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Irish emigrants on the Amazon in 1608 —by Peter Berresford Ellis (author of To Hell or Connaught)* The Irish Diaspora has sent Erin’s sons and daughters to the far corners of the world over many centuries. Irish men and women had appeared in some curious lands. Perhaps Irish migration is so curious and so little known as that to the Amazon in the early 17th Century. Hundreds of Irish refugees, fleeing after the defeat of the Irish armies of O’Neill and O’Donnel at Kinsale in 1602, found a new life for themselves in the land that Portuguese explorers called Brazil. The ancient Irish legend of a land to the west called Hy Breasail, the ‘Land of Youth’, was so widely popular that many Portuguese, Spanish and Italian explorers, actually marked it on maps to the west of Ireland. When in the 15th Century these navigators made landfall in the New World they thought they had discovered this mythical land. Portugal officially claimed it as Brasil in 1500. Exactly how the Irish settlement came about is a mystery. We know that John Smith, the famous pioneer settler of Virginia, writing his memoirs in 1630, recalled that in April, 1620, he had led an exploration up the Amazon River and found the settlement. He said that the Irish had lived there some eight years and were supplied by Dutch traders. His words were confirmed by a report to the Venetian Court, which speaks of “Irish who had settled in that country many years ago”. The precise site of this Irish settlement is given in an anonymous French diary of 1623 which is now in the British Museum which was written by someone who had accompanied Jesse de Forest of Avesne, on an exploration in the area. The writer speaks of some Irish being settled at Sapanopko which is on an island in the Amazon estuary and up another settlement along a river called the Taureque, which is an artery of the Amazon. The writer describes this as the main “habitation des Hirlandois”. It was in 1623 that a problem rose. In 1580 Philip II of Spain had annexed Portugal and claimed its empire. The new Spain authorities now realised it was open season for colonialists in the New World. Other empires were beginning to have the same idea. There was a profusion of English, French and Dutch colonies in the Amazon area. The Spanish decided that there was only one thing to do — drive these settlers out and claim the territory. The settlements were warned to disband. In 1623 the Spanish with the Portuguese colonials launched the first campaign against “the foreigners” with Indian contingents as their main fighting forces during 1623. One by one the settlements were attacked. Some fell easily, some surrender and beat a hurried exit — usually towards the West Indies — while others fought on doggedly. Reports showed that the Dutch West Indian Company was being hit hard and that the French were loosing interest, becoming more concerned with building their empire north of the Gulf of Mexico. The trouble for the Irish settlement was that the Spanish authorities in Brasil regarded anyone not Spanish or Portuguese as “the foreigners”. In the Irish settlement of Sapanopko, the Spanish found a tough resistance. The Irish were led by Filippo Porcel, Irlandez de nacao according to the Portuguese report. This was Philip or Felim Purcell. By 1625, a renewed campaign by the Spanish and Portuguese, the Irish were still holding their own. However, the Portuguese leader Captain Pedro Teixeira had managed to take a prisoner Estevao Corse, Irlandez — the name translated as Stephen de Courcey from Youghal, who seemed to be a prominent merchant. When a Jesuit Father Luiz Figueiera wrote his account of the campaign, he named the Irish leader in 1629 as Gemes Porcel (James Purcell) the brother of Philip or Felim. James and the Irish had to surrender after a 30-day siege of their fort at Tocuju. They were allowed to leave, abandoning their settlements, many heading to Monserrat. The Purcells, however, returned to Europe to make indignant complaints to Spain. They, and other former settlers, were in touch with the O’Neill, the Earl of Tyrone, the son of Red Hugh O’Neill who had died in Rome in 1616. There was an Irish merchant living in Bilbao, in Spain, the Archivo de Indias, call him Gaspar Chillan, Irlandez. His name was Jasper O’Coileain (Collins) of Youghal, whose name also appears on a petition to Conor O'Brien, Lord Inchiquin in 1642. Jasper wrote a plea to Don Inigo de Bricuela, the spokesman for the Irish at the Spanish court, and set out a vague history of the Irish colony in the Amazon. He was helped in this by survivors of the colony whom he names as Ricardo Molrran (Mulrian or O’Ryan) and Ju. Alein (John Allen). He tells Don Inigo how the Irish had to carve their settlement out of the jungle and making a deal with hostile Indians. He makes a plea that Spain should support the Irish in returning to their colony. Another survivor of the colony, William Gaynor, had already written to the exiled Earl of Tyrone, asking him to send priests and religious as well as soldiers, as a support for the returning colonists. Don Ingo did present Collins’ plea at the court in December, 1632, but without success. A decade or so later, after Portugal reasserted its independence from Spain, another Irishman, Peter Sweetman, of Cork, was actually given permission by the Portuguese to settle 400 Irish Catholics, there were to be no “heretics” among them, on the bank of the Amazon. However, at the last minute, Sweetman was ordered to take his settlers to Para, south of the Amazon estuary. What happened to them is not known and the Irish on the Amazon disappear into the historical mists. Father Figueiera’s book Relacao de algumas tocantes ao Maranhao e grao-para was printed in Lisbon in 1621 otherwise we might know nothing at all about those 17th Century Irish adventurers in the Amazon delta. *Notes: Ellis PB: To Hell or Connaught. The Blackstaff Press, London. 1988. This article appeared in IrishAbroad Page last updated 9 Mar 2006 Ireland's OWN Logo by Eamann Website Design and Celtic Background  by Míchealín Ní Dhochartaigh Copyright © 2006 Ireland's OWN All Rights Reserved.