Tobacco

A plant of the nightshade family (Solanaceae) native to America, whose leaves give off a strong, noxious smell when fresh. To make use of these leaves, they must be properly dried and fermented.

Tobacco growing has been free in the Adjacent Islands (Ilhas Adjacentes) since the publication of the law of 13 May 1864, whose provisions were maintained or extended by the law of 15 June 1882 and the decree of 8 October 1885.

While the monopoly was in force, Madeira had an administrator (administrador do concelho, government-appointed head of the municipality) of the tobacco contract and guards who enforced that same contract, and they often carried the strictness with which they performed their fiscal duties to extremes.

Between 1877 and 1882 some tobacco was planted in Madeira, chiefly in São Gonçalo and Santo António (‘St Anthony’). In 1907 the plant was cultivated on the island once again, but it never became widespread, even though it grows well in our soils when they are properly fertilised. Nicotina Tabacum was the dominant species in the plantings made in 1907 and the years that followed, but in some localities Nicotina rústica could also be seen. The first of these species grows naturalised on Madeira and Porto Santo (‘holy harbour’), and its cultivation is at present abandoned, or almost abandoned, throughout the archipelago.

In October 1877 the late Viscount of Monte Belo founded a factory for processing tobacco in Madeira. On 18 July 188? a second factory for the same purpose was set up; it lasted only a very short time, and its owner was the late João de Sales Caldeira. The first of these factories, after operating for some years on its owner’s account, was leased at the beginning of the 19th century to Francisco Gonçalves, who carried on the tobacco-processing industry on this island, at first alone and later in partnership with Nicásio de Azevedo Ramos and Abraão Adida.

In 1908 the ‘Companhia de Tabacos da Madeira’ was established in Funchal. It was wound up in 1912 and was succeeded by the ‘Empresa Madeirense de Tabacos, Lda’, founded on 1 October 1918, whose members were Leacock & C.ª, William Hinton & Filhos, Reid, Castro & C.ª and Rocha Machado & C.ª. The firms Reid, Castro & C.ª, Rocha Machado & C.ª and Hinton & Filhos gave up their rights – the first on 27 April 1914, the second on 26 January 1916 and the last on 28 April 1920 – and the tobacco business was left in the hands of the firm Leacock & C.ª. On 27 September 1920 this firm admitted Diogo Martinho de Freitas as a partner, and he is today the manager of the ‘Empresa Madeirense de Tabacos, Lda.’ (1921).

In 1922 this company imported 49,920 kilograms of leaf tobacco from the Azores, and in the same period 218,052 kilograms of processed tobacco arrived from the Azores and from abroad for various Funchal merchants. We have read somewhere that in 1914 the same company processed 40,918 kilograms of tobacco, 467 of them of Madeiran origin.

The defunct ‘Companhia de Tabacos da Madeira’ made use of the machinery of the Viscount of Monte Belo’s old factory, but the ‘Empresa Madeirense de Tabacos, Lda.’ has acquired various improved machines for its industry, and its products rival those that come from the Azores (1921).

On folio 232 of book VII of the ‘Arquivo da Câmara Municipal do Funchal’ a warrant (provisão) of 1698 is registered, which states that a new administration of tobacco in Madeira was to begin in the following year, 1699. In 1686 there was a judge-conservator (juiz conservador, judge protecting the monopoly’s privileges) of the state monopoly (estanco) on this island, an office that still existed in 1745, when it was held by the superintendent of the royal treasury (provedor da fazenda). The laws of 10 July 1919 and 22 January 1920 created a municipal tax of 50 centavos on every kilogram of tobacco cleared through the customs house. In 1922 this tax yielded the sum of 21,837.21 escudos (the Portuguese currency from 1911: 1 escudo = 100 centavos = 1,000 réis) for the Funchal Municipal Council (Câmara Municipal).