The Foreign Service Journal, October 2011

22 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / O C T O B E R 2 0 1 1 ter-century, 1.3 million Indochinese would be admitted to the U.S. as new residents, half of them during the seven years covered by this book. Refugee Workers is also the story of the rebirth of faith and idealism in the psyche of a jaded America doubting its government and the value of its principles. After the hu- miliating failures of the Vietnam conflict and painful rev- elations of Watergate, writes Thompson, the rescue of Indochinese refugees helped to reignite the country’s sense of purpose. Larry Thompson, an FSO with the State Department from 1965 to 1991, served in Mexico, Thailand, Afghani- stan, Peru, Guatemala and Washington, D.C., ending his career as consul general in Thessaloniki. With Refugees In- ternational from 1996 to 2005, he has worked in more than 30 countries affected by humanitarian emergencies. At present, he is primarily engaged in vegetable gardening and writing Wikipedia articles at his home in North Carolina. William Scott Ament and the Boxer Rebellion: Heroism, Hubris and the “Ideal Missionary” Larry Clinton Thompson, McFarland, 2009, $45, paperback, 252 pages. In the prologue to Willam Scott Ament and the Boxer Rebellion , Larry Thompson writes: “The defeat of China and the Boxers by the West was perhaps the last war of imperialism embarked on with enthusiasm and moral surety. A few people now began to ask a question: Did the Christian nations have the right to impose their culture and religion on China?” This departure from traditional histories of the 1900 Boxer Rebellion focuses on the role of American mission- aries, and, in particular, William Scott Ament. Among other things, Thompson looks at how Ament and the others reacted to the extreme stress and physical danger they faced during the 55-day siege of Western lega- tions in Beijing by a horde of brightly dressed, acrobatic, anti-Western and anti-Christian Boxers at the height of the rebellion. Ament, he acknowledges, lost his bearings — while he bravely saved the lives of many, his heroism was tarnished by hubris and looting. Nevertheless, Thompson argues, he remains is a sympathetic and admirable man of great accomplishment. Although Ament is the main character, the supporting cast includes a young mining engineer and future pres- ident, Herbert Hoover, and a future Marine Corps gen- eral, Smedley Butler, among others. Some of the most interesting characters are women: the Empress Dowa- ger of China; a novice missionary doctor, Emma Martin; and a sharp-shooting adventuress, Annie Chamot. The author drew fromwhat he describes as “mostly old, hard-to-find books, magazine articles and dusty archives” for this unusual perspective on a pivotal historical event. Place Names of Namibia: A Historical Dictionary Joseph Cassidy, Macmillan Education Namibia, 2009, paperback, 125 pages. Namibia, Joseph Cassidy writes, is a country filled with the most magical and stirring place names, which range from the phonetically bewildering “Omumborombongapan” to the arrestingly unexpected “Roastbeef Island.” While traveling in the country, he became fascinated with the strange and compelling names of the places he visited but discovered that there was no book in English to explain them. He began assembling his own historical dic- tionary, initially as a series of entries in Embassy Wind- hoek’s biweekly newsletter, which eventually evolved into this volume. Many locations in Namibia have one or more African names in addition to their European designation. For each, Cassidy provides pronunciation, translation and a de- scription of its history and significance. Intended to im- prove upon the incomplete or less than useful works on Namibian place names he found in his research, this book offers a guide for both English-speaking tourists and for residents of Namibia. Joseph Cassidy has lived and worked on five conti- nents and travelled to dozens of countries in a 20-year Foreign Service career with the State Department. He wrote this book while posted in Namibia from 1998 to 2002 and regards those four years as the highlight of his career. He is currently director of multilateral and global affairs in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor. Place Names of Nambia is available from Gamsberg Macmillan Publishers Ltd. in Windhoek (gamsberg@ africa.com.na) . C OVER S TORY