Virgínia de Faria Moura was born on 19 July 1915 in São Martinho do Conde, in the Guimarães municipality, in the Braga district of Portugal.

[1][2] Nevertheless, her mother was accepted by enough people in the community that she could earn a living teaching children during the day and their parents at night, in a part of Portugal where adult illiteracy was high.

Three years later she joined the Portuguese Communist Party (PCP) and worked with the Socorro Vermelho (Red Assistance), an organization devoted to supporting political prisoners in Portugal and Spain.

Her "Letter to a Modern Woman" (Carta a Uma Mulher Moderna) was a call to women to participate actively in political life.

[3] First arrested on 17 December 1949, Moura was tried for "treason to the Motherland" in 1951, for having signed a declaration that demanded that President Salazar negotiate with the Indian government regarding the Portuguese colonies of Goa, Daman and Diu.

Senior male Communist party members were also held in the Peniche Fortress, and Moura organised a protest by wives of political prisoners against the harsh conditions in which they were kept.

[6] Moura supported the Presidential campaigns of Norton de Matos in 1949, of Ruy Luís Gomes in 1951, and of Humberto Delgado in 1958 and was a charismatic speaker at public meetings.

She became a member of the Central Committee of the PCP and remained in hiding, but also found time to write newspaper and magazine articles under the pseudonym of "Maria Selma".

On April 26, she was invited by the Armed Forces Movement (MFA), which had instituted the peaceful Revolution, to accompany them in the release of political prisoners at the PIDE headquarters, in Porto.