Strange, losing American trinket (5)
I believe the answer is:
curio
'trinket' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
I don't understand how the remainder of the clue works.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for curio that I've seen before include "Bygone" , "Rare thing sought for collection" , "Something unusual, perhaps worthy of collecting" , "Item of bric-a-brac" , "odd thing" .)