Citations
1. Humberto Delgado’s business card with handwritten notes, December 12, 1960. Portuguese Canadian Democratic Association (PCDA) fonds, 2009-022/002 (2), Clara Thomas Archives and Special Collections (CTASC), York University Libraries.
2. Envelope from Frente Patriótica de Libertação Nacional, Rabat, to PCDA, Toronto, 1965. PCDA fonds, 2009-022/002 (02), CTASC.
3. Letter from Humberto Delgado, Algiers, to Guilherme Santos, Toronto, January 20, 1965. PCDA fonds, 2009-022/002 (02), CTASC.
4. Movimento Democrático Português’s bulletin Movimento, issue 2, July 1965, with cartoon referring to Humberto Delgado’s assassination. PCDA fonds, 2009-022/002 (08), CTASC.
5. Communiqué from the Comissão em Defesa da Libertação do Povo Português, Toronto, c. June 1965. PCDA fonds, 2009-022/003 (14), CTASC.
The Air Force General Humberto Delgado, who had lived in Montreal between 1947 and 1950 as the Portuguese representative at the International Civil Aviation, was the opposition’s liberal democratic candidate during Portugal’s bogus presidential elections of 1958. The Estado Novo dictatorship was unprepared for the massive popular support that the charismatic “fearless” general drew during his rallies, with the backing of all factions of the opposition. After “losing” to the regime’s candidate Américo Tomás, Delgado and many of his supporters went into exile in various countries once the dictatorship clamped down on them. Some of them moved to Toronto and Montreal, where they found the Portuguese Canadian Democratic Association (PCDA) in 1959 and its sister organization the Movimento Democrático Português (MDP) in 1961.
While in exile, Delgado and other liberal-democrats, like Captain Henrique Galvão and Palma Inácio, launched a series of high-profile revolutionary actions, including highjacking a cruise ship and civil airplane in 1961. Together with other factions of the Portuguese opposition in exile, most notably the Portuguese Communist Party (PCP), Delgado became the founding president of the Frente Patriótica de Libertação Nacional (FPLN) in 1962, based in Algiers, Algeria. Two years later, after a series of disagreements between opposing factions, Delgado split from the FPLN and founded a rival exiled network in Rabat, Morocco, where his maverick supporters prepared for armed revolt in Portugal. The following year, on February 13, 1965, Delgado was lured into a trap by PIDE agents and assassinated together with his secretary Arajaryr Campos in a Spanish-Portuguese border town near Badajoz – his fate was only revealed months later.
The PCDA corresponded with various leaders of the opposition in exile as an active member of the FPLN’s transnational network. Their correspondence with Delgado was most intense during the Galvão-led assault on the Santa Maria cruise liner in 1961, which generated enormous attention from Canadian and international media outlets, and let to a riot between pro- and anti-Salazar supporters in front of the Portuguese consulate on Bay Street. Shortly before his death, Delgado had accepted an invitation from the PCDA to visit Toronto in May 1965. When news of his death emerged, his supporters picketed the Portuguese diplomatic offices in Toronto, Montreal, and Ottawa.
Many of Delgado’s liberal revolutionaries moved from Rabat to Toronto and Montreal after his death, and joined the PCDA and MDP. One of Delgado’s polemical aides, Henrique Cerqueira, who spread a conspiracy theory that the PCP had enabled his assassination, visited Toronto in June 1965 and raised $3,000 from Portuguese immigrants in the city for an armed revolt supposedly in the works. This “agent provocateur” made a series of damaging allegations about the PCDA’s communist executive until he and other Rabat exiles were expelled.
Places of origin:
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; Rabat, Morocco; Algiers, Algeria; Montreal, Québec
Dates: 1960, 1965
Archived at:
Clara Thomas Archives and Special Collections, York University Libraries
Fonds: F0579
Finding aid here
