José d'Almeida, Portuguese pioneer of Singapore

I’ve written about how Singapore, which celebrates the 60th anniversary of its independence from the United Kingdom this year, could instead have been Portuguese (or perhaps Spanish). However, just as the Portuguese and Macanese merchants of Macau played a key role in the early history of Hong Kong (ceded to the British by Qing Dynasty China in 1842), a Portuguese surgeon turned merchant played an outsize role in the early history of Singapore.

While I had some awareness of this, it was the Portuguese Ambassador to Singapore, H.E. Carlos Pires, who pointed out to me that the story of José d'Almeida Carvalho e Silva was truly remarkable. 

D’Almeida was born in São Pedro do Sul, near Viseu in the north of Portugal, in 1784. He was not even five years old when the French Revolution broke out, which sent shockwaves across Europe. It was in this time of turmoil, shaped by the ideas of the European Enlightenment, that d’Almeida later studied at the Coimbra School of Medicine and Surgery. Portugal was drawn into the Napoleonic Wars when the French invaded in 1807, prompting the Portuguese royal family to move to Brazil with Britain providing naval protection. In 1808, d'Almeida became at age 23 or 24 a senior surgeon on board the Vasco da Gama, a Portuguese warship stationed in Lisbon after the British helped liberate the city in August that year.

Saint Raphael's Hospital, founded in 1569, was the first Western hospital in China.

While the French would continue to be a constant threat until Napoleon was exiled in 1814, d’Almeida was sent to Macau in 1810 to run the Saint Raphael's Hospital, the only medical facility in the Portuguese territory at the time (the building is today the Portuguese Consulate General). He married Rosalia Vieira Ribeiro de Sousa soon after and became a relatively prominent member of Macau society.

When Britain’s Sir Stamford Raffles founded a trading post in Singapore in 1819 for the East India Company, d’Almeida had been in Asia for almost a decade and presumably accumulated some wealth and connections. At the time Macau traded extensively not just with the Portuguese territories of Timor and Flores in the East Indies, but also with the British, Dutch, and French possessions in Southeast Asia. This may explain why d’Almeida was an early visitor to the new British port, and despite the fact that Singapore was then a small settlement surrounded by swamps, a place that the Portuguese had ignored for hundreds of years, d’Almeida had the foresight to acquire some land and have a house built for future use. 

The 1822 Constitution of the Portuguese Monarchy

Back in Portugal, the Liberal Revolution erupted in 1820, forcing the return of the royal court back to Lisbon from Rio de Janeiro in 1821. The 1822 constitution ushered the beginning of constitutional monarchy in Portugal, which coincided with Brazil declaring independence. As news of these developments reached Macau, the territory was thrown into chaos. The governor and magistrate were dismissed, members of the senate were removed, and newly emboldened liberal-minded civic leaders gained power and cut ties with highly conservative and monarchical Goa.

In 1823, Goa sent a military force to reassert control, and d’Almeida was among the revolutionary leaders who were arrested and sent to Goa to be tried. Given the political turmoil in Portugal that rippled across the empire, many of those imprisoned managed to escape. D’Almeida, along with the Rector of Macau’s St. Joseph’s Seminary, Father Pinto e Maia, managed to make it to Bombay. While in British India, d’Almeida is said to have met with Stamford Raffles, who in 1824 was on his way back to England after six years in Southeast Asia. Raffles reportedly offered d’Almeida the opportunity to practise medicine in Singapore, where tropical diseases like malaria and dengue were constant threats.

D’Almeida gladly accepted, but first he had to make a dangerous trip to Macau to smuggle his wife and eight children out. They arrived safely in Singapore in December 1825, and d’Almeida set up a dispensary and clinic in Commercial Square, what is today Raffles Place in the commercial heart of Singapore. The six-year old British port had by then a population of over 10,000 souls, of which around 1% was European, so the Portuguese physician must have been a highly welcomed addition.

A musical soirée at the d'Almeida home

The large house that d’Almeida had built on Beach Road was a short distance from his clinic and soon became a feature of the growing port’s social life. The d’Almeida family counted a few accomplished musicians and they performed music and plays during big parties that the highly sociable d’Almeida liked to throw.

D’Almeida could have lived the rest of his life comfortably as a respected physician (and early landowner), but his adventures would not stop here. More about his fascinating life in the next post!