Armando Normand

Armando Normand (1880–?) was a plantation manager of Peruvian and Bolivian descent who had a central role in the Peruvian Amazon Company's perpetration of the Putumayo genocide. For six years in the Putumayo, Normand committed uncounted abuses against the indigenous population.

Normand worked for the company, which extracted rubber with illegal slave labour, between 1904 and October 1910. During those years, he led a reign of terror against local indigenous populations. According to British consul-general Roger Casement, who investigated crime in the Putumayo River basin in 1910, Normand committed "innumerable murders and tortures" during this period. Several of the crimes that Normand was incriminated with include immolation, bashing out the brains of children, and dismemberment.

Reports and evidence of Normand's crimes were first documented by Benjamin Saldaña Rocca in 1907, Roger Casement in 1910, and Judge Carlos A. Valcarcel in 1915. A warrant for Normand's arrest was issued by Judge Rómulo Paredes on 29 June 1911 along with 214 other men employed by the Peruvian Amazon Company's agency at La Chorrera. Normand was arrested in 1912 but was not brought to trial and escaped from prison in 1915.

Early life

Armando Normand was born in Cochabamba, Bolivia, in around 1880. It is believed he spent the first twenty years of his life in and around Cochabamba. The little information about Normand's early life comes from an interview conducted by Peter MacQueen in 1913, during which Normand said:

Our family was one of the first in the Province of Cochabamba, and I was afforded excellent opportunities for securing an education. After graduating from the Seminario in my native city, I spent two years studying law, but finally abandoned [the] course and went to the Argentine. I attended the National School of Commerce in Buenos Ayres and graduated from that institution as a public accountant. Altogether I remained about two and one-half years in Buenos Ayres. In 1903 I went to London and studied for a few months at the Pitman School in Russell Square in order to improve my knowledge of bookkeeping and modern business.

Roger Casement said he had seen Normand's school certificates, including one from the London School of Book-keepers dated 1904, which qualified Normand as a bookkeeper.

Career

While in London, Normand became friends with the Bolivian minister Avelino Aramayo and through this connection he became acquainted with influential people from Peru and Bolivia. Normand left London in 1904 and travelled to Pará, Brazil, with a letter of introduction to Carlos Larrañaga, the regional manager for Suárez Hermanos, a famous rubber firm in Bolivia. Because there were no open positions at the firm, Larrañaga advised Normand to travel to Manaus, and Larrañaga also wrote letters of introduction for Normand to Julio César Arana, owner of J. C. Arana and Hermanos Company. Arana's company hired Normand, assigning him as an interpreter on a mission to hire workers in Barbados. This mission managed to contract around thirty five Barbadians to work on the Igaraparana River, a tributary of the Putumayo River.

In November 1904, Normand arrived at La Chorrera with the first contingent of Barbadian men, and was commissioned with those men to set up a settlement near the Caqueta River and engage in "trade relations" with Andoque tribespeople. The group was led by a Colombian named Ramon Sanchez, they established a station that became known as Matanzas and soon set off on slave raids, and what Roger Casement referred to as "punitive expeditions", with weapons to hunt natives, and forced them to collect rubber. In 1905, Normand was made co-manager of the Matanzas station after the dismissal of Sanchez for physically abusing the Barbadian men, and in 1906, Normand became the chief manager of Matanzas.

Photograph of the Matanzas rubber station, taken by Roger Casement. It was reported that limbs were often kept and eaten by the dogs kept by Armando Normand at Matanzas.

By 1907, Normand and his employer Arana were subjects of complaints made by Benjamin Saldaña Rocca, a journalist from Iquitos who was determined to hold them responsible for their crimes. Saldaña used statements and first-hand accounts from former workers of the rubber stations, publishing them in La Felpa and La Sancion, two small newspapers from Iquitos. For three years before Casement's investigation, Normand's crimes were well known in Peru. According to Casement's report:

It was alleged, and I am convinced with truth, that during the period of close on six years Normand had controlled the Andokes Indians he had directly killed 'many hundreds' of those Indians—men, women, and children. The indirect deaths due to starvation, floggings, exposure, and hardship of various kinds in collecting rubber or transferring it from Andokes down to Chorrera must have accounted for a still larger number. Señor Tizon told me that 'hundreds' of Indians perished in the compulsory carriage of the rubber from the more distant sections down to La Chorrera. No food is given by the company to these unfortunate people on these forced marches, which, on an average, take place three times a year. I witnessed one such march, on a small scale ...

