The Castillo de los Tres Reyes del Morro (), also known as Castillo del Morro (Morro Castle), is a fortress guarding the entrance to the Havana harbor. The design is by the Italian engineer Battista Antonelli (1547–1616). Originally under the control of Spain, the fortress was captured by the British in 1762 and returned to Spain under the Treaty of Paris (1763) a year later. The Morro Castle was the primary defence in the Havana harbor until La Cabaña was completed in 1774.
History Perched on the promontory on the opposite side of the harbor from Old Havana, it can be seen from miles as it dominates the entrance to the harbor. Built in 1589 in response to raids on the city, el Morro protected the entrance of the harbor with a chain strung out across the water, known as the boom defence to the fort at La Punta. The Morro fortress shares its name with Castillo de San Pedro de la Roca in Santiago de Cuba and the Castillo de San Felipe del Morro in San Juan, Puerto Rico. In this case, the Spanish "morro" means a rock visible from the sea and serves as a navigational landmark. The fortress is part of the Old Havana World Heritage Site, inscribed in 1982 for its historical importance in the European conquest of the New World and its unique mix of architecture.
Cuba under attack (1500–1800)
Colonial Cuba was a frequent target of buccaneers, pirates and French corsairs seeking Spain's New World riches. In response to repeated raids, defences were bolstered throughout the island during the 16th century. In Havana, the fortress of Castillo de los Tres Reyes Magos del Morro was built to deter potential invaders, which included the English privateer Francis Drake, who sailed within sight of Havana harbor but did not disembark on the island.Gott, Richard (2004). Cuba: A new history. Yale University Press. p. 32. Havana's inability to resist invaders was dramatically exposed in 1628 when a Dutch fleet led by Piet Heyn plundered the Spanish ships in the city's harbor.Gott, Richard (2004). Cuba: A new history. Yale University Press. pp. 34–35. In 1662, English privateer Christopher Myngs captured and briefly occupied Santiago de Cuba on the eastern part of the island to open up Cuba's protected trade with neighboring Jamaica.
Nearly a century later, the British Royal Navy launched another invasion, capturing Guantánamo Bay in 1741 during the War of Jenkins' Ear with Spain. Edward Vernon, the British admiral who devised the scheme, saw his 4,000 occupying troops capitulate to raids by Spanish troops and, more critically, an epidemic, forcing him to withdraw his fleet to British Jamaica.Gott, Richard (2004). Cuba: A new history. Yale University Press. pp. 39–41. In the War of the Austrian Succession, the British carried out unsuccessful attacks against Santiago de Cuba in 1741 and again in 1748. Additionally, a skirmish between British and Spanish naval squadrons occurred near Havana in 1748.
The Seven Years' War erupted in 1754 across three continents and eventually arrived in the Spanish Caribbean. Spain's alliance with the French pitched them into direct conflict with the British, and in 1762 a British expedition of five warships and 4,000 troops set out from Portsmouth to capture Cuba. The British arrived on 6 June and, by August, had Havana under siege.Thomas, Hugh. Cuba: The Pursuit of Freedom (2nd edition). Chapter One. When Havana surrendered, the admiral of the British fleet, George Keppel, the 3rd Earl of Albemarle, entered the city as a new colonial governor and took control of the whole western part of the island. The arrival of the British immediately opened up trade with their North American and Caribbean colonies, causing a rapid transformation of Cuban society.
Though Havana, which had become the third-largest city in the Americas, was to enter an era of sustained development and closening ties with North America during this period, the British occupation of the city proved short-lived. Pressure from London sugar merchants fearing a decline in sugar prices forced a series of negotiations with the Spanish over colonial territories. Less than a year after Havana was seized, the Peace of Paris was signed by the three warring powers, ending the Seven Years' War. The treaty gave Britain Florida in exchange for Cuba on France's recommendation to Spain. The French advised that declining the offer could result in Spain losing Mexico and much of the South American mainland to the British. In 1781, General Bernardo de Gálvez, the Spanish governor of Louisiana, reconquered Florida for Spain with Mexican, Puerto Rican, Dominican, and Cuban troops.
Siege
The Morro Castle first saw action in 1762 under the command of Luis Vicente de Velasco e Isla. The British expedition against Cuba under Lord Albemarle landed in Cojimar 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 land attacks in the future.
The Siege of Havana was a successful British siege against Spanish-ruled Havana that lasted from March to August 1762 as part of the Seven Years' War. After Spain abandoned its former policy of neutrality by signing the family compact with France, resulting in a British declaration of war on Spain in January 1762, the British government decided to mount an attack on the critical Spanish fortress and naval base of Havana, to weaken the Spanish presence in the Caribbean and improve the security of its own North American colonies. A strong British naval force consisting of squadrons from Britain and the West Indies and the military force of British and American troops it convoyed were able to approach Havana from a direction that neither the Spanish governor nor the Admiral expected and were able to trap the Spanish fleet in the Havana harbour and land its troops with relatively little resistance.
