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Presidio do Chão Bom The well-known former political prison in Tarrafal is a place to visit, to know the history and the place where many people were imprisoned.



On October 29, 1936, 157 antifascist prisoners disembarked in the small bay of Tarrafal (Santiago Island, Cape Verde archipelago), who were going to inaugurate the so-called «Penal Colony of Tarrafal», that is, the Tarrafal Concentration Camp. Baptized as «Campo da Morte Lenta», it was intended to be the instrument of physical elimination of the main opponents of Portuguese fascism, institutionalized in 1933, with the designation of Estado Novo. The first batch of prisoners, transported by Luanda, from the former Companhia Colonial de Navegação, consisted of communists, anarchists, unionists and anarcho-unionists, who had participated in the general strike of 18 January 1934; sailors from the warships Dão, Afonso de Albuquerque and Bartolomeu Dias, who had revolted on September 8, 1936; political leaders who opposed the Estado Novo; antifascists considered by Salazar as "pernicious". Many of these prisoners had already served their sentences; others had not yet been tried; some had no guilt at all.

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