Illustration on the first issue of 'LA FELPA'

Enslaved locals were expected to gather between 50 and 100 kg (110 and 220 lb) of rubber in a fabrico depending on their assigned quota. The natives marched along with their loads of rubber to Matanzas from areas in the forest that were, in some cases, a ten-to-twelve hours distance by foot. The land route to deliver rubber from Matanzas to La Chorrera was estimated by Casement to be 110 kilometres (70 miles), and could take "four to five days of hard marching" to traverse by the Barbadian men, which escorted the natives.

Around 1907, a small steamship was launched on the Igaraparana River above the waterfall of La Chorrera, shortening the distance that natives entrapped at Matanzas had to travel in order to deliver rubber to La Chorrera. From Matanzas, they were to travel to Entre Rios, a two-day walk, and then to a place named Puerto Peruano, which was around 64 km (40 miles) or more from Matanzas, with little to no food. At Puerto Peruano, the rubber carried by the natives was then loaded onto a boat and shipped to La Chorrera. In 1910, Casement estimated that over the course of the whole march, natives would walk 97 kilometres (60 miles) or more to deliver rubber to La Chorrera and he stated the path was "one of the worst imaginable". These marches from Matanzas to La Chorrera usually occurred twice in year, after a collection period referred to as a fabrico. A fabrico was the season for the natives extracting rubber, and could last between 75 and 100 days.

When Normand became the station manager in 1906, for every 15 kg (33 lb) of rubber collected by the natives, he received three soles. At the time of Casement's visit in 1910, Normand was making around 20 soles for every 15 kg (33 lb) of rubber, which was 20% of the station's generated profit. The manager of La Chorrera told Casement the company owed Normand 18,000 soles before a harvest of rubber in 1910—around £1,800—and Casement believed that Normand would get paid £300 for that collection period based on the output of Matanzas. According to Normand in 1910, 120 men, who could annually bring in around 16,800 kg (37,000 lb) of rubber, were being forced to work at the Matanzas station. The number of people kept captive to work at Matanzas prior to Casement's visit is unknown, however the information given the American Consul in Iquitos, claimed that there were 5,000 indigenous people dedicated to extracting rubber for the Matanzas station in 1907. The manager at La Chorrera, Juan A. Tizón, also told Casement the company had been running the Matanza station at a loss for a few years.

After meeting Armando Normand in 1910, Roger Casement wrote:

he is the ablest of these scoundrels we have met yet, and I should say far the most dangerous. The others were murderous maniacs mostly, or rough, cruel ignorant men ... This is an educated man of a sort, who has lived long in London, knows the meaning of his crimes and their true aspect in all civilized eyes.

Normand left the company a month or two after Casement's visit; he had requested to separate from the firm in a letter the previous year. According to Normand, at the time, he was "often ill and had symptoms of the dread beri-beri". When Victor Macedo, the general manager at La Chorrera, heard about Normand's request for resignation, he asked Normand to stay longer at the Matanzas station because they had no one to replace him. When British consul George Mitchell and American consul Stuart J. Fuller visited the Putumayo in October 1912, they visited every plantation where atrocities had been reported except for Abisinia and Matanzas. By then, the Matanzas plantation was completely abandoned.

Role in the Putumayo genocide

Armando Normand committed numerous crimes in the Putumayo River basin, which members of the Peruvian Amazon Company witnessed. Several witnesses who came forward include Roso España, Marcial Gorries, Genaro Caporo and Barbadians Westerman LevineFrederick Bishop (Barbadian) and Joshua Dyall. Some of these first-hand accounts were used as evidence in the La Sancion and La Felpa publications that exposed the company in Peru, Roger Casement's report and an extensive report released by the United States relating to slavery in Peru.

