São Miguel Island

São Miguel Island, often called "The Green Island," is the biggest and most crowded island in the Azores, a Portuguese archipelago. It spans 760 km² and is home to roughly 140,000 people, with Ponta Delgada—the archipelago’s largest city—housing 45,000 of them.

The island was the second in the Azores to be discovered and settled, likely between 1426 and 1437, by Portuguese colonists under Gonçalo Velho Cabral. The exact date is uncertain, but the discovery was later recorded by Father Gaspar Frutuoso in his history of the Azores, *Saudades da Terra*. He described the island as mountainous, covered in ravines and dense forest, kept damp by frequent showers and warm sun.

Not long after the first settlement at Povoação Velha, a volcanic eruption occurred in the uninhabited Sete Cidades crater, sometime between 1439 and 1444. No precise date exists, but Frutuoso noted that returning navigators found the western part of the island transformed, with tree trunks and pumice floating in the sea. Settlers in Povoação felt tremors and heard loud roars from the earth for nearly a year before the peak vanished in fire.

In the early 1400s, Prince Henry the Navigator authorized settlement, and many people from mainland Portugal’s Estremadura, Alto Alentejo, Algarve, and Madeira arrived under a royal decree. The fertile soil and mild climate also attracted French and Flemish settlers. Sephardic Jewish New Christians may have made up as much as 30% of the population, with surnames like Pereira, Pimentel, Dias, and many others. Some Moors were exiled to the island during the Inquisition. The island’s location and rich soil spurred rapid economic growth. A military garrison made it a key stop for African and Asian trade, while exports of sugar and later orchil—a dye sent to Flanders—stabilized the economy.

The first capital was Vila Franca do Campo, but a devastating earthquake and landslides in 1522 destroyed it. This disaster helped Ponta Delgada rise as the administrative and economic hub from 1546.

During the 1580 Portuguese succession crisis, São Miguel’s people won the naval Battle of Vila Franca against a French squadron backing the pretender António, Prior of Crato.

After the Portuguese Restoration War in 1640, the island regained its commercial role, forging new ties with Brazil during its heavy colonization. Many historic mansions and churches date from this period, funded by orange exports to Great Britain.

In 1831, during the Liberal Wars, troops loyal to Queen Maria II landed in Nordeste, sent by the future Duke of Terceira, and organized resistance to the Absolutist regime. By 1832, a militia declared support for the constitutional monarchy and Queen Maria, then sailed to the continent to help liberate Porto.

After the Liberal Wars, the Devourism period brought economic growth. The port of Ponta Delgada expanded, exporting new crops like tea, pineapple, and tobacco. Fishing, food staples, and dairy farming also grew, boosting many population centers.

Following the Carnation Revolution, the island became the seat of the Presidency of the Autonomous Region of the Azores, based in Ponta Delgada, and its economic, social, and political importance within the archipelago continued to rise.

In June 2001, a smuggler’s yacht from Venezuela to Spain’s Balearic Islands stopped at São Miguel with over half a tonne of cocaine. Before entering Rabo de Peixe harbor, the crew hid the drugs underwater with an anchor, but the netting unraveled and packages washed ashore. Police seized about half, but the remaining 210 kilos spread on the island. Within three weeks, 20 deaths from overdoses were reported. Substance addiction remains a problem, and smugglers now use the Azores to transfer drugs to fishing boats or speedboats for shipment to mainland Portugal or elsewhere.