Maria Bonita (bandit)

Maria Bonita
Maria Bonita (Maria Déia) "Mrs Lampião". She is wearing a holstered pistol and has a bandolier of ammunition over one shoulder.
Born	Maria Déia (1911-03-08)March 8, 1911 (not verified) Bahia, Brazil
Died	July 28, 1938 Angicos, Sergipe, Brazil
Occupation	Cangaceira
Known for	Banditry, Murder, Robbery, Extortion
Spouse(s)	José Nenem, Virgulino Ferreira da Silva (Lampião)
Children	Expedita Ferreira

Maria Bonita was the nickname of Maria Déia, a member of a Cangaço band, marauders and outlaws who terrorized the Brazilian Northeast in the 1920s and 1930s. Maria Bonita means "Beautiful Maria". She has the status of a 'folk heroine' in Brazil.

She was the girlfriend of "Captain" Virgulino Ferreira da Silva, better known as Lampião (Portuguese pronunciation: [lɐ̃ˈpjɐ̃w], meaning "lantern" or "oil lamp"), the outlaw bandit leader. She was raised in the Jeremoabo area of the State of Bahia.

Virgulino's father was killed in a confrontation with the police in 1919. Virgulino sought vengeance and proved to be extremely violent in doing so. He became an outlaw and was incessantly pursued by the police (whom he called macacos or monkeys). The cangaceiro bandit's weapons were mostly stolen or obtained by bribery from the police and paramilitary units and consisted of Mauser military rifles and a variety of smaller firearms including Winchester rifles, revolvers and the prized Luger semi-automatic pistol. The band, whose numbers varied between about a dozen up to a hundred, attacked small towns and farms in seven Brazilian states, fought pitched battles with paramilitary police, killed people and cattle, extorted money, kidnapped hostages for ransom, tortured, fire-branded, maimed, raped, and ransacked.

Maria Bonita joined Lampião and his bandits in 1930, aged in her early twenties. Like other women in the band, she dressed like the cangaceiros and participated in many of their actions. At the time she joined the bandits she was semi-estranged from her husband, José Nenem, a cobbler. The band travelled on horseback wearing leather outfits including hats, jackets, sandals, ammunition belts, and trousers to protect them from the thorns of the caatinga (dry shrubs, cacti and brushwood typical of the dry hinterland of Brazil's Northeast). The women who joined bandit groups were often termed cangaceiras. The cangaceiras were as hardy as the male bandits, they were also well-armed and were trained in the use of weapons. They were often involved in battles with the military police; Maria Bonita and a second female bandit were killed in a shoot out, and another woman in the band, Dadá, was wounded in a later battle with the police and had to have her leg amputated.

Maria and Lampião had a daughter, named Expedita, in 1932. A number of cangaceiras joined the band over the many years of its existence, and it was usual for Lampião to personally attend any births. Such children, including Lampião's own, were fostered out to settled relatives or friends of the cangaceiros, or left with priests.