Judge Carlos A. Valcárcel initiated an investigative commission in 1911 to find new information; the first-hand accounts from ex-employees who worked under Normand make up the majority of the 'Andoques' chapter in his book El proceso del Putumayo y sus secretos inauditos. Judge Rómulo Paredes conducted the actual investigation around La Chorrera and Matanzas, he collected physical evidence and included numerous eyewitness accounts in his 3,000-page manuscript relating to the atrocities. In 1911, Paredes described Matanzas as "completely annihalted and almost extinguished".

"Two Andoke boys. They had just arrived with their loads of rubber. Casement mentions that "this tribe, once numerous, is now reduced all told to probably 150 persons, murdered by Armando Normand".

The crimes of Armando Normand

Normand starved the natives under his control, giving them no food and little-to-no time to cultivate food. On occasion, Normand used starvation until death as a means of capital punishment.

Near the end of 1904 or the beginning of 1905, Augustus Walcott was physically abused by Normand and Ramon Sanchez. Normand had Walcott "hung up by his arms tied behind his back for a very long time, and beaten with swords or machetes." Clifford Quintin was also abused by Normand on two separate occasions. The scarring from this flagellation was shown to Roger Casement in 1910. Another Barbadian named Percy, or James Francis was also tied up and flogged by swords under Sanchez's orders, however there is very little information regarding that incident.

The first issue of Benjamin Saldaña Rocca's newspaper La Sancion contained an account from Julio Muriedas, who worked under Normand. Muriedas stated Normand administered 200 or more whiplashes his enslaved workers did not meet a weight quota of rubber. When the natives tried to flee, they were suspended by their hands and feet before fire was applied. Victims, sometimes children, were tortured so they would expose their families' hiding places.

Flogging of a Putumayo native, carried out by the employees of Julio César Arana

Sidney Morris was at Andokes for three or four months until he became ill. He was employed there on correrias, and stated that while he did not flog natives there, he witnessed a number of flagellations while under Normand's management. Morris stated that Normand would administer the first couple of lashes before handing the whip to another employee to continue the punishment. "They [the natives] were flogged badly, men and women and children. He saw a boy, a small boy, flogged to death..." Morris stated some of the indigenous men who were flogged at Matanzas also perished from their wounds. He also witnessed the shooting of multiple natives, and the immolation, then shooting of one native man that Normand had caught. Morris reported that he knew of another native that Normand had ordered to be executed by burning to death. Morris stated that while he didn't witness this killing, he heard Normand give the order and he also saw the Muchachos de Confianza making preparations for the fire.

In January 1907, Normand led an attack against employees of Urbano Gutierrez, a Colombian rubber firm, which was attempting to establish an outpost near the Caqueta River. A group of twenty Peruvians, along with two Barbadians, came across eight people that were separated from the main group of Colombians, and killed two while taking the rest as prisoners. The Peruvians sent a letter to Normand, who arrived three days later with another group of subordinates. Normand interrogated the prisoners and he ordered the chief of these Colombians, Felipe Cabrera, to send a message to his partner José de la Paz Gutiérrez to surrender all of the fire arms his group had. Roso España was a Colombian employed by Urbano Gutierrez and he provided an eyewitness account for this raid led by Normand. España claimed that after the Colombians surrendered their firearms, the Peruvians began killing the natives around Urbano Gutierrez's settlement.

