Helvécia

João Flach's stele was found in the former colony cemetery. After the death of his father Johann Martin Flach, who was one of the first Swiss to settle in the colony, and after returning from Switzerland where he was studying agronomy, João took over the family plantations and increased them considerably. When he died in his turn drowned in the Peruípe river in 1868, he left behind about one million Swiss francs (equivalent to 1970), a colossal sum for the time. Nova Viçosa, Bahia, Brazil, January 2018.