By 1888, Fitzcarrald was already the richest rubber entrepreneur on the Ucayali River. In 1888, he visited Iquitos with a large quantity of rubber and many Asháninka servants. In the city, he visited
Manuel Cardozo, the owner of a Brazilian rubber-exporting firm. There, he fell in love at first sight with Cardozo's stepdaughter Aurora Velazco, who was a widow. They soon married and Fitzcarrald entered a business partnership with Cardozo to extract rubber in the Ucayali. Fitzcarrald already had knowledge and links with the Asháninkas, Humaguacas,
Cashivos and other tribes they could exploit to tap rubber. He made fun of rumors natives of the Ucayali were savage cannibals, stating someone wise made up the tale. Fitzcarrald's new coalition dominated trade and the rubber industry in the
Atalaya area, which was near the confluence of the
Tambo and
Urubama rivers. Fitzcarrald also owned stations and outposts on the Tambo River. Many of the independent merchants around the Tambo and Ucayali rivers eventually began working with Fitzcarrald. By 1891, most of the Piro natives on the Urubamba River were
indebted to Fitzcarrald. An important indigenous figure who was a part of Fitzcarrald's network was an Asháninka chief named
Venancio Amaringo Campa. Amaringo began working with Fitzcarrald as early as 1893. Amaringo provided labor for this network by enslaving other native groups, which were then added into the rubber-extracting workforce. Slave raids from the
Unini River were organized and were primarily focused in the
Gran Pajonal area. Amaringo also organized punitive expeditions against other entrepreneurs with whom Fitzcarrald had disagreements. Fitzcarrald also had alliances with other Asháninka chiefs, who would capture and trade slaves. The rubber firms would advance supplies to Asháninka groups that had agreed to extract rubber; in this way, many natives became indebted to the firms. The Asháninka who did not agree to collect rubber were targets of
correrias (slave raids). Killing of indigenous men and enslavement of the women and children was common practice during these raids. Some of the indigenous groups exploited by Fitzcarrald include Asháninka, Piro, and Harakmbut natives. in 1888. Fitzcarrald became established as a rubber baron in the late 19th century; he managed rubber operations on the Pachitea, Upper Ucayali, Urubamba, Tambo, Apurimac and Madre de Dios rivers. He became known as the "King of
Caucho" rubber, referring to latex extracted from
Castilla elastica trees, which are not suitable for long-term exploitation. The most effective way of extracting rubber from this tree is to cut it down; this incentivized and necessitated constant movement for new sources of rubber trees.
The Isthmus of Fitzcarrald In 1892, Fitzcarrald established a rubber station on the
Mishagua River, a tributary of the Urubamba River. In 1893, Fitzcarrald began looking for a portage route across the Mishagua River and another river. He had previously heard about a suitable path from information relayed to him by natives. This was a short, direct route from the Urubamba River to a river that Fitzcarrald believed to be the
Purus River. Fitzcarrald was credited with developing portage routes between the Mishagua River, and the
Manu, a tributary of the Madre de Dios River. The former leads to the Ucayali River. This area later became known as the
Isthmus of Fitzcarrald. Fitzcarrald and his enterprise explored the
Madre de Dios region of
BAP Fitzcarrald in
Lake Sandoval, Madre de Dios, Peru. He is credited with founding the city of
Puerto Maldonado, and he also explored the area that is now
Manu Biosphere Reserve. and across the isthmus. The portage of the
Contamana took two months to complete. Ernesto de La Combe stated there were 300 Piros, 500 Asháninka, and 200 non-indigenous men on the second expedition. It took 600 men to drag the
Contamana hull across the isthmus; logs were placed underneath the boat so it was easier to transport. The establishment of the Isthmus of Fitzcarrald route enabled the transportation of rubber from the Madre de Dios region. Rubber was then transferred to ships on the Mishagua that could reach the Urubamba, the Ucayali River, and thereby sail down the Amazon to markets and Atlantic ports for export. In an article titled "'Purús Song': Nationalization and Tribalization in Southwestern Amazonia", anthropologist
Peter Gow refuted claims Fitzcarrald, and later his brother Delfín, discovered any portage routes. According to Gow: [t]hese were standard routes used by Piro people moving between river systems, and are regularly mentioned in the earlier literature... What the 'discoveries' related in the histories actually relate is the increasingly direct articulation of this trading system with the burgeoning rubber-extraction industry in the latter half of the 19th century.
In the Madre de Dios River basin Fitzcarrald's expeditions into the Madre de Dios region are considered to be the cause of the modern-day division between local
Yine and
Mashco Piro peoples. The Yine are the descendants of natives whom Fitzcarrald forced to work for him and the Mashco are the descendants of natives who fled following Fitzcarrald's arrival. According to
Euclides da Cunha in his essay
Os caucheros, Fitzcarrald, along with a Piro interpreter, attempted to persuade a Mashco chief it would be more advantageous to enter an alliance with Fitzcarrald than to fight. The Mashco chief wanted to see the "arrows" they had brought and was handed a Winchester cartridge. He tried to injure himself with this bullet and after comparing it to an arrow of his own, which he stabbed into his arm, this chief walked away from Fitzcarrald with confidence. After a physical, half-hour-long conflict between the two groups, 100 Mashcos including the chief had been killed. Da Cunha described the small army that accompanied Fitzcarrald as "disparate
physiognomies of the tribes he had subjugated". Dominican missionary José Álvarez provided details of another conflict between Fitzcarrald and a Mashco tribe that may have occurred during the same expedition as the one in the incident described by da Cunha. According to Álvarez: {{Blockquote There were also raids against natives on other tributaries of the Manu, most notably the Sahuinto, Sotileja, and Fierro. Most of the indigenous men Fitzcarrald's enterprise found during their slave raids along the Manu River were killed. Some of these slave raids were against
Guarayo natives. Fitzcarrald's captain Maldonado led a campaign in the Sahuinto area, where his group killed many Mashco men before enslaving their women and children. Captain Sanchez destroyed native farms, villages, and canoes on the Sotileja River.