España also declared that after killing twenty-five people, Normand's group herded the elderly natives into the canoes the Colombians had brought, once in the middle of the river, all of the natives that were loaded onto the canoes were shot. Afterwards, España stated, the heads of children were rammed down into holes that were dug for the support beams of a house. Westerman Leavine reported that he saw one child killed this way. The Colombians, along with several indigenous prisoners, were marched to Matanzas by the group of Peruvians. According to España, four natives, including one chief that was taken prisoner during this event, were "clubbed to death" a short distance from the settlement of Matanzas. Leavine stated that while he did not witness the killing of these four natives, he had heard of this incident around the time it had occurred. Leavine's deposition to Casement in 1910 corroborated most of España's statement. Eight of the Colombian prisoners were taken to La Chorrera and later they were abandoned on a canoe by employees of Arana's firm while in transit to Iquitos, near the Peruvian border with Brazil. Felipe Cabrera, Jose de la Paz Gutiérrez and Aquiléo Torres were kept as prisoners and imprisoned by members of Arana's company with the intention of pressuring them into employment.

Westerman Leavine and Genaro Caporo both gave information relating to the murder of three elderly natives and their two adult daughters in the middle of 1907. Normand personally killed these five people and their bodies were eaten by the dogs he trained. Leavine also witnessed other crimes to which Caporo testified. In one instance, a native chief was burnt alive in front of his wife and two children because he was not able to collect enough rubber to satisfy Normand. The wife was then beheaded, the children were killed, and their bodies were thrown into a fire. Leavine and Caporo also witnessed Normand killing a woman because she refused to be the concubine of an employee. Normand wrapped another woman in a kerosene-soaked Peruvian flag and set her on fire; she was then shot, Caporo stated she had previously suffered one hundred whip lashes.

Near the end of Caporo's deposition, he declared "[t]o terminate with this repugnant criminal, whom I have seen commit crimes so horrible that perhaps they are unequalled in the history of the entire world, it is sufficient to say that I have seen him repeatedly snatch tender children from their mothers’ arms, and, grasping them by the feet, smash their heads to pieces against the trunks of trees." According to Westerman Leavine, over the course of six years, he saw Normand kill "many hundreds" of natives, including women and children. This did not include the many indirect killings that were caused by starvation, exposure, and the demanding job of collecting and delivering rubber. The Barbadian Frederick Bishop claimed that the elderly Andoque people, "all Normand could get hold of", had been killed long before 1910.

Judge Carlos A. Valcarcel found evidence that Normand flogged, imprisoned, and starved to death at least four natives. Valcarcel charged Normand with the destruction of the Cadanechajá, Japaja, Cadanache, Coigaro, Rosecomema, Tomecagaro, Aduije, and Tichuina nations. Paredes stated that at Matanzas, Normand imprisoned nearly 1,000 natives who eventually died from excessive whipping, time in the stocks, and starvation.

Valcárcel named of some of Normand's victims who died from flagellation and torture. One witness knew of the natives Ursechino, Cajecoy, Agocoboa, who were flogged and left to die in the stockade.When Normand abducted Teresa, he murdered three natives, including Teresa's mother-in-law. Teresa's husband, Doñecoy Andoques, testified to this and said that his wife's original name was Paccicañate. Normand also had Doñecoy and his father interred in the cepo, and the father of Doñecoy died as a result of Normand's abuse. Doñecoy was imprisoned for three months in the cepo, and upon his release Normand threatened to kill Doñecoy, like his parents, if he tried to care for Paccicañate. Normand later whipped and assaulted Paccicañate, who he forced into becoming one of his concubines. She died the following day from his violence. There were multiple witnesses to this incident, including Pablo Andoques, Lincoln Andoques, Caruso Muinane, and Daniel Alban, all of whom reported this information to judge Paredes in 1911. Daniel Alban and Pablo Andoques both reported that Teresa was a victim of Normand's jealousy, and that Normand flogged her as well as had chili peppers spread on her genitals.

An indigenous youth carrying a load of rubber, either from the Matanzas or Entre Rios station.

