In this pages I will try to retell the story of the strikes of 1921-1922 in the Argentinian
Far South where about 1500 patagonian workers were murdered by the Argentinian Army.
It is an interesting story, in the sense that it depicts the manyfold character of human
nature. Here you will find men who fled their countries to escape suffering, only to see
their descendants or even themselves inflict the same suffering to other people. You will
also find men that travelled thousands of kilometers to die in a faraway country fighting
for the rights of people they barely knew. On the local side there is an army whose members
did not hesitate in killing their fellow countrymen, even though they were supposed to
protect them. And also a government that managed to keep their hands clean even though it was
the president himself who sent the army to "pacify" patagonia.
The story on this pages is based on the book by Osvaldo Bayer Los Vengadores de la Patagonia
Tragica (4 volumes of about 200 pages each). It is a pity that the book is not translated to
english or french. So if you want to read it you should know some spanish. It has spawned an
argentinian movie, called La Patagonia Rebelde ("The rebellious Patagonia) that is in
fact quite good. But it only covers the first two volumes of the book.
After the release of the movie, Los Vengadores de la Patagonia Tragica has been reprinted
several times, but under the same title as the movie.
Although it was banished by the military government in the 70's (it was even publicly burned
together with other "subversive" books!), now it is not difficult to find it in Buenos Aires,
but it bis probably a lot harder in other parts of the world (even in Latin America!)
It is my purpose to write this pages simultaneously in english, spanish and french, so in
each page you will find not only links that will take you backward or forward but also
a link to the same page in different languages. My time and my resources are very limited,
so these pages will progress rather slowly. Please be patient.
For the same reasons, the pages are not as well illustrated as I would like. In fact, all the
graphics and photos in these pages have been taken from free sites on the web. Not all of
them are really pertinent to the story and that is because there is not a lot of
material available on the web (that is in fact one of the reasons why I wanted to build this
pages). If you see here something that belongs to you, please e-mail me and I will give you
the credit you deserve or eventually take it down, if such is your wish (I hope it is not!)
If you have any comments regarding anything concerning these pages like translations (which
I hope you will not find too blunt), doubts, further info or new material (graphics or text) that
you may have, please write to the address below.
