Morro Castle (fortress)

Morro Castle Castillo de los Tres Reyes Magos del Morro is a picturesque fortress guarding the entrance to Havana bay in Havana, Cuba. Juan Bautista Antonelli, an Italian engineer, was commissioned to design the structure. When it was built in 1589, Cuba was under the control of Spain. The castle, named after the biblical Magi, was later captured by the British in 1762.

Morro Castle in Havana shares the name with other structures in Santiago de Cuba and the Castillo de San Felipe del Morro in San Juan, Puerto Rico. In this case "morro" in Spanish means a rock which is very visible from the sea and therefore serves as a navigational landmark.

Perched on the promontory on the opposite side of the harbor from Old Havana it can be viewed from miles around as it dominates the port entrance.

Built initially in 1589 in response to raids on Havana harbor, el Morro protected the mouth of the harbor with a chain being strung out across the water to the fort at La Punta.

Seven Years War


It first saw action in 1762, while under the command of Luis Vicente de Velasco e Isla. The British expedition against Cuba under Lord Albemarle landed in Cojimar to the east of Havana and attacked the fortress from its landward side. The fort fell when the British successfully mined one of its bastions. When the British handed the island back in 1763 to Spain, the fortress at La Cabaña was built to prevent this from happening again.

Exhibition
Inside the gates is an exhibition on the lighthouses of Cuba – El Morro once housed a school for lighthouse keepers. There was actually a watchtower here until the British blew it up in their successful siege in 1762. The Faro Castillo del Morro lighthouse was added in 1846.

The cannons around the fort are now badly rusted but the walls are in great shape. The fort has central barracks up to four stories high. A small underwater archeology exhibition is also located here. Noteworthy are the old latrines and their chute into the sea as are the two sets of doors and the drawbridge mechanism. The current harbor master's office is still housed in the fortress. A plaque dedicated by the ambassador of the United Kingdom commemorates the 1762 siege and a small memorial is located between two strong powder rooms in the North East Bastion.

A small turret at the end of the wall offers views of the sea crashing onto the rocks 20 meters below and take in the dimensions of the huge dry moat. The opposite side of the moat holds more modern guns and cannons, La Bateria de Velasco, and offers a sweeping view down to Cojimar.

Appearances in books and movies
In 1839, the Cuban writer José Antonio Echeverría (1815-1885) published his only novel, Antonelli, in the periodical La Cartera Cubana in three parts. An historical novel in the tradition of Walter Scott, Antonelli describes the love triangle between Antonelli, a Spanish soldier, and the planter's daughter they both love. Morro Castle is the setting for many of the book's events, including its tragic finale.

Morro Castle appears in Richard Henry Dana's account of his travel to Cuba, To Cuba and Back.

Morro Castle appears in the McDougal Littell textbook ¡En español! Level 2.

Morro Castle appears in the movie The Ghost Breakers (1940), in the background as Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard enter the harbor by ship.

Morro Castle can be seen in the background of John Singleton Copley's Watson and the Shark.

During his life,the Castro regime imprisoned the Cuban poet and novelist Reinaldo Arenas (1943-1990) at El Morro Castle for his homosexuality. The film version of Arenas's autobiography, Before Night Falls, starring Javier Bardem, features scenes set in El Morro Castle prison. (A fortress in Mexico City doubled for the prison, since the filmmakers were not allowed to film in Cuba.)