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✅ What Caused the Popular Uprising in Angra in 1751?

A recurring issue in the Azores was that, despite the region's agricultural potential and a typically surplus grain production, cereal shortages remained a constant concern for the local population, particularly among the most disadvantaged.

What led to this situation?

Essentially, large landowners and wholesale merchants, whose primary source of income came from exporting agricultural products (mainly cereals), had no hesitation in selling beyond reasonable limits. They did so even knowing that such practices would create serious difficulties for the peasant class. According to Helder Lima, "one single concern dominated and prevailed in their minds: ensuring that the ships anchored in the ports, waiting for their precious cargo, lacked nothing and were denied nothing. It was preferable in the eyes of the leaders to see the very populations who produced and owned wheat for their own consumption suffer the most pressing hardships than to witness any disruption in exports."

Thus, it was not enough that island farmers were not the owners of the land they cultivated, nor that they were poorly paid or materially rewarded for their work. They also frequently found themselves unable to purchase and consume the very grains they produced.

It was in this all-too-familiar context that the popular uprising of Angra in 1751 took place. The cereal shortages on Terceira Island, the excessive wheat exports carried out by certain landowners indifferent to local needs, and the apparent complicity of municipal officials in this situation likely triggered an unprecedented popular rebellion in Angra.

The rebels, facing little resistance, successfully ordered the unloading of wheat belonging to the Marquis of Castelo Rodrigo, which had been authorized for shipment by the municipal authorities and was already loaded onto a galley anchored in the port of Angra. Furthermore, they demanded the replacement of certain city council officials, whom they considered to be opponents of popular interests and complicit in the powerful elite's profit-driven ambitions. The rebels achieved their goals, as Father Jerónimo de Andrade recounts: the People’s Judge dismissed the municipal government and appointed a new one of his choosing, composed of shoemakers, stonemasons, tailors, artisans, etc.

Despite the brief success of the popular rebellion, royal justice was swift and ruthless. After due investigation, the courts ordered the imprisonment of those involved, who were detained in Angra’s dungeons. The main leaders were even sent to the Kingdom, specifically to the Limoeiro prison in Lisbon, where they were charged with treason (lese-majesty)—a crime that carried severe consequences, including confiscation of property, public flogging, and execution by hanging.

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