Pico (Castle of São João do)

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The castle of São João do Pico (‘peak’)’, says Dr Azevedo, ‘lies north-west of the city of Funchal, overlooking it and the harbour, on the height of the Pico dos Frias (‘the Frias’ peak’). This point and that of the Pena (‘crag’) were already indicated in the regulations (regimento) of King Sebastian as the closing points of the walls for defence by land; but the Philippine building was perhaps designed for sea defence as well. Two of the manuscripts of the history of this archipelago in our possession state that the castle of the Pico was begun by the governor-general Dom Francisco Henriques: now he took office on 28 October 1622 and died on 23 July 1624; a stone tablet in the parade ground commemorates the governor-general Luís de Miranda Henriques Pinto as the builder of the rest of the work; and he, according to those manuscripts, took office on 6 June 1636 and left it on the same day in 1640; it is therefore clear that the castle of São João do Pico was built between 1622 and 1640’.

Above the outer gate that closes off the ground adjoining the fortress, the date 1632 can be read. It is known that the Spaniard Benedicto Catalão, who for 30 years had belonged to the Castilian garrison on this island, was appointed lieutenant of the fortress by letters patent of 4 December 1655.

On p. 184 of the 1st vol. of this work we said that the Municipal Council never made use of the grant of the Pico fortress, obtained from the Government for 10 years, to house the gaol of the judicial district (comarca) provisionally. What we failed to say is that many years earlier, in 1821, the prisoners were transferred to the same fortress. They remained there until the work of converting into a gaol the lower part of the building, now demolished, in the Largo da Sé was completed; that building had belonged to the farmstead (casal) of Dona Guiomar Madalena Acciaioly.