The Spanish authorities decided on a strategy of delaying the British attack until the strength of the city's defences and the onset of seasonal rains inflicting tropical diseases would significantly reduce the size of the British force via disease, along with the start of hurricane season would force the British fleet to seek a safe anchorage. However, the city's main fortress, the Morro Castle, was overlooked by a hill that the governor had neglected to fortify; the British installed batteries there and bombarded the fortress daily with heavy shelling. The fortress eventually fell after the officer in charge of Morro Castle, Luis Vicente de Velasco, was mortally wounded by a stray bullet. The capture of Morro Castle led to the eventual fall of the rest of the fortifications and the surrender of the city, the remaining garrison, and the naval forces present before the hurricane season began.
The surrender of Havana led to substantial rewards for the British naval and military leaders and smaller amounts of prize money for other officers and men. Upon their return to Spain, the Spanish governor, Admiral, and other military and civil officeholders were court-martialled and punished for their failures to conduct a better defence and for allowing the Spanish fleet present to fall intact into the hands of the British. Havana remained under British occupation until February 1763, when it was returned to Spain under the 1763 Treaty of Paris, formally ending the war.
Siege of El Morro
On 11 June a British party stormed a detached redoubt on the La Cabaña heights.Guiteras, p. 84. Only then did the British command realize how strong the Morro was, surrounded by brushwood and protected by a large ditch.Pocock, p. 226. With the arrival of their siege train the next day, the British began erecting batteries among the trees on La Cabaña hill overlooking the Morro (some higher) as well as the city and the bay. Surprisingly, this hill had been left undefended by the Spanish army despite its well-known strategic importance.Pocock, p. 227. Charles III of Spain had earlier instructed Prado to fortify this hill, a task that he considered the most urgent of those relating to the fortifications. The task had been started, but no guns had been installed.Bradley, pp. 226–227.Schneider, p. 82.
Two days later a British detachment landed at Torreón de la Chorrera, on the west side of the harbour. Meanwhile, Colonel Patrick Mackellar, an engineer, oversaw the siegeworks' construction against the Morro.Pocock, pp. 223–224. Since digging trenches was impossible, he resolved to erect breastworks instead.Bradley, pp. 227–228. He planned to mine towards a bastion of the Morro once his siege works had reached the ditch and to create a runway across this ditch with the rubble produced by his mining activities.
By 22 June, four British batteries, totaling twelve heavy guns and 38 mortars, opened fire on the Morro from La Cabaña. Mackellar gradually advanced his breastworks towards the ditch under cover of these batteries, so by the end of the month, the British had increased their daily direct hits on the Morro to 500.Pocock, p. 229. Velasco was losing as many as 30 men each day, and repairing the fortress every night was so exhausting that men had to be rotated into the fort from the city every three days. Velasco finally convinced Prado that a raid was necessary against the British batteries. At dawn on 29 June, 988 men (a mixed company of grenadiers, marines, engineers, and enslaved people) attacked the siege works. They reached the British batteries from the rear and started to spike guns, but the British reaction was swift, and the attackers were repulsed before they caused any serious damage.Pocock, pp. 230–231.
On 1 July, the British launched a combined land and naval attack on the Morro. The fleet detached four ships of the line for this purpose: HMS Stirling Castle, HMS Dragon, HMS Marlborough and HMS Cambridge.Guiteras, pp. 95–96. The naval and land artillery simultaneously opened fire on the Morro. However, naval guns were ineffective, and the fort was too high.Pocock, pp. 231–232. Counter-fire from thirty guns of the Morro inflicted 192 casualties and seriously damaged the ships, one of which was later scuttled, forcing them to withdraw. Meanwhile, the bombardment by the land artillery was far more effective. By the end of the day, only three Spanish guns were still effective on the side of the Morro facing the British batteries. The next day, however, British breastworks around the Morro caught fire, and the batteries were burned down, destroying the product of much of the work undertaken since mid-June.Pocock, p. 237. Velasco immediately capitalised on this event, remounting many guns and repairing breaches in the fortifications of the Morro.Guiteras, p. 97.
Since its arrival at Havana, the British army had heavily suffered from malaria and yellow fever and was now at half-strength.Pocock, p. 230. Since the hurricane season was approaching, Albemarle was now engaged in a race against time. He ordered the batteries to be rebuilt with the help of men of the fleet. Many 32-pounder guns were taken from the lower deck of several ships to equip these new batteries.
By 17 July, the new British batteries had progressively silenced most of Velasco's guns, leaving only two operational. With the absence of artillery cover, it became impossible for the Spanish troops to repair the damage inflicted on the Morro.Guiteras, p. 104. Mackellar also resumed the construction of siege works to approach the fortress. With the army in such bad condition, work progressed rather slowly. The British army's only hope now resided in the expected arrival of reinforcements from North America.