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1595 Engraving by Jan Huygen van Linschoten, showing the extensive cultivated lands of the Achada Plain and the nucleus of the village of Angra
Angra do Heroísmo as seen in 1671
An engraving of Angra showing the Fort of São João Baptista
Some claim that Angra was founded by Álvaro Martins, who sailed with Didrik Pining on his expedition to the New World, and with Bartolomeu Dias on his voyage around the Cape of Good Hope. Others contend that Angra was founded in 1450 or 1451 by Jácome de Bruges, a Fleming in the service of Prince Henry the Navigator, who recruited farmers, fishermen, and merchants in the Low Countries to colonize the Azores.
The first references to the settlement of the Azores date to between 1439 and 1449, through the donation of Henry the Navigator the colonization of seven islands in the central and eastern groups of the archipelago. Terceira, included in this group, would be administered by Jácome de Bruges as stipulated in the nomination process, dated March 1450, that included not only the settlement of the lands, but also the milling monopoly, ovens, salt concession, land rights in the name of the monarchy, tithes, administration of justice, and rights of succession including the exceptional provision for materlineal succession. But, the great difficulty in attracting settlers meant that by 22 August 1460, the island was still unpopulated.
The site chosen by the first settlers was a ridgeline, which opened, like an amphitheatre, onto two small bays, separated by a peninsula, at the head of which stood the extinct volcano of Monte Brasil. One of these coves was deep enough (around 40 m or 130 ft) to provide an anchorage for large vessels, and it had the further advantage of being sheltered from most strong winds, except for those from the south and southeast.
In 1474, Álvaro Martins Homem ordered that the river flowing into the cove be diverted into a manmade stone-lined channel, running downhill, so that its rushing waters could be harnessed to turn the waterwheel of a mill. This laid the foundation for the future economic development of the village of Angra. At the same time, this allowed the area on either side of the river's course to be rearranged according to a rectilinear street-plan and organized into neighborhoods by function (commercial, residential, etc.), to accommodate the needs of the fast-growing port. The first houses of Angra were built on the hillside above the cove, the steep streets winding down to the shore. On high ground, away from the sea, a castle/stronghold/fortress was begun; it would eventually be named Castelo dos Moinhos (English: Castle of the Mills). By 1534, Angra was the first town in the archipelago to be elevated to the status of city. In the same year, it was chosen by Pope Paul III to be the seat of the Diocese of Angra, with ecclesiastical authority over all of the islands of the Azores.
The commercial port of early Angra played an important role in the Portuguese East Indies trade beginning in the 15th century. The bay of Angra was often full of caravels and galleons, a circumstance that contributed to the progress of the city and its people. The construction of a number of manors, convents, churches, and military fortifications in Angra, infrastructures that were usually inappropriate for a small city (or small island) indicates the important role that Angra played in trans-Atlantic shipping for the Portuguese. The Portuguese nobleman Pero Anes do Canto (1480–1556), who was born at Guimarães, was the superintendent of fortifications on Terceira. For his competency in that role, and other services to the Portuguese Crown, he was rewarded with the title moço fidalgo (knight-gentleman), and the high office of "Purveyor to the Armada of the Islands and the merchant vessels of the East India trade in all of the islands of the Azores" (a hereditary title that followed successive members of the Canto family for three hundred years). The importance and power of the Cantos can hardly be overstated. During the period when Portugal was trading with its Asian, African, and South American colonies, they were responsible for the protection and welfare of the merchant fleet (and the staggering wealth represented by the cargoes in their holds) once the ships approached the last leg of their voyages in the North Atlantic. They were also responsible for acting as the chief customs official, the chief magistrate charged with resolving disputes, and the overseer of the naval defenses of the Azores.
Portuguese succession[edit]
Main article: War of the Portuguese Succession
King António, Prior of Crato, who ruled Portugal from Angra during the 16th-century succession crisis
Before Philip II of Spain had a chance to enforce his claim to the crown of Portugal, in 1580, António, Prior of Crato, an illegitimate scion of the Beja line of the House of Braganza Portuguese royal family, proclaimed himself king on 24 July 1580. However, his rule in continental Portugal lasted only twenty days; on 25 August, he was defeated at the Battle of Alcântara by the Spanish Habsburg armies led by Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, Duke of Alba.
After Alcântara, he attempted to rule Portugal from the Azores, where he established an opposition government in Angra do Heroísmo that lasted until 1583. Although for a time he was the monarch (minting coin and conferring titles), his government on Terceira was only recognized in the Azores, and from that place of refuge, António conducted a popular resistance movement opposed to the recognition of a foreign king. He was supported by a number of French adventurers under Filippo di Piero Strozzi, a Florentine exile in the service of France, as well as Portuguese patriots, some of whom came to the Azores to assist him directly.
