The Security Issue

This is verified by Robert K. Reeves in The Lisbon Earthquake of 1755: Confrontation between the Church and the Enlightenment in 18th Century Portugal:

Crime in general, and looting in particular, was another of Pombal’s immediate concerns after the tremors stopped and the fires were squelched. Looting was made punishable by immediate, summary trial and execution, which one first-hand account delicately described as follows: “The best orders have been given for preventing rapine and murders, frequent instances of which we have had within these three days.” Martial law was quickly established, as “the King sent directly to the nearest garrisons for his troops; upon whose arrival order was restored....” And, as stated previously, judges were given extraordinary temporary powers: “...the Judges were likewise distributed in different parts of the city with orders to execute upon the spot all who were found guilty of murder or theft." (pg. 47. All quotes taken from The Lisbon Earthquake of 1755; British Accounts. Lisbon: The British Historical Society of Portugal, 1990)

Security became an issue. It is reported that gallows were set up in several parts of the city as a warning against looting. It was also noted that at least 34 were executed for looting....

Thieves were apprehended, who being found with goods on them,… were condemned and hung the next day, for which purpose gallows were erected in the most conspicuous parts of the city.

And We All Know Catholics Are Stupid, Anyway

Through interlibrary loan, I have read a considerable number of these accounts, as has Dr. Shi (who you might remember from my previous articles was helping me in my research). In addition to the 20-plus secular histories I have read, Dr. Shi checked out T.D. Kendrick’s The Lisbon Earthquake and Charles Brooks’s Disaster at Lisbon for me. He later wrote: “I have scoured five more books that I ordered online but to no avail. The most interesting one was a compilation of eyewitness accounts by Englishmen in Lisbon. The only references to hangings involved those accused of theft.” He also noted that one of the accounts actually complimented Lisbon’s priests for not taking advantage of the catastrophe to promote the Inquisition. After immersing myself in these eyewitness accounts, I went back and re-read several secondary accounts.

Some of these secondary accounts portray the overall response to the disaster in the larger context of the rhetorical conflicts of the 18th century between religion and philosophy. On one side in Lisbon, there was “reason, rationality, secularization and science.” On the other side, “a society steeped in religion,” “fanatical Catholicism,” “superstition,” “myth,” “emotionalism,” “religious hysteria,” “the medieval ideologies of the Inquisition,” “Dark Ages” intellects, and “mysticism.” As Eloise Engle writes in her 1966 work, Earthquake! The Story of Alaska’s Good Friday Disaster:

The Lisbon quake is significant because it is one of the earliest to be scientifically investigated. It also marked the beginning of rational thinking, rather than blind superstition about the earthquake’s cause.

There were no indications that Pombal was not supportive of the impressive actions of most clergy during the response. Much of the temporary housing and the provision of food became the responsibility of the Church and churches became the center of temporary facilities for those displaced. That suggests that Pombal saw danger only in the religious practices and interpretations which might inhibit or delay the reconstruction process.

For books, encyclopedia articles, and research papers, footnotes are required for such things as direct quotes, dates, borrowed thoughts, and even facts that are not common knowledge. I found Nash’s entire work very difficult to verify because he gives no footnote citations after his assertions and quotations. The back of his book has a huge bibliography, which contains over 400 entries, in just the “earthquake” section. But there is no way to know which source he used in the Lisbon article, and where. In addition, he writes that “An Englishman named Chase was quoted by Blackwoods Magazine in 1860…”, but he lists no Blackwood’s Magazine of 1860 in his bibliography. Is he referring to Thomas Chase, whose account is reproduced in Gentleman’s Magazine of 1813, which Nash does list in his bibliography?

Through inter-library loan, I obtained Thomas Chase’s experiences of the Lisbon disaster, taken from a letter written to his sister, reproduced in both Blackwood’s Magazine (Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 88, July-December, 1860: “The Great Earthquake at Lisbon, Account of Thomas Chase,” pp. 195-297), and "Mr. Thomas Chase’s Narrative of the Earthquake at Lisbon" (The Gentleman’s Magazine, London February-April, 1813, as quoted in The British Accounts).

Tomorrow, we will explore Thomas Chase’s fascinating experience of the Lisbon earthquake — including his interactions with Lisbon Catholics — as well as some other first-hand eyewitness accounts. Were priests roving around the debris looking for heretics to burn, hanging those they believe had incurred God’s wrath, baptizing people in admonishment of their obviously sinful instigation of the quake? And who really was tried as a heretic, strangled, and burned after the Lisbon earthquake of 1755?