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 Lucia Maria Bastos Pereira das Neves The forgotten in the independence process: a history to be made

Almanack, Guarulhos, n. 25, ef00220, 2020 http://doi.org/10.1590/2236-463325ef00220 intense passion for her husband, but this never removed her sense of responsibility to the point of abandoning everything to return to Portugal and live in peace in a northern farm with Luís Paulino. And on the other hand, political issues, when she sensibly and objectively, analyzes the political events of that time, condemning both “Brazilian extremists” and “Portuguese radicals”. With a keen perspective, she stated that the distinction between Brazilians and Portuguese, or “Europeans”, was already a reality before Independence. It was just a matter of “birthplace”. Her husband was “Brazilian”, because he was born in Cachoeira; she was Portuguese, because she was from Penafiel. Such a point of view did not mean, however, that those born in Portugal were necessarily against Independence, and those from Brazil adhered to the national cause. One of her phrases reveals the balance of her position: “I love Portugal, I like Brazil and I wish only he good, because I am neither selfish nor ambitious”. In several missives, she criticized the brutal attitudes of the Portuguese general Madeira de Melo against the Brazilians: “make no mistake there: they do nothing with the Brazilians by force. Sweetness and more sweetness, equality and more equality”. And she concluded, vehemently: “Brazilians are not stepchildren, they are children”. She faces the difficulties of war and makes decisions for herself, despite having two children, born in Portugal - Bento and Luís -, in the most difficult moments, such as financial crises and political struggles. Against the opinion of his son Bento, defender of the Portuguese constitutional cause, she left Salvador and went to the interior to ensure the possession of her mill at the height of the civil war, when the Portuguese cause seemed lost. Her other son, Luís, adopted Brazil as a “home- Forum