The Prison in Luanda, European Convict Labor, and Portuguese Efforts at "Effective Colonization" of the Angolan Colony

For several centuries stretching back to the Middle Ages, the Portugal crown and later Tribunals of the Inquisition used exile as a punishment and a tool of social control. Before 1415, these were remote border towns far from Lisbon and other population centers. As the empire grew, so did the range of locales for exiling convicts and sinners. This process continued until the independence of Brazil in 1822. For much of the nineteenth century, the system of exiling convicts was thrown into disarray and subjected to several penal reform movements in Portugal, as elsewhere in Europe. By the 1880's this previous system of exiling convicts to the colonies was linked to the (then) pressing need for “effective colonization” and subsequent development of Portugal's existing African colonies, as outlined by the Treaty of Berlin. This began a new phase in the history of exile as punishment for the Portuguese when they focused their long-term efforts on their largest and most promising colony of Angola. In the early 1880's the Portuguese crown opened a new prison in Luanda to receive convicts (mostly) from Portugal and the other African colonies. These convicts would be leased out to city governments, the army, the police, and other regional and national bodies as well as to individuals and used by the prison itself. This paper will discuss the rationale and function of the Luanda prison and the labor provided by its inmates from 1883 (when the prison opened) until the 1930's when it closed.