Carlos Fitzcarrald

Fitzcarrald was the eldest son of an Irish-American sailor who later became a trader and married a Peruvian wife.[2] Both his father and grand father were American sailors. Williams Fitzgerald, the grand father was the captain of a sailboat who drowned in a shipwreck. His son, Williams Fitzgerald Junior migrated to Peru, and settled down in San Luis de Huari There he met Fermín Lopez, as well as his daughter who he fell in love with and married. The marriage resulted in seven children in total, whose names were: Isaís, Fermín, Rosalía, Lorenzo, Grimalda, Delfin, Fernando and Edelmira. The father focused on the educated on his first born Isaís, ensuring he went to well known schools in the country.

Isaís was a distinguished student: guided by his fathers desire that he would become a sailor, specializing in naval engineering. Williams planned to send his first born to a nautical school in the United States to further his education around 1878. Before this, Williams encouraged his son to take a trip along the Marañon to sell merchandize. The trip allowed Isaís to make a strong profit off of the cargo, and familiarize himself with the unexplored region of Peru. During the business venture, he was stabbed after confronting someone in a bar. The wound was so bad that newspapers reported that he had died. His father paid for the medical expenses but suffered from grief. When Isaís got better, he travelled to find better treatment and on the way back, he found out his father had passed away. After gathering blessing from the family Isaís moved away from his hometown with his fathers maps.[3]

Isaís ventured to Cerro de Pasco to join the military, after finding out a war with Chile had broken out. He ran into a group of natives, tied up by soldiers who were taking them to Pasco as 'volunteers.' Isaís protested, demanding the group of soldiers release the captives who complained about mistreatment. The soldiers asked him to produce identification, but he was not a citizen and had left baptismal and school certificates at home. He was arrested after the soldiers found his fathers maps, accusing him of being a Chilean spy. There was no proof of identification for months, until the day he was supposed to be executed. A Fray Carlos was supposed to administer last rights: the two previously met in San Luis. Carlos didn't recognize Isaís at first on account of sickness and weakness, but recognized his story. Over the course of a confession, Carlos was able to verify that he was the first-born son of Williams Fitzgerald Junior. The Fray immediately declared under oath that the prisoner indeed was Isaís Fermín Fitzcarrald. Isaís later added Carlos to his name on account of Fray Carlos saving his life.[4]

On the advice of Fray Carlos, Isaís decided to travel to Loreto to seek “the happiness that the civilized had denied him.“ He disappeared without a historical trace for ten years in the jungle. Multiple rumors tried to explain his absence. In 1888 a report by a missionary named Father Sala reported hearing an “Amachengua” or reincarnation of Inca Juan Santos Atahualpa. The white figure claimed that the “Sun Father” had sent him with a message that the tribes were to work together. The man to obey on earth and representative of the sun was Carlos Fitzcarrald. He threatened that if they did not listen, the rivers would dry up and the game would be chased away.

Gabriel Sala reported: "Fitzgerrald intelligently exploited the belief that the Campas have that one day the Son of the Sun will come down from the sky. The rubber worker, to provide himself with pawns, sent emissaries to the nomadic tribes and scattered in the immensity of the jungle, with the slogan of making it known to his ears that the They used a surprising cunning to convince the Indians to abandon their freedom; by means of seductive words and gifts, they reduced them, and fixed their awnings on the margins of the nos, to have them more at hand as freighters for the collection of the rubber, or pawns for the cultivation of the chácaras." [5]

By 1888 Fitzcarrald was already the richest rubber entrepreneur on the Ucayali. In this year, he made a visit to Iquitos with a large quantity of rubber and many Campas servants. In the city, he visited Manuel Cardozo, the owner of a Brazilian firm that exported rubber. There, he apparently fell in love at first sight with Cardozo's step daughter, Aurora Velazco who was a widow. They soon married, and Fitzcarrald entered a business partnership with his father-in-law Cardozo to extract rubber in the Ucayali. Carlos already had knowledge and links with the Campas, Humaguacas, Cashivos and other tribes they could exploit to tap rubber. He made fun and jokes out of the rumors that the natives of the Ucayali were savage cannibals: stating someone wise made up the tale.[6]

He became established as a rubber baron in the late 19th century. Determined to find a way to transport rubber out of the Madre de Dios region, he exploited native workers. He forced them under pain of death to dismantle and transport a ship over a mountain during the turn-of-the-20th-century rubber boom in the Amazon Basin.[7]

Starting in 1894, he explored the Madre de Dios region of BAP Fitzcarrald in Lake Sandoval, Madre de Dios, Peru. He founded the City of Puerto Maldonado and explored the area that is now the Manu Biosphere Reserve. To achieve this, it was necessary to transport his steam ship piece by piece over the mountains to the Madre de Dios basin.[7]

Fitzcarrald discovered a short passage overland between the Mishagua River, a tributary of the Urubamba, and the Manu, a tributary of the Madre de Dios River. The former leads into the Ucayali River. The Isthmus of Fitzcarrald was later named after him, as discovery of this route enabled transport of rubber from the Madre de Dios region. It was transferred to ships on the Mishagua, which could reach the Urubamba, the Ucayali River and thereby down the Amazon to markets and Atlantic ports for export.[7]

A 1904 map of the isthmus that Fitzcarrald discovered.

His expeditions into the Madre de Dios region are considered to be the root of the modern-day divide between the local Yine and Mashco Piro peoples. The Yine are the descendants of the natives that Fitzcarrald forced to work for him, while the Mascho are the descendants of the natives that fled following Fitzcarrald's arrival.[2] Anthropologist Stefano Varese describes a strategy used by Fitzcarrald against the natives, stating: "With a deep knowledge of the mountain, he knew how to use traditional rivalries (…l. The method is simple: Winchesters are given to the Cunibo who must pay in Kampa slaves and then Winchesters are given to the Kampa who must pay in cunibo [and other] slaves…"[8]

He died at age 35 together with his Bolivian business partner Antonio de Vaca Díez when their ship Adolfito sank in Urubamba in an accident. The two of them also had a business relationship with Nicolás Suárez Callaú, who would be the primary benefactor out of the accident. Suárez managed to absorb Fitzcarrald's fleet, most of his Peruvian personnel, and soon became the biggest exporter of rubber in Bolivia. The Orton Rubber Co. which Vaca Díez founded, was entirely absorbed by Suárez's company as well.[9]

• The Carlos Fermín Fitzcarrald Province was named after him.
• Puerto Maldonado has a place to view the sunken remains of Fitzcarrald's steam ship, the Contamana, which is located in the Madre de Dios River.
• Fitzcarrald's disassembly and transport over a mountainous jungle land bridge, as well as his exploits inspired director and writer Werner Herzog's film Fitzcarraldo (1982), which symbolizes the extremes generated during the rubber boom, and takes Fitzcarrald's symbolic transport of a disassembled ship to an explicit hyperbole by dragging an entire steamboat over a mountain.[7]

• Abuses against the Putumayo Indians
• Roger Casement
• Nicolás Suárez Callaú
• Julio César Arana