Posted by trafego on 13 Setembro, 2021
Have you ever heard of Fort Santa Cruz? the Brazilian Alcatraz
It is no exaggeration to say that, in the 17th and 18th centuries, Santa Cruz da Barra was for us much like Alcatraz was for the Americans in the 20th century: difficult to access, it made escapes almost impossible. Its cells were built for the custody of military prisoners, as an integral part of the disciplinary regulations of the Armed Forces. “However, it is said, the fortification came to house common prisoners. It was used for the custody of insubordinate and rebellious soldiers, as well as political prisoners, especially during the imperial and republican periods”, says Ornellas. Far beyond serving as a prison, however, the construction was one of the main fortifications in Rio de Janeiro. Because of it, for centuries the city was free from several invaders, mainly French and Dutch.
Located at the end of the eastern shore of Guanabara Bay, on a rocky peninsula at the entrance to the bar and in front of the São João fortification complex, Santa Cruz da Barra marked the entrance channel for larger ships. “It was very safe, almost impregnable, as the military engineers of the 18th century used to say”, says historian César Ornellas, coordinator of the History course at Centro Universitário La Salle. “Since its construction, in the 16th century, until the beginning of the 1940s, there was no access road to the fortress. The usual access was by sea, landing in the sheltered part of the waves. Violent sea, strong currents, isolation by land, a strong security scheme and the tradition of repressing the insurgents made escape attempts difficult. So much so that this one, by La Salle, was the only one until the 20th century.”
The fortress began to be built in 1555 – and, as ironic as it may seem, precisely by order of a Frenchman. Nicolas Durand de Villegaignon had arrived in the country that year with the intention of founding a colony, Antarctic France. The Portuguese ended up expelling the French from the area in 1567 and inherited, in addition to the construction of Santa Cruz da Barra, the fortress of Villegaignon, in the same bay of Guanabara. It was during the campaign to expel the invaders that the Portuguese soldier Estácio de Sá founded, on March 1, 1565, between the Cara de Cão and Sugarloaf Mountains, where the São João fortress, São Sebastião do, was built. Rio de Janeiro. A city that, as can be seen, has in the past an important presence not only of Portuguese, Indians and blacks, but also of French, Dutch and pirates, with their looting and adventures worthy of cinema and literature.
Santa Cruz da Barra became part of the Guanabara Bay defense system. It underwent expansions in the mid-17th century and between 1768 and 1769, as well as additions between 1862 – the time of the Christie Question, the breaking of diplomatic relations between Brazil and Great Britain – and 1870, when its two floors of bunkers were completed. , the shelters for stocking the supply material.
In the 18th century, it had 44 cannons. From them, shots were fired if any ship tried to enter the bar at night. The harbor was only open from sunrise to sunset. “If the ship wanted to enter, it was warned by a barrage of guns. If he insisted, he was shot,” says César Ornellas. Not all of this security scheme, however, was able to calm the population of Rio de Janeiro, who became alarmed whenever they saw Dutch or French flags. In 1695, for example, the French engineer François Froger passed through Rio de Janeiro and Salvador on a long journey, which resulted in the book Relation d'un Voyage Fait en 1695, 1696 and 1697 aux Côtes d'Afrique, Détroit de Magellan, Brésil, Cayenne et Isles Antilles (“Report of a journey made in 1695, 1696 and 1697 along the coasts of Africa, the Strait of Magellan, Brazil, Cayenne and Antilles”, without translation into Portuguese). He says that, when they saw the ships with French flags, the residents of Rio sent their wives, children and goods to the interior, fearing an invasion followed by looting. They had no reason to be so afraid. At least not this time. Froger was not a privateer: he was on a diplomatic mission. During his stay, he observed the habits of the population and drew detailed maps of the entrance to Guanabara Bay, with the location of each battery or fortress.
It was these maps that gave subsidies so that, 15 years later, the fears of the population became a reality. In 1710, another French privateer, Jean-François Duclerc, at the head of a fleet of five ships and little more than a thousand men, tried to invade the city through the entrance to the bar. Prevented by heavy fire especially from the fortress of Santa Cruz, Duclerc landed in Guaratiba, in Sepetiba Bay, and tried to invade Rio on foot. It is believed that the expression “it's no use pushing the envelope” emerged – used until today to characterize something difficult to achieve.
The fight between the French and the Portuguese took place in the heart of the city. Duclerc ended up arrested, with his crew, and murdered under circumstances never clarified in the house of Lieutenant Tomás Gomes da Silva, who had his custody. Among the men of the corsair was Lieutenant La Salle – the same one who opens our story and who would star in the most fantastic escape from colonial Brazil. Arrested for participating in the attack, La Salle knew that he would be held liable for the crime of lese-majesty (treason to the king or his kingdom) and that he would only have two fates in view, if he did not try to escape: capital punishment or life exile in Africa.
The fortress no longer works as a prison. In defense of our coast, his last warning shot was fired in 1955 against the cruiser Tamandaré. Listed as a National Historic Landmark since 1939, today it can be visited by tourists, who can find more than 40 pieces of artillery from different periods, the dungeons, the chapel of Santa Barbara (built in the 17th century), the sundial (1820) , the place of hangings and the wall of executions, among other historical artifacts. Besides, of course, a beautiful view.
Source: https://aventurasnahistoria.uol.com.br/noticias/reportagem/historia-forte-santa-cruz-alcatraz-do-brasil.phtml
Posted by trafego on 13 Setembro, 2021