Finally! I downloaded and expanded the 1.2412 version, copied the "debian" dir from 1.2212 to 1.2412, edited debian/changelog to show the new version, debian/rules to remove the "--with-fuse=external \" line, did a "fakeroot debian/rules binary" and installed the resulting ntfs-3g and libntfs-3g packages. Then I chmoded +s /bin/ntfs-3g, and now I can mount my external usb ntfs drives even if I have a fstab entry for them! And since that is the only way I can get the ntfs partitions to mount with a decent character set...
Finally! I downloaded and expanded the 1.2412 version, copied the "debian" dir from 1.2212 to 1.2412, edited debian/changelog to show the new version, debian/rules to remove the "--with- fuse=external \" line, did a "fakeroot debian/rules binary" and installed the resulting ntfs-3g and libntfs-3g packages. Then I chmoded +s /bin/ntfs-3g, and now I can mount my external usb ntfs drives even if I have a fstab entry for them! And since that is the only way I can get the ntfs partitions to mount with a decent character set...