Battle of Salga Bay
The first military action in the Azores occurred about a year after António's crushing defeat at Alcântara. A Spanish fleet of ten warships, commanded by Pedro Valdez, bombarded Angra on 5 July 1581, then began investigating the coast of the island in search of the best landing places. At dawn on 25 July, the first ships loaded with Spanish troops anchored in Salga Bay, about twelve kilometres east of Angra's harbour in the village of Vila de São Sebastião. A coastwatcher, stationed at the cape called Ponta do Coelho, gave the alarm, but when the first Portuguese forces arrived about one thousand Castilians had already landed and had started to sack the surrounding villages. In this phase of the fighting, according to local accounts of the action, a leading role was played by young and pretty Brianda Pereira who, together with other women, attacked the enemy with farm implements when she saw her house destroyed.
By midmorning, the Spaniards were sweeping the coast with their artillery, and the fighting was fierce. About midday, when the outcome of the battle was still unsettled, an Augustinian friar called Pedro, who was taking an active part in the struggle, thought of the stratagem of driving cattle against the Spaniards so as to scatter them. Over a thousand head of cattle were quickly gathered and, by means of shouts and musket shots, driven against the enemy positions. The disconcerted Spaniards fell back and were pursued to the shore, where almost all of them lost their lives in the fighting or drowned while trying to reach their boats. This unconventional victory, the Battle of Salga Bay, proved that António could count on a good deal of local support.
Battle of Ponta Delgada
The next major military action did not take place until the following summer. Álvaro de Bazán, 1st Marquis of Santa Cruz, was sent in 1582, as "Admiral of the Ocean", to drive the pretender and his supporters from Angra and the Azores. Badly outnumbered, he won the Battle of Ponta Delgada on 26 July 1582, off the coast of the island of São Miguel, against a loose confederation of Portuguese, French, English, and Dutch privateers.
Battle of Terceira
Although António's fleet was completely defeated at the Battle of Ponta Delgada, the pretender did flee into exile in France after the battle. His supporters were subsequently defeated the following year at the Battle of Terceira, near Angra, on 27 July 1583, which allowed Philip's forces to finally occupy the Azores and complete his unification of the Crowns of Spain and Portugal. Yet, Santa Cruz, the Spanish admiral, who was acclaimed for his victories against the House of Aviz and its partisans in the Azores, recognized that England presented a grave threat to Spain's empire, and he became a zealous advocate of war with the English. A letter he wrote to Philip II from Angra do Heroísmo, on 9 August 1583, two weeks after the Battle of Terceira, contains the first definite suggestion of the formation of the Spanish Armada.
It was following the events of the battle of Terceira that the existing fortifications in Monte Brasil were rethought. During the Anglo-Spanish War (1585–1604), the original Portuguese fortifications were redesigned by Italian military engineer Giovanni Vicenzo Casale and his assistants, since privateers, such as Francis Drake and Walter Raleigh, had attacked Spanish ships and possessions. The first cornerstone was laid in 1583, and the fortifications were progressively elaborated to include several bastions and cannon emplacements. By the Restoration, the Spanish commander, Álvaro de Viveiros, resisted for eleven months (from 27 March 1641 to 4 March 1642) behind the walls of the impregnable fortress, and only a concentrated task force commanded by Francisco Ornelas da Câmara and João de Bettencourt were able to defeat the commander. The fort was taken, and reclaimed for Portugal: a church was constructed within the fortress in honour of Saint John the Baptist (Portuguese: São João Baptista) after 1642.
17th century[edit]
A young Almeida Garret, during the Napoleonic invasions escaped, along with his family to Angra, where they remained until English forces liberated the Iberian Peninsula
After a time in London, former Emperor Pedro I of Brazil joined liberal forces in Angra do Heroísmo, where he made a base for his eventual assault on the continent during the Liberal Wars
Over the years, Terceira (and Angra in particular) has been a popular place for out-of-favor monarchs to cool their heels while events on the Portuguese mainland or elsewhere went on without them. In 1667, near the end of the Portuguese Restoration War, King Afonso VI, his chief advisor, Castelo Melhor, and Castelo Melhor's francophile party were overthrown by the king's younger brother, Pedro, Duke of Beja, (who later ruled as Pedro II of Portugal.) Pedro first installed himself as his brother's regent; then, he arranged Afonso's exile to the island of Terceira in the Azores on the pretense that he was incapable of governing. Afonso's exile lasted seven years.
João Baptista da Silva Leitão de Almeida Garrett, better known as the author Almeida Garrett, was born in 1799 in Porto, Portugal. In 1809, his family fled the second French invasion carried out by Soult's troops, seeking refuge in Angra do Heroísmo. While in the Azores, he was taught by his uncles, all prominent churchmen. (His uncle, Dom Frei Alexandre da Sagrada Família, was the twenty-fifth bishop of Angra.) In 1818, Almeida Garrett left the island and moved to Coimbra to study at the university's law school.