Chiache o Zoy, the sister of Paccicañate, was also forced to become a concubine for Normand and later provided a testimony to judge Paredes in 1911. Chiache claimed that Normand forced Chiache to undergo two separate abortions, and during her deposition to Paredes, Chiache emphasized that one of these babies was already well developed. The deponents Dorotea Witoto and Roosevelt Andoques cite the forced abortions undergone by Chiache, to support their claim that Normand forced his indigenous concubines to have abortions. Roosevelt cited the case of another woman named Yjá to support his claim. Another one of Normand's indigenous concubines, named Zoila Erazo, provided an oral testimony in 1980, some of which is based on her experience with Normand. In her testimony, Erazo described how Normand had threatened her and forced her to have an abortion.

Chiache stated that Normand abused her because he had feelings of jealousy, and on one occasion Normand had her placed in chains. Chiache claimed that Normand had ordered the decapitation of numerous women on the route between La China and Matanzas because these women became tired of walking. She also stated that Normand personally killed, and had ordered his subordinates to kill, the children of women he captured so that they would not slow down Normand's group on the return journey to Matanzas or La China. Chiache testified that these killings were carried out in a variety of methods ranging from decapitation, strangulation, and by swords. In her deposition, she provided the names of several of these children killed by Normand or his subordinates. Chiache also reported several other instances of murder perpetrated by Normand, or on his orders, including the killing of Chiache's aunt by one of Normand's muchachos de confianza. At the end of her deposition, she stated that Normand had cut the ring fingers off of two natives for not meeting the demanded quota of rubber, and when Normand left the Putumayo he took three of Chiache's sisters with him, and two young girls that were unrelated to Chiache.

Charred bones of Paccicañate or Teresa, murdered by Normand

There were multiple witnesses to the murder of an indigenous woman named Isolina, who was given to Normand as a concubine by Andrés O'Donnell as a gift of friendship. When Carlos Seminario gave an account of Normand's crimes to Victor Macedo, the manager of La Chorrera transferred him to another plantation. Seminario and several other deponents stated Normand killed Isolina over jealousy of an employee named Blondel. After allowing Blondel to sleep with Isolina, Normand had her hanged and whipped, and Isolina died of her wounds.

It was reported Normand amputated the arms and legs of a chief who refused to tell Normand the location of other natives who had fled. Casement did not name this chief in his report however Valcarcel named other chiefs whom Normand killed with a machete, including Chief Jañigandoy and five others. He amputated the arms and legs of other natives, leaving them to die of the resulting blood loss. One Barbadian named Clifford Quentin came forward, stating he saw one chief killed this way because the chief had not got his people to extract rubber for Normand. Quentin told Casement he had decapitated at least three natives at the behest of Normand. Normand had a native chief named Tojá put in chains and executed, then killed Tojá's wife Pandica with a machete; ten other women were killed by Normand's muchachos de confianza in the same manner on Normand's orders because they attempted to run away.

"Charred bones of the Jeiviche and Cadañeineco Indians burned alive by Normand"

Normand murdered chiefs Jemajegaina, Chemeje, Cadanecoja, and Jiticupa because they did not bring their people to work rubber. The corpses of those chiefs, except for Chemeje's, were burnt. He also murdered chiefs Toocue and Pichijup for not inducing their people to work rubber. A witness saw Normand kill the son of chief Napa and with ten other natives because they tried to run away. Hardenburg reports instances of kerosene being poured on men and women before they were immolated. Valcarcel's report mentions the immolation of a native named Jañaique. According to Casement:

Dr Paredes declares that he himself certified to the murder of no less than 1,000 people in the actual station house of Andokes or Matanzas - Normand's headquarters. This in no wise represented all the massacres perpetrated by that monster or his section, but only the deaths that Dr. Paredes became convinced of as having taken place in close proximity to the house itself. The bones he says he found in heaps - some in the bed of a stream - others in a deep pit that had been dug to receive them when it was known that I might visit Andokes - and others lined the paths through the forest in certain directions ... The crimes he attributes to Normand are worse even than I realised. He adds, too, that the outraging of children, of even very small children, was frequently practised by these men and that these innocent victims of this atrocious lust were killed or died from the effects of outrages committed upon them.

