Santa Cruz (parish)

We read in ‘The Island Epic’ (Insulana):

The historian of the islands also says: ‘rounding a bend in the land, they entered a fine cove on the shore, where they saw a fair and delightful valley covered with trees set in order, and there on the ground they found some old stumps felled by time. From these the captain ordered a cross to be made, which he at once had raised on high on a tree, giving the place the name Sancta Cruz, where afterwards a noble town was founded...’

To commemorate the raising of the cross at the time of the discovery, a marble monumental cross was erected on the very spot, so tradition says. A storm blew it down in 1889, and it was rebuilt the following year. The old marble cross bore the arms of the Moniz family, and it was probably a member of this family who had it built. This fully explains the origin of the name of this parish (freguesia), which is one of the oldest and one of the places where the colonisation of Madeira began earliest.

The parish soon grew in importance and developed with remarkable speed. It quickly rivalled the neighbouring and rival settlement of Machico, which, according to some old documents, it soon came to surpass, except for the position Machico enjoyed as seat of the captaincy and residence of the donataries.

For the oldest parishes of this island, such as Machico, Santa Cruz, Câmara de Lobos, Ribeira Brava, etc., the year in which they were created is not known with complete precision. They were originally centres of population, or “settled farmsteads” (fazendas povoadas), with their own chapels and private chaplains, as we have already noted with regard to the last of these parishes. Santa Cruz would have been created as an autonomous parish in the second quarter of the 15th century. The learned annotator of the Saudades says that ‘Santa Cruz was created shortly after Machico was constituted, the latter taking precedence solely because it was the head of the captaincy’. What we said elsewhere about the creation of the parish of Machico (volume II, page 294) applies here too: it is not very likely that this parish and that of Santa Cruz were created later than the parishes of Câmara de Lobos, Caniço and Ribeira Brava, as Dr Álvaro de Azevedo maintains.

The oldest document concerning this parish, cited in the Indice Geral do Registo da Provedoria, is the royal decree (alvará régio) of 5 December 1580, which fixed the vicar’s annual salary at 24,756 réis (old Portuguese money of account; 1$000 = 1,000 réis, 1:000$000 = one conto = 1,000,000 réis). The royal decree of 9 July 1590 raised this to 15,000 réis in cash, 4 moios of wheat and 2 pipas (wine cask and measure, c. 400–500 litres) of wine. A further 3,000 réis a year was added in 1600. The earliest parish priest known from the parish archive is Friar Hercules da Cunha, a native of Calheta (‘small cove’), who was already serving there in 1538. He was succeeded by João Drumond; around 1597 by the licentiate Belchior Rebelo (1604); then Francisco Duarte Morais (1622), António da Rocha (1637), Henrique Madureira de Figueiredo (1650), Tristão de Mendonça Vasconcelos (1674), Manuel Ferreira Teixeira (1687), the licentiate António Ferreira de Andrade (1693) and Estêvão Lomelino de Vasconcelos (1709).

A royal decree of 27 August 1589 established a curacy (curato) in this parish, with a stipend (côngrua) of 20$00 réis a year, to which the royal decree of 23 May 1747 added a further 40,000 réis, also annually.

We stated (volume II, page 294) that the collegiate church of Machico was established by the royal decree of 18 June 1572. In fact it already existed by then, as did that of Santa Cruz: the decree concerned the increase in the salary of the six beneficiaries of the two collegiate churches, which rose from 10$00 réis a year to 12,000 réis. The royal decrees of 9 July 1590 and 2 January 1610 raised these salaries, respectively, to 21,000 réis a year, and to 61,000 réis in cash, 2 moios of wheat and 1 pipa of wine, also annually.

The royal decree of 17 November 1557 created the post of preacher. Under the royal decree of 15 October 1644 this office was later entrusted to the guardian of the convent in the same parish, who performed it himself or through his friars, with a salary of 30,000 réis a year.

