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Savage: The Life And Times Of Jemmy Button

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Charles Dickens wrote, "Missionaries are perfect nuisances and leave every place worse than they found it." I do not know if Dickens knew about the missionary aims of the Patagonian Missionary Society, but there he surely would have found confirmation of his opinion. In _Savage: The Life and Times of Jemmy Button_ (Thomas Dunne Books), Nick Hazlewood has written an amazing and sad story about missionaries, colonialism, and a tragic clash of cultures. Sparking the story, a shocking tale of repeated good intentions and bad results, was the high Tory captain of the HMS _Beagle_, Edward FitzRoy. FitzRoy thought it would be grand to take Fuegian specimens back to Britain. One of them, swapped for a button, became Jemmy Button, and Darwin got to see him on the _Beagle_'s trip in 1831 to take him back home (so he had influence in Darwin's _The Descent of Man_). FitzRoy's hopes were futile, as Jemmy turned native again.

In 1845, the Patagonian Missionary Society, one of the many Protestant vanguards of British colonialism, made an effort to land on Tierra del Fuego and begin proselytizing. The mission lasted a week, because the natives merely stole from it, without improvement of their souls. In 1850, a similar attempt lead to the deaths of the missionaries. Newspapers warned the Patagonian Missionary Society off any future effort, but the public loved this British bravado, and the Society was emboldened to try a new venture. It would use one of the Falkland Islands as a staging ground to which Fuegians could be ferried, civilized, converted, and returned. To this end, Jemmy was found and was kidnapped once again, along with members of his family. They became homesick and resentful, and were cycled back home, with another nine Fuegians picked up. The Society's reports were glowing, but glossed over the frequent problems. One of the basic ones was that the Fuegians had little concept of property rights, and when they liked something, they took it, and they resented any subsequent searches. When this group was returned, eight missionaries were murdered. The Society blamed the work of Satan, but as one letter to the papers said, the massacre "...was produced by the recklessness of the society and their agents, and therefore I must conclude that Satan is much maligned in this matter."

Hazlewood has told this astonishing and distressing story with a novelist's fluency. In the end, the efforts toward the Fuegians could not have been more futile. Ranchers and sheep-farmers soon began invading their island, and brought devastating diseases or simply hunted them down and shot them. No pure Fuegians survived. Those with intentions of greed harmed them as much as those with intentions of improvement under the guise of imposition of a strong culture over a weak one. Such were the benefits of civilization to the savages.

The reviews that are already submitted do an excellent job of describing the scope of the book so I won't do it again.
Normally I would be satisfied to see that other reviewers have given the marks that are deserved and would not bother to write yet another review.
This book is not normal, however. I was struck by Hazlewood's ability to paint all of the characters as rational and intelligent but also products of their times and cultures. The story unfolds in a nonjudmental way...and then leads the reader to be a witness to untold horrors and great tragedy.
Well worth the read.

The title, "Savage", is of course ironical. Captain Fitzroy thought, when he captured three Tierra Fuegian men and a young girl in 1830, that his "specimens" were the savages, even as he sailed them away from their homes and their grieving families.

So _Fitzroy_ is the savage, of course? Certainly, but Hazlewood's irony, and his capacity for imaginative compassion, is deeper than that.

Fitzroy thought he was doing good. Mutual incomprehension between the Tierra del Fuegians and passing European and American ships had led to murder: and people with muskets and ship's cannon are more efficient at murder than people with spears. If some Tierra del Fuegians could be taught English and gain an understanding of European culture and manners, there might be fewer violent encounters. And if his captives could be taught to build and cultivate crops, then they could be returned to their homes, equipped with seeds, food animals and tools, and perhaps teach their kinspeople a more comfortable and secure way of living.

Hazlewood tells the story of how this benevolent (by the standards of its time) project goes horribly wrong. The remarkable figure of Jemmy Button, the resourceful young man captured by Fitzroy (later returned to his home by Fitzroy, as promised), and how he fared in English culture and his own, is a central thread in that story. However this is history and not biography; the canvas is wider than one man.

Tragedy comes with the arrival of the Patagonian Missionary Society in the Land of Fire. Like Fitzroy they believed they came with good intentions; unlike Fitzroy they offered little of value, took much, and mostly broke their promises. They sought the help of Jemmy Button, who was back living with his people, but with a half-remembered stock of English. Button offered that help, and he and his family, and other Tierra del Fuegians were in return kept as virtual slaves in the Society's encampment. Hazlewood shows how tensions rose until the missionaries were massacred, probably by a party led by Jemmy Button.

