In a few weeks time, I’ll be heading out to Poland to launch ‘Wild Coast’, the book of my travels in Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana. There were several points in my journey where my path crossed with Poles…. Here are three of them. Can you think of other Polish-Guianese connections?
1. There is the Gorinsky family who settled in the Rupununi. Peter G married a daughter of HPC Melville, she being half-Wapisiana. The Gorinskys still have strong links with Guyana, and I believe introduced the first vehicles to the savannah.
2. The greatest explorer of Guyana was actually a Prussian, Robert Schomburgk. It’s possible he came from a part of East Prussian now in Poland.
3. The French tried to settle Polish ‘displaced persons’ in French Guiana at the end of World War Two. Some settled here in the old penal colony of St-Jean. Sadly, the settlement only failed when many of the settlers were drowned on the Maroni, coming back from a football match. The photo shows the grave yard, and the tomb of one Elisabeth Rakcozy.
