Misha Williams

(3) 
 
 
strange and ancient ruins and record hieroglyphs. Fawcett soon 
recognized the many ancient writings in stone in Ceylon matched 
identically those he had discovered in other parts of the world: in North 
Africa, in Malta and in Western Ireland for example. Like several of our 
contemporary writers and alternative archaeologists, Fawcett concluded 
that similarities in these far-flung carvings indicated that early civilization  
stemmed from one source and was linked worldwide. 
 
The following family details are important because they affected the way 
Fawcett was presented to the world after his disappearance. Despite the 
fierce disapproval by his family, Fawcett proposed to Nina Agnes 
Paterson, daughter of a district judge at Galle, Ceylon. Fawcett's brother 
Douglas and his sisters mischievously told him that Nina was far from 
being a virgin (a serious crime in those halcyon days). Fawcett wrote to 
her to say; "…you are not the pure young girl I thought you to be", and 
the engagement was immediately called off. Nina soon married a Captain 
Herbert Prichard, who took her to live in Alexandria where he died after 
of an embolism due to anthrax. In the style of high Victorian melodrama, 
his dying words were apparently "Go….and marry Fawcett! He is the real 
man for you" Fawcett, having discovered the nasty ploy of his family, 
begged Nina for forgiveness and they were married. They had three 
children who were to play a major role in the story.  Jack, the eldest, was 
born on May 19th, 1903 (Buddha's anniversary and a crucial event as will 
be explained), and was to disappear with his father on the 1925 
expedition to Amazonia. Brian was born in 1906, and was the "despised 
and overlooked" second son (very much a repeat of Fawcett's childhood 
experience). However Brian put his father's name on the world map 
through a book called Exploration Fawcett which was to cause a hell of a 
lot of trouble and misunderstanding in the following seventy-five years, 
but from Brian's point of view, all for a very good reason. Brian was a 
master manipulator and communicator. If he was still alive now he would 
never have disclosed the Fawcett Secret Papers to me or anyone. But his 
wit, intelligence and insight, leaping out of his writing, were the major 
factors that led me to write this play.  Joan, born in 1910 and still alive, 
put her faith in me. She and her daughter Rolette have allowed me access 
to those incredible Secret Papers that overturn the official version of the 
Fawcett story.  
 
 
 

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(4) 
 
 
The rift between Nina's side of the family and Fawcett's own relatives 
lasted for over a hundred years and continues today amongst their 
descendents. This has had an unfortunate effect on the public perception 
of the real Fawcett story. One of Nina's descendents, Timothy Paterson, 
not being allowed access to Joan's papers, virtually invented his own 
myth about "Uncle Percy" which is now circulated on the Internet. The 
real facts of this mystery are dramatic dynamite beyond one's wildest 
dreams and need no further invention by Timothy Paterson or any one 
else. I have constructed 80 years worth of these real events into a two-
hour play that I hope will encapsulate the truth at last.  
 
 
"Exploration Fawcett" 
 
Ironically the very book that introduced a lot of the world in 1953 to the 
amazing travels of Col P.H. Fawcett, "edited by his son Brian Fawcett", is 
a sham, but a well-meaning sham. It is thought to be an autobiography 
and it is still in print. In fact, Fawcett's younger son Brian, credited as 
"the editor," ghost-wrote it. It was the "Book of the Month" and was 
translated into many languages. Fawcett's "story", in press reviews from 
Graham Greene and Harold Nicolson, was described as "reckless and 
inspired …full of mystery, fortitude, and doom…a staggering book… 
compares with Conrad's Heart of Darkness" etc. But the book was a blind 
and not written by Fawcett at all. Fawcett's actual autobiography "Travel 
and Mystery in South America" was never published and the manuscript 
lost in the U.S. while doing the rounds of publishers in 1924. Fawcett 
wrote to his best friend , Harold Large, complaining that "publishers have 
turned down my book here and in the USA. They want thrills and 
embroidery; I'd rather not publish it at all". Brian was a much better 
writer than his father and had no qualms in giving the public what they 
wanted. Exploration Fawcett is an excellent read and has truly placed 
Fawcett back on the world map. But the book only reveals ten percent of 
the real story. And even the map in the book's front-piece of Fawcett's 
final and fatal route is a false trail planted by Brian. In fact the expedition 
went in the opposite direction! The real truth sat in a family trunk for fifty 
years, in the form of letters, diaries, notebooks, guarded from the public 
and media for most of that time by Brian Fawcett himself. WHY? 
 
 
 

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(5) 
 
 
As early as 1928, a bitter rift had opened between the Fawcett family and 
the media. Fawcett and his expedition had been missing for three years 
and The North American Newspaper Alliance, his main sponsor, decided 
tosend an expensive expedition to find out what had happened. 
Commander George Dyott was put in charge. It set off from Cuiaba, an 
old mining town at Brazil's centre and jumping off point for all 
expeditions (including Fawcett's) into the massive unexplored Mato 
Grosso, a million square miles of forest south of the Amazon. A naval 
man with no jungle experience, Dyott reported that the Fawcett party had 
gone North-East to the Rio Kuluene, a tributary of the great Xingu River 
and had been clubbed to death by Kalapalos tribesmen because they had 
offended tribal etiquette.  The world press seized on this sensational story 
and have continued to repeat it up until today. Fawcett's wife Nina and 
the young Brian were appalled. Their reasons were: 
 
1) Fawcett was fastidious in observing the ways of Amazonian forest 
people and always learned some vocabulary and protocol of a tribe before 
even setting foot in its territory. 
 
2) Dyott ignored the family's vital information that the expedition had 
gone North-West and instead relied on Cuiaba tittle-tattle; false 
information planted by Fawcett who did not want to be followed. This led 
to Dyott searching the wrong area. 
 
3) Dyott took no interpreters and got the 'clubbing to death' story entirely 
from sign language he had learned from American Western silent movies. 
The Dyott version, laden with American preconceptions about 
"imperialist British colonels and their disdain for the natives", has 
damaged Fawcett's reputation and painted the very opposite to the truth.  
 
More "rescue missions" followed and in the 1930's.Young adventurers, 
some perhaps crossed in love, often rejected the time honoured idea of 
joining the Foreign Legion in preference to the far more dangerous 
"Looking for Fawcett".  By 1950 they were still coming (to Dyott's fatally  
mistaken location). They should have gone North-West from Cuiaba, the 
actual route that is mentioned in the Secret Papers. Foolhardy 
expeditions, some very ill-equipped, disappeared. Hundreds died 
searching an area Fawcett had never visited! 
 
 

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