Interestingly, despite what we think of as the racist arrogance of the Victorians, the authorities in nearby Port Stanley and in London understood the events in terms that we might consider "modern": they saw the massacre as the result of the missionary society's cruelty, bigotry and duplicity, which had placed intolerable pressure on the Tierra del Fuegians. Claims that the slain missionaries had been "martyrs" were quietly (and justly) derided, and no attempt was made to avenge their deaths.

The title "Savage", I think, refers neither to the Tiera del Fuegians nor by heavy-handed irony to the Victorians. Though the Patagonian Missionary Society does emerge as something of a villain, their villainy was too drab to be "savage". The title refers not to people but to the events that led to the destruction of the first and second missions to Tierra del Fuego.

The wholesale slaughter of Jemmy Button's people by European settlers a generation or two later is dealt with briefly at the end of the book; that was unquestionably the act of savages, but beyond the focus of this book.

This is a great book. Far from depressing despite the subject matter, it is instead encouraging about the possibility of communication and imaginative sympathy between people whose cultures, histories, technologies and languages have virtually nothing in common, so long as neither side is blinded by racist or religious arrogance.

We are in some ways as far from the Victorians as we are from the Tierra del Fuegians. It may be easier for us to imaginatively identify with Tierra del Fuegian ideas on (for example) family, sex, politics, clothing, and perhaps religion, than with the Victorians. The Victorians, particularly Hazlewood's missionaries, accepted a vast and rigid structure of ideas, almost none of which we now accept; Tierra del Fuegian attitudes are in some ways easier for a post-post-modernist to accept. (This is not to pretend that the Tierra del Fuegians were new age philosophers, let alone Noble Savages.)

So the book is an exercise in empathy for both the Victorian and Tierra del Fuegian protagonists, and reveals the humanity of both. An example is Jemmy Button's bashfulness in the presence of an Englishwoman, when a British ship arrives at his Tierra del Fuegian home twenty years after Button's return. That his discomfort turns out to be because he has married, and that Button is inclined to conceal his married status while talking with a lady ("English ladies very good," he had commented), is cheering enough, and so too is the comprehension of the British sailors when Button's wife arrives by canoe, to find out what is going on. Button's embarrassment, and the hearty congratulations of the sailors when they recognise the cause of his embarrassment, is in its own way an inspiring moment, and well captured by Hazlewood. These are not saints on either side of this cultural divide, but they are human. And they enjoy their mutual recognition without imagining, as a post-structuralist might, that they are unable to communicate because they are irredeemiably "other".

While it both inspires and also makes angry, "Savage" is also a hugely entertaining book. Hazlewood offers many revealing glimpses into peoples, white and brown, whose ways of life have long since vanished. For example this, from a 17th century sea-captain's letter to his son:

"A merchant of Loundon wrote to a factor of his beyoand sea, desired him by the next shipp to send him 2 or 3 Apes; he forgot the r, so it was 203 Apes. His factor has sent him four score, and says he shall have the rest by the next shipp ... if yorself or frendes will buy any Apes to breede on, you could never have such a chance as now."

Even then, a simple typo could have embarrassing results...

Cheers!

Laon

Jemmy Button was not a decisive figure in human history. Indeed, he would have lived out his life and died totally forgotten were it not for the chance of his being taken to England, and returned home on the immortal voyage of the Beagle. As such, he pops up from time to time in works on Darwin and evolution, and has always left me wondering, Darwin went on to fame and authority, what ever happened to Jemmy Button? Until now, for me at least, the question has been left hanging.

In this absorbing book, Hazlewood lets Darwin go his way, and tracks Button and the fascinating story of intentions -- good or pig-headed, as you will -- gone bad. This is not a dry academic publication. The same day I got this book, a friend lent me three detective novels -- one Jeffery Deaver and two James Pattersons -- but once I got my nose into Savage, I could hardly pull it out. From my previous reading, I had a picture of Captain Fitzroy as an unpleasant character, being forced to right his wrongs through no good will of his own. Hazlewood's research shows me that I seem to have been led astray. His Fitzroy is far more sympathetic than the one I had known.

An inferior artist leaves you gasping at his craft. Hazlewood is such an expert writer that you may read the entire book without really noticing the skill and work that must have gone into the creation of this book: fluent writing, careful research, and fine construction throughout.

Had Fitzroy never packed Jemmy Button off to England, perhaps the Fuegian Indians would have disappeared from this world without a trace. At least through the work of the missionaries, whatever their motive, a record has been left of their language and some of their culture (BTW, I disagree with the previous reviewer who said we are closer to the Yamana than to the Victorians; a romantic notion that hardly bears up to a moment's consideration.) This book leaves you with a lot to think about.

Permit me to quote Alfred Russel Wallace in exposition of the book's title: "The white men in our colonies are too frequently the true savages."

