As a frequent visitor to the island of Rodrigues, following a piece of A Study of Social Exclusion in Rodrigues (2003), I am surprised to observe the lack of interest in the Rodriguans? history-rich beautiful country. How apt is Roussety (2000)?s observation that ?happy is a people who have inherited a history?.

However, the people of Rodrigues cannot be held responsible for their indifference to the priceless treasure of their history. The denial of the opportunity to appreciate and experience their homeland?s history could have been the main contributing factor for the disadvantage of having been administered by Mauritius from the beginning of its discovery. Incontestable evidence has shown that Mauritius has not really cared about Rodrigues, never mind drawing the attention to its great historical heritage. This is so not only in the area of its political development but also in respect of the provisions of social welfare.

Alfred North-Coombes (1970) states: ?Rodrigues? continued as before, a dependency, mostly forgotten and neglected?? Cheong-Lum?s findings reiterate Mauritius? supercilious attitude thus (1997): ?Rodrigues was always administered as a dependency of Mauritius, very much like a poor relative, which was occasionally mentioned?? This was the sad state of affairs subjugating Rodrigues in a subordinate condition long after Mauritius had achieved independence from Britain in 1968.

On the other hand, one cannot deny that there has been noticeably tangible improvement in some areas of the infrastructure of the island. For instance, an architecturally attractive airport building has been constructed at Plaine-Corail; but it appears that only part of it is in use. There is also a decent new library. However, to one?s disappointment, there is insufficient skilled assistance for the researcher, apart from the fact that all important research materials are available only in the National Archives in Mauritius.

Like Mauritius, Rodrigues has a rich and fascinating legacy of history of piracy, intrigue, conspiracy and rivalry among European nations, such as the British, the Dutch and the French. They were fiercely engaged in establishing a foothold in the Indian Ocean with a view to facilitating the pursuit of the profitable spice trade in the East. Coincidentally, in this struggle, one could see the embryonic seeds of colonialism in the continent of Africa and beyond.

Of volcanic origin, Rodrigues is one of the Mascarene islands in the Indian Ocean. It is a tiny island about nine and a half miles long and four and a half miles wide, with deep ravines and hills, covered with a canopy of huge green trees and foliages during the rainy season. During the dry period, from above, Rodrigues resembles the lunar landscapes, with dry bare rocky hills, brown fields and defoliated cliffs and valleys revealing the enormous bowels of crevices and holes, encircled by giant white ripples of waves against the coasts.

Geographically, Rodrigues lies 400 miles east of Mauritius. The Portuguese discovered it in the early 16th century, when it was named after navigator Diego Rodrigues. In 1528, he safely manoeuvred his sailing vessel to the island. Unlike the larger islands in the Indian Ocean, Rodrigues did not attract attention not only because of its small area but also because it was difficult to access. The coral reefs, shallow waters and other perilous obstructions made it a very difficult to put ashore. Therefore, for a long period, European navigators used it as a point of reference while plying the wealth-generating spice trade from East to West.

The current Rodrigues? population is about 36,770 (Digest of Statistics on Rodrigues 2004). However, when it was discovered, it was an uninhabited island covered with dense forests, possessing many exotic birds, like the solitaire.

Tucked away in its remote isolation from other larger islands in the Indian Ocean and difficult to approach, it was felt by a small group of intrepid adventurous French Huguenots as an ideal place to set up a colony, free to practise their religion and pursue their chosen ways of life. In Western Europe, particularly France, they were harassed and persecuted for their newly discovered religious faith during the 16th century period of Reformation. The Reformation movement was comparable to a religious revolution, inspired by single-minded reformists like Martin Luther, John Calvin and others.

In England, Henry VIII (1491-1547) challenged the Church of Rome over his divine right as King to divorce Catherine of Aragon and marry Anne Boleyn. In Germany, Martin Luther, a brilliant theological scholar, questioned some aspects of the Bible teachings by posting his 95 critical theses on the door of All Saints? Church on 31st October 1517. Luther was responding to the controversial Dominican monk, Johann Tetzel, who had begun to sell ?indulgences?, that is, the reduction of retribution for sins in exchange for donations of gifts, offerings and money. Sanctioned by Pope Leo X, the selling of indulgences did not only arouse the contemptuous wrath of devout Catholics but it also provided the raison d?être and inspiration for the Reformation movement.