Partnership with Bolivian rubber barons On September 4, 1894, Fitzcarrald arrived at "El Carmen" rubber station on the Madre de Dios River, which the Bolivian rubber baron
Nicolás Suárez Callaú owned. Fitzcarrald had traveled on the steamship
Contamana along with merchandise, which he offered to the Bolivians at lower rates than Suárez could find along the Madeira and Beni Rivers. The Isthmus provided a safer route for Suárez to export rubber. Suárez decided to invest 500,000 Bolivian pesos for the improvement and further development of the new route Fitzcarrald had established. Fitzcarrald later traveled further down the Madre de Dios River to the Orton River, where he met
Antonio de Vaca Díez, who was a rubber baron and a senator for the Bolivian department of Beni. Vaca Díez was invited into a developing business network, which would create an association of Peruvian, Bolivian, and Brazilian rubber exporters. Around 300 men were distributed at points ranging from between Mishagua and El Carmen to establish new supply stations, which would support the enterprise's operations in the area. An engineer named Manuel Balbastro was sent to the isthmus to establish a plan for a railway that would extend from Mishagua to the opposite side of the isthmus on the Manu River. Balbastro estimated this project could cost up to four million
Peruvian soles. The project was later abandoned because it was believed to be too expensive. Balbastro was persuaded to stay at Mishagua and work for Fitzcarrald's enterprise for a season; he later told Fray Sala about some of the atrocities and abuses he witnessed white
caucheros perpetrate against natives. Transportation on the Madre de Dios for this new partnership would be provided by the steamships
La Esperanza,
La Shiringa, and
La Contamana; while on the Ucayali, the steamships
Bermúdez,
La Unión,
Laura,
Dorotea, a tugboat named Bolivar,
Cintra, and
Adolfito launches would facilitate transportation. In 1895, Fitzcarrald chartered the steamship
Hernán and transported of rubber that year on a voyage to Iquitos. The steamship
Contamana was sold to Fitzcarrald's new Bolivian associates but it sank on the same day of its sale due to unforeseen damage that occurred during its passage. In 1896, the Peruvian government granted Fitzcarrald exclusive navigational rights to the Upper Ucayali, Urubamba, Manu, and Madre de Dios rivers. Suárez and Vaca Díez had to negotiate separately with Fitzcarrald so they could operate on the rivers he controlled. Suárez offered Fitzcarrald rubber-bearing lands on the Manu River in exchange for navigational rights. Suárez and Fitzcarrald established a company named Suárez y Fiscarrald. Suárez' ships were also permitted to travel through the Urubamba-Ucayali River due to these negotiations. The same year, Vaca Díez traveled to London to register The Orton Rubber Co. and he intended to return to Bolivia with several new migrants who would work for him. Fitzcarrald and Vaca Díez met again in July 1897 near Mishagua, where they discussed business.
Death Fitzcarrald died at age 35 on July 9, 1897, together with his Bolivian business partner Vaca Díez, when their ship
Adolfito sank in the Urubamba River in an accident. They were traveling to Mishagua at the head of a convoy, and were being followed by the steamships
Laura and
Cintra. In a letter to her family, Lizzie Hessel, who witnessed the accident, wrote Fitzcarrald had boarded
Adolfito to persuade Vaca Díez to travel on a canoe because Fitzcarrald did not have faith in the new steamship. Fitzcarrald was persuaded to stay on the ship with his business partner. Albert Perl, who was navigating the
Adolfito, wrote that Fitzcarrald had boarded the steamship to wish the crew and passengers good morning; however, Fitzcarrald did not intend to travel with them as he felt safer with travelling with his natives by canoe. Perl stated that Fitzcarrald was persuaded to stay on board during the journey. Perl wrote that at around 3:30 in the afternoon
Adolfito came across a dangerous rapid, which became a fatal obstacle for the ship. Hessel also believed a chain broke on
Adolfito and afterwards the ship lost control to the current. Perl wrote after the ship lost control in the current, it was slammed against rocks and then sank. Fitzcarrald's biographer Reyna stated Fitzcarrald was a "renowned swimmer" and had tried to save his friend Vaca Díez, who did not know how to swim. Perl wrote he saw "[b]oth Vaca-Diez and Fizcarrald swung through the windows into the raging flood". Perl was caught in a whirlpool from which he managed to escape, unlike Fitzcarrald. Fitzcarrald's body was found days later and was buried in the forest. He was reburied two years later in a cemetery in Iquitos. Hessel wrote that Fitzcarrald's wife blamed the group of travelers who were accompanying Vaca Díez for Fitzcarrald's death, because he had arranged accommodations for this group. Ernesto Reyna blamed Perl, who was piloting
Adolfito at the time, for the accident. Tony Morrison, who compiled and edited Lizzie Hessel's letters, speculated the river accident may have been planned and said "convenient accidents" were a business tactic used by rubber barons. After July 1897, some of the remaining Mashco and Guarayo natives along the Madre de Dios River began attacking canoes and raiding settlements established by Fitzcarrald's enterprise. The Mashcos were able to assume control over the isthmus and burned down rubber stations, killed mules that provided transportation on the route, and damaged infrastructure that Fitzcarrald's enterprise had established. ==Legacy==