A secret Recife group begins organizing escape routes

The society’s first dramatic benefit at Recife’s Teatro Santo Antônio used music, theater, poetry, and public sociability to raise support for emancipation. During the interval, Epiphania and Joaquina...

On 10 July 1884, the province of Amazonas declared enslaved people in its territory free, following Ceará’s provincial abolition. Regional abolition reflected local campaigns and a wider crisis of the...

A second theatrical benefit drew a full audience. Using the proceeds, the Ave Libertas society secured letters of freedom for three enslaved women whose names were not preserved in the newspaper...

On 7 September 1884, Porto Alegre held a public ceremony associated with emancipation and the local Centro Abolicionista. The city’s surviving records document the organized campaign and the public...

At a public festival in Recife’s Teatro Santa Isabel, the society installed a new board, heard speeches and music, and delivered twenty letters of manumission. Leonor Porto presented the documents....

A meeting record cited by historians lists 96$000 réis paid for twelve passage fares. Club correspondence used coded terms such as “Englishmen” for enslaved people escaping toward Ceará. This...

To mark one year since Ceará abolished slavery, Ave Libertas organized a public celebration in Recife with a civic procession, music, religious ceremony, and speeches. At the theater, several...

The Jornal do Recife reported a visit by Joaquim Nabuco to the Ave Libertas board. He brought two letters of manumission, for enslaved women named Isabel and Maria. The episode shows a relationship...

Minutes of the Clube do Cupim record planning an escape operation aboard a vessel carrying 250 sacks of manioc flour toward Macau, Rio Grande do Norte. The cargo could help conceal people from...

Law no. 3,270, enacted on 28 September 1885, regulated gradual extinction and provided freedom for some enslaved people aged 60 or older. Those freed at 60 could be required to provide up to three...