The monument to the Héroes de Cavite in Cartagena

The Plaza del Ayuntamiento and the Héroes de Cavite

The Plaza del Ayuntamiento is one of the focal points of the city of Cartagena, home to the Roman Theatre and Town Hall, with the tourist office at its foot, a place where various streets meet and lead out to the waterfront.

Among the buildings around the square are the Port Authority and the Military Government offices, and in the central garden alongside is the monument in honour of the “Héroes de Cavite and Santiago de Cuba”.

The monument was erected in remembrance of those who fought and fell in the wars in Cuba and the Philippines in 1898, and is unusual in that both of the battles commemorated by it marked catastrophic defeats for Spain. The battle of Santiago de Cuba (July 1898) was the largest single naval conflict of the Hispano-American war, and it resulted in the total destruction of Spain’s Caribbean fleet, with 474 men dead and wounded (as opposed to only one American life lost). The Battle of Cavite was fought in May of the same year during the war in the Philippines, and ended with the country’s Pacific fleet suffering a similar fate. 161 Spanish lives were lost, while only one American perished during the battle, and that fatality was caused by heatstroke.

The monument in Cartagena was first proposed in 1919 by the Infantry Captain Francisco Ruíz Anaya, who held meetings with the Ministerio de Marina to gain approval for the project. It was financed by popular support and donations from various military, political, cultural and social authorities, as well as other cities in Spain, America and the Philippines.

The sculptor chosen to design and produce the monument was Julio González Pola, who came to live opposite the port in Cartagena after the city was chosen ahead of Cádiz to be the home to the memorial. The work he produced is 15 metres high, and the design represents glory and patriotism as well as remembering those fallen in battle. Apart from the main figures of the monument, the names of all those who died in battle in Cuba and the Philippines are inscribed on it.

King Alfonso XIII himself made the first donation towards the monument, contributing the sum of 8,000 pesetas, a small fortune at the time, and it was he who unveiled the monument on 9th November 1923, together with his queen, Victoria Eugenia. During the ceremony he also presented the specially minted medal of Santiago de Cuba y Cavite to the survivors of the two battles.

The monument is one of the most photographed sites in Cartagena, located in front of the Town Hall and the Roman Theatre Museum, looking across into the busy waterside area of the port.

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