The American Confederates in Brazil

While I've written about the Confederate immigration phenomenon in Brazil before, I thought it was worth revisiting, since a reader sent me this article about a celebration of the end of the Civil War in the heart of Sao Paulo state.

In case you're not familiar, an American community grew around Santa Barbara d'Oeste in Sao Paulo following the Civil War, as Confederates and their families fled the war-torn south in search of land to start anew. They found it in Brazil, where even today there remains a community of descendants of the Southern immigrants.

From Globo and my abbreviated translation:

"Nascido na Georgia, o coronel Norris chegou a ser senador pelo Texas antes que os exércitos do industrializado norte dos EUA devastassem econômica e militarmente os estados confederados do sul latifundiário, na guerra entre 1861 e 1865. Veio para o Brasil, segundo a fraternidade, graças ao contato que tinha com a marçonaria (da qual o imperador Dom Pedro II fazia parte) e do interesse brasileiro nas técnicas agrícolas sulistas, principalmente o cultivo do algodão."

"Born in Georgia, Colonel William Hutchinson Norris became a senator in Texas* before the armies from the industrialized north of the US economically and militarily devastated the Confederate, plantation-based South, in the war from 1861 to 1865. He came to Brazil, according to the Fraternity of American Descendants, thanks to a contact he had with the masons and thanks to the Brazilian interest in Southern agricultural methods, mainly the cultivation of cotton."

*According to several other sources, he was a senator in Alabama...might want to do some fact checking, Globo.

The celebration, called the Confederate Festival, the people of the town dress up in period clothing from the Civil War, do square dancing, and listen to jazz, country, and folk music. Check out some of the fantastic Scarlett O'Hara-esque dresses from this year's festival, as well as the period uniforms.

Also, I found a short little documentary about the Confederates in Brazil from 2001. While it gives an interesting overview of the Confederate history in Brazil, it paints a somewhat unrealistic picture of slavery and racism in the two countries, as well as glossing over the symbolism of the Confederate flag (I'm sure Alex Castro would have thoughts on the slavery issue). I especially liked the anecdote about the American doctor who fell in love with the Brazilian slave who managed to marry her and start a family, though that seemed like a romanticized version of the story. In any event, it's worth watching.

 

 

Comments

[brazinglish]

Acho que esse último vídeo que você linkou passou na íntegra na TV Cultura ano passado. Infelizmente vimos só a metade, porque (mais uma vez) infelizmente não temos o hábito de assistir a TV Cultura, o que é uma pena. Foi super interessante!