Arrest and disappearance

Armando Normand was officially dismissed from the Peruvian Amazon Company on 14 February 1911 along with ten other employees who were implicated in the perpetration of atrocities against the indigenous population. The Prefect of Iquitos sent a telegraph to the Peruvian Minister of Foreign Affairs which stated this group of men had fled towards Brazil. On 29 June 1911, 215 arrest warrants were issued against employees of La Chorrera's agency, including Normand. There were three sets of arrest warrants issued against employees of the Peruvian Amazon Company. Normand was included with the second set, which was ordered by judge Romulo Paredes, and they were "charged with a multiplicity of murders and tortures all through that region". In December 1911, a Barbadian reported to Casement he had seen Normand and Victor Macedo, together in Manaus, along with several other men who were implicated in crimes in the Putumayo region. The Barbadian informed Casement he thought this group was going towards the Acre territory in Brazil.

Normand later travelled to Buenos Aires then to Antofagasta, where he reportedly sold Panama hats for two years At the end of 1912, he returned to his home town of Cochabamba, still using his birth name. For a time, he started a business selling horses from Chile. Upon learning about Roger Casement's report, Armando wrote a letter to officials in Lima refuting the charges. Shortly after, he received an order of arrest and extradition to Peru, and the authorities sent him to Guadeloupe Gaol in Lima. In 1913, while awaiting his trial, Normand participated in an interview with Peter Macqueen, detailing his life up to that point. In 1915 it was reported Normand had escaped to Brazil with other Arana henchmen. There are no historical traces of Armando Normand after that.

In literature

Angus Mitchell, the editor of Roger Casement's diary that was released in 1997, stated the Matanzas station "in a number of respects ... might be compared to the 'inner station' of [Joesph] Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness,' and if there is a single figure that resembles Kurtz in this journal it is Armando Normand".

In The Lords of the Devil's Paradise, Sidney Paternoster compares Normand to Simon Legree, a cruel and sadistic slaver in Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin. Paternoster wrote: "Legree's acts pale in comparison to those of Armando Normand, and surely if any one in the Putumayo is to be punished this man deserves to be made an example of".

Although Fred Mustard Stewart changes the name, nationality, and location of a character named Jorge Ruiz, who appears in Stewart's 1973 novel The Mannings, the character seems to be inspired by Armando Normand. In the novel, Stewart says Ruiz, an agent at the novel's Oro Blanco rubber station, "could have been a successful accountant in Caracas, but here in the jungle he had become a monster".

See also

• Peruvian Amazon Company
• Putumayo genocide
• Andrés O'Donnell
• Julio César Arana

Bibliography

• Slavery in Peru: Message from the President of the United States Transmitting Report of the Secretary of State, with Accompanying Papers, Concerning the Alleged Existence of Slavery in Peru. United States. Department of State. 1913. Retrieved 14 August 2023.
• Casement, Roger (1997). The Amazon Journal of Roger Casement. Anaconda Editions. ISBN 1901990052. Retrieved 16 September 2023.
• Casement, Roger (2003). Mitchell, Angus (ed.). Sir Roger Casement's Heart of Darkness: The 1911 Documents. Irish Manuscripts Commission. ISBN 9781874280989.
• Goodman, Jordan (2009). The Devil and Mr. Casement: One Man's Battle for Human Rights in South America's Heart of Darkness. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISBN 978-1-84467-334-6. Retrieved 21 August 2023.
• Hardenburg, Walter (1912). Transcript of 'The Devil's Paradise. / A catalogue of crime' by W. E. Hardenburg. National Library of Ireland.
• Hardenburg, Walter (1912). The Putumayo, the Devil's Paradise; Travels in the Peruvian Amazon Region and an Account of the Atrocities Committed Upon the Indians Therein. Putumayo: London: Fischer Unwin. ISBN 1372293019. Retrieved 22 July 2023.
• Valcárcel, Carlos (2004). El proceso del Putumayo y sus secretos inauditos. The International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs.
• Olarte Camacho, Vicente (1911). Las crueldades en el Putumayo y en el Caquetá. Imprenta Eléctrica.