This collegiate church also had the post of organist, created before 6 February 1592, since a document of that date raises the organist’s salary to 6,000 réis a year.

The parish had its seat in a small chapel built there in the very first days of the colonisation, whose dedication was probably São Salvador, the present patron saint of the parish church. An old nobiliary tells us that this church was built in 1533 under the direction of João de Freitas (volume II, page 54), a nobleman of the Royal Household (fidalgo da Casa Real). By a warrant (provisão) of 29 September of that year the king made him a royal grant of the chancel as a family vault for himself and his family, in recognition of the expense and labour the building had cost him. The church has undergone various repairs and restorations, and some have suggested that the side aisles are not part of the original building, which seems to us hardly admissible. It is the largest church outside Funchal and has three aisles, although one reads elsewhere that they are not three clearly defined aisles. It is in a fair state of repair and, says the annotator of the Saudades, contains ‘besides the altars, three further chapels, namely: the chancel, which the king granted to João de Freitas for his services, and especially for having given the land for the church and overseen its building; the chapel of São Tiago, now of the Blessed Sacrament (Santíssimo Sacramento), founded by João de Morais; and that of the Almas, belonging to the Pereiras, who came from Porto Santo (‘holy harbour’)’.

The parish has the chapels of São Pedro, Santo Amaro, Our Lady of Remedies, Our Lady of Pity, Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception and St Elizabeth of Portugal. There were other chapels that the passage of time and human neglect have caused to disappear: those of Santa Catarina, São Lázaro, Our Lady of Grace, St Giles, São Francisco Xavier, Our Lady of the Peña de Francia, Jesus Cristo, Our Lady of the Rosary, St Joseph, São Fernando and St Sebastian. A brief account of these chapels will be given elsewhere in this work.

A large number of nobles and knights settled in this parish in the days of colonisation. Some of them founded entailed houses and became the founders of distinguished families. Among these we shall mention Antão Álvares de Carvalho, João Escórcio Drumond, João de Freitas (Volume II, page 54), Urbano and João Baptista Lomelino (Volume II, page 281), Pedro Álvares de Almadas Nuno da Costa, João Afonso Escudeiro (Volume I, page 136), Pedro Lopes de Figueiredo, Rui Gramacho, Lopo Lordelo, Antão Álvares de Sousa, etc.

Several members of the family of João de Freitas distinguished themselves heroically in our campaigns in Africa and Asia. The following passages, which we found in an old document, bear on the subject of this article: ‘Jordão de Freitas, whose deeds the historians of Asia describe at length, was born in the town (vila) of Santa Cruz and was captain of Moluco, lord of the islands of Ambon and Siam by grant of Dom Manuel, King of Ternate, in the year 1537, confirmed by King John III in the year 1543. Gonçalo de Freitas da Silva, his son and a native of the same town, served valiantly in India, where he held the same lordship, confirmed by King Sebastian in the year 1574. Jordão de Freitas da Silva, son of the latter, was sent as ambassador to France concerning the recovery of the artillery and other property of the fleet that was lost there in the year 1626; he died while pursuing this claim, and for this service his son Gonçalo de Freitas received the commandery of Santa Maria de Lisboa in the Order of Christ.’

We have already dealt in this work with the illustrious natives of Santa Cruz Friar Remígio da Assunção (volume I, page 101) and Canon Alfredo César de Oliveira (volume III, page 9).

The principal localities of this parish are: Vila, Serrado da Vila, Morena, Estreito, Espigão, São Fernando, Palmeira, Rego, Regadinhas, Lombo da Calçada, Fonte dos Almocreves, Eiras Velhas, Bom Jesus, Fazenda, Lombada, Dona Mécia, Fajocos, Ribeira de Santa Cruz, Águas Belas, Moinho da Serra, Levadas, Roma, Moreno, Eiras, Janeiro, Terça, Santa Catarina, Cano, São Sebastião, Calçada de São Gil, São Gil and Relação. The parish has 7,054 inhabitants (1921).