities in order to assimilate to any degree that may bring a better life. Of course, Orizio's journeys are to find those stuck in their ways, and it emerges in many cases that the best and brightest youths often don't stick around. His style is fairly conversational and choppy, and each chapter stands alone as its own essay since Orizio never attempts to make connections between any of the groups' experiences. This may be off-putting to some, but it never bothered me-just think of it as a series of related long magazine essays. An excellent glimpse into some of history's lost corners, and sure to be of interest to amateur anthropologists (a bibliography on each "tribe" would have been nice or those of us interested in further reading).


More like a travel magazine   February 12, 2004
R.P. (central Illinois)
0 out of 9 found this review helpful

This book was shorter than I expected. Its a good book for beginner's, but it is as much an account of Mr. Orizio's travels as it is a scholarly work. Good book, needs an in-depth follow up


Fair Account of Colonists Decendents   August 27, 2003
Matthew T. Szramoski (Fairfax, VA United States)
2 out of 5 found this review helpful

The book gives a fair account of the decendents of European colonists in remote corners of the world. I found it interesting that it did nort include those nations where colonists decendents still live in large numbers and are a major success in their new home! It is interesting to note that in almost all of the countries discussed the economy and lifestyle have plummented for everyone since independence.