19th century[edit]
Main article: Liberal Wars
Ngungunhane, the Lion of Gaza, was captured by Portuguese forces after his rebellion in Portuguese West Africa and exiled to Angra do Heroísmo
When King João VI died in 1826, the country was plunged into a succession crisis. The king had a rightful male heir, Emperor Pedro of Brazil, who had successfully rebelled against his father in the 1820s. Many prominent Portuguese, however, did not wish to be reunified with their former colony. The king's younger son Miguel was exiled in Austria, having led a number of failed revolutions of his own against his father's liberal regime. Pedro abdicated the Portuguese throne in favor of his 7-year-old daughter Maria da Glória, stipulating that she would marry her uncle Miguel when she came of age. In order to rule jointly with his niece, however, Miguel was obligated to swear an oath to uphold the existing liberal constitution. Miguel initially agreed but quickly reneged. He deposed his young niece and began establishing an absolutist monarchy.
Pedro and his daughter then began a conflict known variously as the Liberal Wars, the Portuguese Civil War, the War of the Two Brothers, and the Miguelite War. On June 22, 1828, liberals deposed the Azores' captain-general Manuel Vieira de Albuquerque Touvar, deporting him to the mainland and establishing a headquarters on Terceira. The Battle of Praia da Vitória on August 11, 1829, saw the Terceirans repulse a Miguelist attack. This would lead to Angra being given the honorary title of do Heroísmo, "the Heroic". Maria da Glória resided on the island from 1830 to 1833; her forces were victorious the following year.
On 20 September 1836, Charles Darwin, the eminent English naturalist, nearing the end of his voyage around the world aboard the research vessel HMS Beagle, arrived at the Azores and anchored at Angra. The next day, Darwin hired a horse and some guides and rode to the center of the island where an active volcanic crater was supposed to exist. What he found there was not a "crater" at all; instead, what he found was a series of fissures in the rock with steam issuing from them. To a naturalist, his long day in the saddle was not very illuminating. Biologically speaking, Darwin wrote, he could "find nothing of interest". The next day, Darwin traveled along the coast road and visited the town of Praia da Vitória on the northeastern end of the island. He returned by way of the northern shore, and he crossed the central part of the island on his way back to the Beagle. He departed on 25 September for the island of São Miguel, to pick up any letters that may have been posted to him there.
Angra and neighboring Praia da Vitória were the sites of an interesting episode of the American Civil War. Unable to break the blockade by US Navy ships of southern (Confederate) ports, and hoping to draw these blockading ships away to counter other perceived threats, the Confederate States of America had commerce raiders built in Britain and France. One of these left Liverpool in July 1862 in the guise of a "merchant ship" and rendezvoused with supporting ships in the harbor of Praia da Vitória. This meeting-place was chosen because Portugal was neutral and the Azores were far away from pursuing US Navy ships. In that port and, later at Angra, cannon and other supplies of war were transferred aboard the new ship. The CSS Alabama was commissioned on 24 August 1862 just outside the harbor of Angra, and it left Terceira to begin its career as the most effective commerce raider in naval history.
Ngungunhane (also known as Mdungazwe Ngungunyane Nxumalo, N'gungunhana, or Gungunhana Reinaldo Frederico Gungunhana) was born in Gaza in southern Africa around 1850, and he died at Angra do Heroísmo on 23 December 1906. A vassal of the Portuguese king, he later rebelled, and he was defeated and imprisoned by the Portuguese Army, led by Joaquim Mouzinho de Albuquerque. He was exiled to Lisbon and then to the island of Terceira, where he converted to Catholicism; he lived there until his death. He was the last emperor of the Empire of Gaza, a territory that is now part of Mozambique, and he was the last monarch of his dynasty.
Nicknamed the "Lion of Gaza", he reigned from 1884 to 28 December 1895, the day he was made prisoner by Joaquim Mouzinho de Albuquerque in the fortified village of Chaimite. Because he was already known to the European press, the Portuguese colonial administration decided to condemn him to exile rather than send him to face a firing squad, as would normally be the case. He was transported to Lisbon, accompanied by a son named Godide and other dignitaries. After a brief stay, he was transferred to Angra do Heroísmo, where he died eleven years later.
20th century[edit]
Angra was hit by a major earthquake on 1 January 1980 that did considerable damage to the city's historic center and to many other locations on the island of Terceira. The Azores have experienced many earthquakes and volcanic eruptions since prehistoric times, but the 1980 event was probably the most serious since the eighteenth century. The damage in the city was repaired and rebuilt within four years. In 1983, the historic center of Angra do Heroísmo was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
