Mrs. Marina Chapman, from Yorkshire, England, shares her extraordinary tale in a new book about how a colony of capuchins in the Colombian jungle helped her learn survival skills after she was left behind in the rainforest by kidnappers who poorly executed her abduction.
She imitated the monkeys’ eating patterns and shrill calls, even mastering the art of climbing trees, although at night she rested in a hollowed-out tree trunk. On one memorable occasion, a monkey she named Grandpa, due to his patches of white fur, alleviated her debilitating stomach pain by guiding her to a river and urging her to drink until she vomited.
The narrative of Mrs. Chapman, which bears resemblance to Tarzan stories, commenced in the 1950s when, at just four years old, she was drugged and kidnapped from her Colombian hometown.
Experts have yet to find any proof that her account is fabricated.
In her memoir, The Girl With No Name, Mrs. Chapman describes the moment she regained consciousness in the forest.
“Some distance away, monkeys were observing me. After a brief period, one of the monkeys left the group and approached me. Terrified, I curled into a ball, attempting to make myself as small as possible,” she recounts.
“He extended a wrinkled brown hand and, with a single firm push, rolled me onto my side. I shivered on the ground, bracing myself for the inevitable second blow.
“But it never came—the monkey had lost interest. He returned to the group, squatted on his hind legs, and resumed his watch over me, joined by the others. They all appeared eager to examine me.”
She expressed that the way they revelled in each other’s presence made them feel like a family. Despite experiencing nights of loneliness where she cried for hours, she also felt a sense of happiness among the monkeys, realizing, “I was gradually turning into one of them.”
Later, she was rescued by hunters but faced hardship when sold into prostitution before finally making her way to England, where she married a church organist. Today, a mother of two and grandmother of three, she resides with her husband John in a three-bedroom semi-detached home in a suburban area of Bradford.
Though she believes she is in her 50s, she cannot recall her exact birth date.
Her claims prompted skepticism when they emerged last year, yet they have endured scrutiny, leading National Geographic to plan a documentary about her. Mrs. Chapman’s daughter, Vanessa, 28, characterizes her mother as “wild and spontaneous,” noting, “She was sometimes criticized for her parenting style, but her only model was a troop of monkeys.”
Experts indicate that monkeys are known to accept young humans into their groups. In 1991, a six-year-old Ugandan boy named John Ssebunya was discovered in a tree, having spent three years in the wild, partly raised by vervet monkeys; and in 1996, a two-year-old boy named Bello was found cohabiting with chimpanzees in Nigeria.
by Robbo Green
