Andrade (Dean António Joaquim Gonçalves de)

This distinguished Madeiran was born in Funchal on 7 December 1795 and was ordained priest in 1821. We believe that he held a doctorate in canon law or in theology, but we cannot state this with certainty. He was a canon of our Cathedral, Funchal Cathedral (Sé), and in 1834 he was secretary to Dom Francisco José Rodrigues de Andrade when this prelate left Madeira and went into exile in Italy. Together with other clergy he accompanied his hierarchical superior, and they all took up residence on the outskirts of the city of Genoa.

On the death of Bishop Dom Francisco he settled in Lisbon, and from there he was summoned to Madeira in 1844 by the prelate of this diocese, Dom José Xavier de Cerveira e Sousa. Protestant proselytism was then very active on the island, and the prelate was waging a fierce struggle against the propagandist Roberto Kalley and his followers. He needed at his side a man of prestige, prudence and learning to assist him in the arduous undertaking to which he was committed. Gonçalves de Andrade gave up the cultivation of letters, to which he was then actively devoting himself, and the close companionship he enjoyed with our leading men of letters, and came to live beside the prelate, to whom he rendered the most important and distinguished services. In 1846 he was appointed vicar general of this bishopric, and in 1853 dean of the Cathedral (Sé Catedral). When Empress Dona Amélia and her daughter, Princess Dona Maria Amélia, arrived in Madeira in 1852, Canon Andrade was appointed their chaplain and confessor, and he also served them as secretary. He was present at the last moments of the ill-fated princess, who held him in the highest regard and the deepest and most respectful esteem. Together with Dr António da Luz Pita, he was one of Empress Dona Amélia’s most devoted helpers in the definitive foundation of the Hospice, the hospice (hospício), and in the provisional installation of the hospital for tuberculosis patients, before the construction of the sumptuous building where it is housed today.

In 1853 Dean Andrade accompanied the mortal remains of Princess Dona Maria Amélia to Lisbon, and he settled there, remaining in the empress’s service.

António Joaquim Gonçalves de Andrade was a man of rare talent and wide intellectual culture. He enjoyed great prestige and esteem, not only for his gifts of mind but also for the eminent qualities of his character. In Lisbon he had been on terms of close friendship with the most prominent figures in letters and politics, who greatly valued his virtues, his learning and the charming simplicity of his manner.

He proved himself a writer of considerable merit in the learned notes he wrote for Castilho’s translation of Ovid’s Fastos, and in the annotations he added to the edition of António Cordeiro’s ‘Island History’ (Historia Insulana), published in 1862.

It is recorded that he left valuable unpublished writings, and it is also said that he possessed extremely valuable documents for the history of this archipelago, which have been entirely lost.

At the seminary (seminário) of this city he taught Latin, philosophy and theology, and he was a corresponding member of the Royal Academy of Sciences of Lisbon (Academia Real das Sciencias de Lisboa) and of other literary bodies in Portugal and abroad. He died in Lisbon on 16 January 1868 and lies buried in his own family vault (jazigo) in the Angústias (‘sorrows’) cemetery in Funchal.