Posted on 05/08/2016 9:43:34 PM PDT by Theoria
On a stage festooned with Confederate flags, a singer was belting out “Dixieland Delight” by Alabama near an obelisk honoring the Americans who fled to this outpost in the aftermath of the Civil War.
“We’re not racists,” said Cícero Carr, 54, an engineer whose great-great-grandfather hailed from Texas. Wearing a fedora featuring the rebel battle flag, he explained in Portuguese, “We’re just revering our ancestors who had the good sense to settle in Brazil.”
At the annual celebration of Brazil’s self-described Confederados one scorching Sunday in April, Confederate flags adorned the hoop-skirted gowns of young belles and the trucker caps worn by beer-guzzling bikers, as well as the graves of pioneers with surnames like McAlpine, Northrup and Seawright.
The commemoration reflected the resilience of what some historians call the lost colony of the Confederacy in this region of sugar cane fields and textile factories. Unencumbered by the debate raging in the United States over whether Confederate symbols promote racism, the Brazilian descendants of the American settlers, many of them clad in Civil War uniforms, mingled at food stands offering Southern fried chicken and buttermilk biscuits.
The motto of the organizers: To Live and Die in Dixie.
The presence of the Confederados in the interior of São Paulo State dates to an effort by Emperor Dom Pedro II, a staunch ally of the Confederate States of America during the Civil War, to lure white immigrants to Brazil. Thousands of Southerners took him up on his offer, moving here in the 1860s and 1870s.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Around festival time[April] down there, the press usually runs a few articles about their history and such.
NYT has some nice photos. Reuters article from earlier.
later
You see this Charlie:) Cool stuff.
For later
I may retire there after the next Civil War.
I'm just glad my Confederate ancestors went back, a little deeper, into Texas.
I’ve actually been there and worked with a geologist from there
As well as in Colombia the descendants of William Lankins Bradford who fought with Semmes and refused surrender at Mobile Bay
There are a number of them in Barranquilla and Santa Marta
They have his uniform under glass and letters from Lee and Semmes asking him to come home....his grandson was the primary orthopedic surgeon in Baranquilla for many years latter half of 1900s
http://civilwartalk.com/threads/looking-for-lt-william-l-bradford-from-columbia.87578/
You’ll see the name of some of my family & my surname at 1:29
in the video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D93o3kItF-E
Real interesting. Never knew about the Confederados in So. Am.
Incredible knowledge on that CW message board.
Around festival time[April] down there, the press usually runs a few articles about their history and such.
NYT has some nice photos. Reuters article from earlier.>>> every year it is very interesting.
My great-grandfather was one of the Confederate soldiers that fled into Mexico rather than surrender. He eventually ended up living in London.
That’s interesting....I really had no idea about this community, or the history of the confederates moving so deep into South America. I knew about some of them settling in Mexico.
Excellent....you win the internet. I’m going with you cause it’s coming sooner or later.
That flag is still legal down there?
Ping
Paging Al Sharpton.
I may invite them back after the next Civil War. They will be welcomed to the land of their ancestors.
There is no "debate raging in the United States over whether Confederate symbols promote racism".
It is merely rabble rousing by leftist troublemakers, which is then happily fomented by the complicit and treasonous MSM. That does not constitute a debate. It constitutes adult leftists acting like children.
In ridind around rural West TN yesterday I saw more Confederate flags flying than US flags.
Thanks for sharing. FReepers always have interesting stuff to add.
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