Unsavory Compromises of Region and Empire: Slavery and the End of the Farroupilha War

Historians of Rio Grande do Sul have long debated the endgame of the Farroupilha War of 1835-45, a failed attempt at secession led by cattle ranchers in Brazil's southernmost province. The fate of the freed slaves who fought on the rebel side has been a topic of particular contention: debate has centered on the putative existence of a conspiracy between rebel and Imperial officers to eliminate the freedmen by deliberately exposing them to slaughter at the Battle of Porongos, in November of 1844. This paper argues that there was no conspiracy at Porongos, but that there was conspiracy at the Treaty of Ponche Verde, which brought a formal end to hostilities five months later. Rebel officers conspired with the Empire to recognize the freedom of the former slaves on paper, while denying it in practice. They turned surviving freedmen soldiers over to the Imperial Army, which consigned the black rebel veterans to a nebulous status, neither slave nor free. The paper further argues that this unsavory compromise was essential to the Empire's strategy of securing the southern frontier and guaranteeing Brazil's boundaries. The perpetuation of enslavement by hook and by crook was the decisive component in folding region into nation in southern Brazil.