This book is billed as a story about Jemmy Button, but Jemmy is only a starting point for this fascinating tale exploring what civilisation is, how good intentions can do wrong, and cultural misunderstanding.

Jemmy Button came from Tierra del Fuego, the land at the very south of South America. Along with 3 others from this area, he was taken away from his primitive existence (and you can be as PC as you like - it was primitive) to England. The reasoning behind this was if Jemmy and his compatriots could be taught English and `Civilisation' he would be able to go home and teach others the benefits of good living. Well of course, it didn't quite work out that way. Jemmy and some of his compatriots were returned home (one died in England), but they were not forgotten.

As time progressed, missionaries entered the picture. Their belief was that if they could track Jemmy down, they could use him as an interpreter and go-between to help convert the Tierra del Fuegian barbarians, and bring them to the life of Christ (and make them wear clothes - this was important to missionaries). The majority of the book is taken up with the story of the various attempts of missionaries, all of them misguided and ultimately doomed to fail. As with many a story about indigenous communities, this one ends with genocide brought about by a combination of accident (introduced disease, alcohol) and intent (settlers would go out and shoot the `vermin' that stole their sheep).

While well researched and full of detail, I thought this was a rather dry account of this period of English colonialism. However, it is an important one that has yet to receive the exposure it deserves. Students of colonialism or the demise of indigenous cultures (and some would argue they are each the same) should definitely find a copy of this book and read it.

It is said that narrative is the lifeblood of history, and Savage succeeds in taking a number of forgotten documents and weaving an interesting narrative out of them. Neither dry nor slow, the author takes us to from a so-called civilized England to the nether lands of so-called barbarity. We meet the influential Charles Darwin and spend time with the obscure Jemmy Button. During our voyage we watch well-meaning people succumb to starvation and surprise massacres. Through it all we compare and contrast two ways of life, and see first hand that, as Rudyard Kipling said, when comparing the Western worldview to that of the Eastern, the two often do not meet.
After finishing this well written work last night at 5:00am, I began asking myself why it was written, and still don't have a solid answer. Did the book have an overriding purpose, other than to tell us what happened long ago in an age that no longer exists? Was it written foremost to show a clash of civilizations from another era? Was it to examine the dangers of colonialism, whether under the British flag or that of a church group? Was it written simply to relate an interesting historical footnote?
Too, in reading what I thought the author might be saying, I came away with different conclusions. Though considered brilliant and able, I think Darwin missed the mark, and don't hold him in the esteem the author seems to. The debate over his theories goes on and on, yet it need not rage between religious groups and so-called Darwinists. Modern science, with its study of an intricate DNA almost requires me to have as much faith in a non-planned evolution as I might in intelligent design. As well, I came away with a higher view of the missionary endeavor, especially that of the later missionaries, than the author might. I live in Argentina as a missionary, and lament deeply that religious workers to these southern shores brought, albeit unknowingly, deadly diseases and colonial expectations. Yet they also brought skills, help and the desire to learn the language and some of the tribal culture. They did not bring bullets, thrive in ignorance or promote mass destruction. Might they, even with their faults, be called the "better angels" of western culture, especially in the face of others who came only to get and to force the nationals to fill labor yards or cemeteries? I know first hand from missionary accounts of oil companies that subjected tribes to such labor in Colombia that the tribesmen would go swimming just to down themselves. I know of oil companies that abused tribesmen in Indonesia with long hours and little pay so the tribesman could buy overpriced radios and other western items. This exploitation would not be recognized until later by the children of those abused. Missionaries however, for all their faults, are not usually associated with this type of cruelty. The author, in pages 301-303 of the 2000 hardback edition, nails it on the head in explaining what went wrong in the mission's earlier years and presents a casebook example of poor missiology. Yet in a wider scope good missiology prevailed around the world. Biblical Christianity helped end slavery in England; it helped stop widow burning in India. I remember my friend David who worked with tribes for 20 years in the jungles of Ecuador. Due to his work tribesmen no longer viewed twins as evil, that is, when twins were born they were no longer pierced through by spears. Yes, I digress, but there is a wider story out there that thankfully is not as colonial as was the Patagonian Missionary Society. Yet even this society, with weaknesses that shame me, did try to help the tribes and not parade them through European zoos as other groups did. The idea that the natives should have been left alone ended when Magellan circumnavigated the globe. Given the two options, I would prefer missionary limitation than determined western exploitation. In reading Savage I think that history bears this out.
So...have I meandered? Yes. But this is in part due to the book. The Pulitzer Prize winning author Barbara Tuchman once wrote that the "why" of history often becomes apparent as history is being written, that the "why" should not be forced into the writing. I found Savage to be well written and it brought history alive, yet still wonder what it is meant to relate. What was its overriding "why"? Until I know, I can only guess, and meander.