This lack of historical knowledge has been confused further by the presence in Trinidad of thousands of black Grenadian, Vincentian and Tobagonian immigrants, first or second generation, who know even less than do native blacks about white Trinidadians or the history and people of their adopted country. Indians are a bit more knowledgeable because they arrived here a number of generations before Grenadians and Vincentians. Of course there are blacks too who came long before the influx of Grenadians and Vincentians. But in the eyes of some blacks, local whites are indistinguishable from white American tourists. I find it annoying to be viewed by some of my own countrymen as an American tourist.
Class is another issue.
Meanwhile true-true French creoles today can tell almost at a glance, or by innuendoes in brief answers to the briefest of questions, who belong to them and who do not, especially since they are mostly related to each other. By the same measure, they know who is not French creole, and this can apply even to other local whites. So, many generations after the first French creoles came here in the late 1700s, some of them neither know nor care about their origins except in a superficial way. What they do know is the overwhelming influence and importance of the Roman Catholic faith in their lives, something they all share, which provides an ineradicable link with many other Trinidadians, black, brown or Indian. He came with two other men, Dert and de Lapeyrouse.