Like Mauritius, Rodrigues has a rich and fascinating legacy of history of piracy, intrigue, conspiracy and rivalry among European nations, such as the British, the Dutch and the French. They were fiercely engaged in establishing a foothold in the Indian Ocean with a view to facilitating the pursuit of the profitable spice trade in the East.

The Reformation movement was followed by the rising waves of the Enlightenment - a progressive 17th century European movement concerned with the ideas of God, reason, nature and man synthesized into a world-view. It inaugurated the notion of power and reason through which man contemplated the universe and improvement of his social condition. The goals of the rational man were to achieve knowledge, freedom and happiness, which, inevitably, possessed wide implications, social, political and philosophical, let alone religious. While the Reformation movement challenged the Catholic Church, the Enlightenment revived the notion that man was a creative being.

Thinkers and philosophers of ancient Greece were among the earlier investigators of the use of power and reason. The progress in this direction was linear, continuous and evolutionary. For Martin Luther as well as Francis Bacon the truth lay in the application of human reason to the subject matter put through rigorous probing of unfettered minds. Contributors to the Enlightenment, which was a critical, reforming and revolutionary movement, were inspired and developed by a number of great thinkers, scholars and philosophers. They included Francis Bacon, Isaac Newton, Jeremy Bentham, Decartes, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Montesquieu, Voltaire and many others. Taking the ideas of the Enlightenment forward, later on, Thomas Jefferson also contributed to the critique of authoritarian states, thereby enhancing the concept of natural rights and liberal democracy.

It was inevitable that the Protestant movement in Germany provided the leadership as early as in 1517, with Johann Tezel?s sale of indulgences and Martin Luther?s challenge to this corrupt practice. As a result, the devout Catholics? anger was aroused and they joined the growing ranks of German reformers. The latter were known as the Huguenots,the origin of whose name is uncertain but could have derived from the German Eidgenossen (confederates bound together by oath). But the spelling of Huguenot could have come from Hugues, the leader of the Geneva movement, which was hostile to the Duke of Savoy, called Besançon Hugues.

In Germany the growth of the Huguenot movement gathered self-confidence incrementally. Spilling over the borders in France, this reformist movement made irreversible incursions especially into areas of economic depression and among those disaffected against the established order of government. Fearing the de-stabilisation of the country, the French hierarchy, led by the bigoted clergy, took harsh measures against the French Protestants. In August 1523, the first martyr among them, Jean Vallière, was burned at the stake in public in Paris in order to deter any future religious rebellion.

John Calvin, the leading spirit among the French Protestants, pleaded with the French King Francis I to show compassion to the reformers, but to no avail. On 18th October 1685, Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes, which, in 1598, following the civil war, safeguarded the Huguenots? religious and political freedom. This led to the exodus of over 400,000 French Protestants. They fled the country, seeking exile in religiously liberal and tolerant countries, such as the Netherlands, Germany. Switzerland and England. Being mainly of an urbanised religious minority group, engaged in industry and commerce and artisanship, France, in the exile of the Huguenots, lost the bulk of its most industrious population.

In the 16th and 17th centuries, the rivalry was fierce among the Western European nations, seeking to establish a foothold in the Indian Ocean. This region was then of great strategic commercial importance in view of the profitable spices and other exotic produce of the East for the European market. With Portugal under the domination of Spain, the Dutch were denied access to the vibrant market of Lisbon. Resenting this, they sought to establish an outpost in the Indian Ocean. In 1598, Vice-Admiral Van Neck Warwijk left Amsterdam in a conquering spirit with a fleet of eight well-armed vessels to the Indian Ocean. Sighting the unoccupied Mauritius, he named it after the Prince of Orange of Nassau. In 1603, the Netherlands chartered East India Company annexed Rodrigues but not so much to occupy it as simply to dissuade their rivals, the English and the French, from claiming it. The Dutch established themselves in Mauritius, the larger island, about 400 miles away from Rodrigues.

Marquis Henri Du Quesne, a high-ranking French Admiral, then living in Switzerland, of Huguenot persuasion, had a plan for the masses of his French co-religionists in the Netherlands. The States-General in Holland supported the project, eager to lighten the burden of French exiles in the country. Du Quesne wanted to set up a colony in Bourbon, now known as Réunion, if still unoccupied by the French, or Rodrigues, if a settlement was feasible and sustainable. Although he empathised with the French Huguenots, Du Quesne?s investment in the project was not entirely altruistic. His instructions were that if occupied the colony of Bourbon was to be named after him, as also in the case of Rodrigues. Advertisements were circulated widely in England, Holland, Switzerland and Germany: the response attracted a large number of Huguenots, men, women and children, desperate to avoid religious persecution. They were enough of them to charter two large vessels.

