Andrés O'Donnell (1886-?) was an agent of the Peruvian Amazon Company of Irish-Peruvian descent, employed in the Putumayo River basin between 1903-1910. He managed the Entre Rios station for the Company, which collected rubber from locally enslaved indigenous populations. In 1910 Roger Casement described his plantation as "merely a center of terrorization - that is all." O'Donnell is included in three different testimonial correspondences collected in Walter Ernest Hardenburg's 'The Putumayo: The Devil's Paradise,' and at least five testimonies collected by Roger Casement in 1910. Casement’s report as well as Hardenburg’s book were published in 1912, and helped to expose atrocities that occurred during the Putumayo genocide. An investigation carried out by judge Carlos A. Valcárcel later managed to collect at least twenty three depositions that incriminated O'Donnell in the Putumayo genocide. O'Donnell separated from the Company in 1910, and later disappeared without a trace in the United States around New York.
Early life
There is very little public information written about Andrés O'Donnell's early life. What is documented about this time, comes from Roger Casement's journal as relayed by Andrés himself. "I miss a good deal of his Spanish. He says his grandfather went to Spain from Ireland, and father came from Spain to Peru. I doubt the grandfather. It is probably further back." Andrés was born in Peru around 1886, and left "Lucia" in 1901 near the age of 17. The name “Lucia” is not specified to be a settlement or a person in Casment’s journal. Sometime within the next two years O’Donnell was able to secure employment with a rubber firm operating along the Putumayo River.
Career
O'Donnell began working for Julio César Arana's rubber firm sometime between 1901-1903. This was around the age of eighteen or twenty. By 1904, O'Donnell was managing the Entre Rios station, which was located near the upper Cahuinari River. During his time in the Putumayo, he learned a Huitoto language, and became a fluent speaker in it. Near the end of his employment, Entre Rios was estimated to have a "great clearing" of between 200-300 acres surrounding the buildings. During his management it was stated of him, that he compelled the natives to bring in a quota of rubber, and when punished them when they didn't. More often than not this punishment included flogging, or the 'cepo' which was a stockade like device. The cepo at Entre Rios contained 24 holes for the feet or legs, and was noted to be larger than the cepo at Occidente or Ultimo Retiro.
When Andrés arrived to Entre Rios in 1903 there was an old great Native chief named Chingamuni, who still retained influence over the local Huitoto population. The manager at the time was Elías Martinengui, who only had one fabrico at the station before O'Donnell assumed management. O'Donnell mentioned that the chief was a "captain of energy and character" who was highly respected by the Huitoto's. On the way back with O'Donnell from La Chorrera after a fabrico, Chingamuni was killed during a quarrel by a Colombian named Calderon who also worked for Arana. O'Donnell stated that the Colombians were at Entre Rios and all over the Putumayo before he arrived. The Colombians "'treated' the Natives 'very badly,'" according to O'Donnell they were "much worse than he and the Peruvians... it was simply 'conquering' Indians and holding them as slaves - killing them and their women and living entirely on them." In Roger Casement's journal, he notes that this is exactly what O'Donnell and other agents of the Peruvian Amazon Company continue to do, "only with less killing."
A judicial investigation that occurred after O'Donnell's employment with the Company implicated him with the September 24 1903 massacre of Ocaina natives at La Chorrera, ordered by Benjamin Larrañaga. This was witnessed by Emilio Mozambite and declared in his testimony. The years around 1905 are referred to as the "state of siege". Employees of the station were not allowed to bathe or wash their clothes without taking their rifle to the river and letting O'Donnell know. The "state of siege" took fruition in the Natives sending "pot shots" at the Company employee's in defiance and retaliation. According to O'Donnell he was also shot at while bathing by the river.