A Huguenot, François Leguat, a nobleman of Burgundy, secured permission to leave France. Having learned of the venture, he offered his services to Du Quesne. He was appointed Major to lead this great exodus. However, on 28th January 1690, it was suspended. Du Quesne believed it was too risky not only as a result of the unusually severe winter weather and too many women and children among the exiles but also because of the rumours that the King of France had despatched a squadron of seven ships to protect Bourbon.

A less ambitious expedition was organised. On 4th September 1690, Leguat led the venture on the small frigate, the Hirondelle, with a small party of like-minded youmger adventurers in search of a safe refuge overseas in order to set up a colony, free of religious persecution. The destination was Rodrigues, the uninhabited tiny island to which the Dutch laid claim, as Captain Antoine Valleau assumed that Bourbon was already colonised by the French. As the ship proceeded, the young men became increasingly restless and tensions grew not only among themselves but also against the ship?s captain. Jacques de la Case was one among the most aggressive adventurers from the very start of this gruelling sea-journey. However, Captain Valleau managed to make steady progress in the rough sea.

On 15th March 1691, a ferocious cyclone hit the Indian Ocean. Using all his seamanship skills, Captain Valleau managed to overcome the storms and save the ship, but, in the process, lost his position. In those days the science of navigation was still underdeveloped. On 3rd April, land was sighted: it was Mauritius. However, Valleau felt that it was too risky not to navigate Hirondelle towards the nearer and safer Rodrigues.

On 25th April 1691, Rodrigues was sighted. The long gruelling sea-journey had taken its toll. Before reaching the island, Jean Pagni, one of the ten adventurers, died of scurvy and was buried at sea. Approaching the island safely, with its treacherous coral reefs and other perilous obstacles, called for all Captain Antoine Valleau?s genius in seamanship. Navigating through the Eastern Passage efficiently, Valleau brought the small frigate, Hirondelle, safely to anchorage at Grande Rivière on 30th April 1991. The expedition took 239 days of sailing from Amsterdam to Rodrigues.

John Calvin, the leading spirit among the French Protestants, pleaded with the French King Francis I to show compassion to the reformers, but to no avail. On 18th October 1685, Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes, which, in 1598, following the civil war, safeguarded the Huguenots? religious and political freedom. This led to the exodus of over 400,000 French Protestants.

While the Captain and others left to explore the island within the proximity of the frigate, Hirondelle, François Leguat was preoccupied with other matters. On the following day, 31st May 1691, he set foot on the island. Awed by the idyllic and peaceful environment, the colony was named Eden after the Biblical Garden of Eden. Overwhelmed by the serenity that the island of Rodrigues projected, Leguat envisioned a successful settlement of Huguenots there. Mesmerised by the beauty of the island, others, including one of the ship?s pilots, and François Leguat decided to settle down, despite the option to return.

However, Captain Valleau kept Jacques Guiguer, one of the young adventurers, and the boy Pierrot with him, on grounds that he would otherwise be short of crew. After taking fresh stores for the return journey, he set sail to Mauritius but also wanted to proceed to Bourbon to report to Du Quesne whether the French had in fact occupied it. Then he learned that gangs of pirates had been using Madagascar as their base. This made him change course in the less risky direction of the Dutch Cape; but the strategy proved hopeless. Therefore, despite Captain Antoine Valleau?s ingenuity in avoiding the nests of pirates in the Indian Ocean engaged in raiding the precious cargo of ships from the East to Europe and dodging the other enemies, the Hirondelle was captured by the French navy long before reaching Holland.

Hirondelle set sail from Amsterdam on 4th September 1690 and arrived in Rodrigues on 30th April 1691. This intrepid sea-adventure, exposed to countless risks, including capture and shipwreck, took no less than 239 days to reach the island. A featureless monument, consisting of a block of concrete, against which is nailed a decaying piece of wood, in the square of Port Mathurin, was built to commemorate François Leguat?s landing on 31st May 1691. For such a uniquely remarkable history belonging to Rodrigues, it is disconcerting to observe such an unfitting plaque to mark the landing of the adventurous Huguenots.

Dr Sam Lingayah