Barcelona leaves behind the last vestiges of the Ciutadella military barracks

BarcelonaOn February 13, 1992, in a tent in the middle of the parade ground of the Jaime I military barracks, a historic agreement was signed by which the Ministry of Defense definitively ceded the barracks and military buildings near the Ciuta Park to the Generalitat (the Catalan government), and subsequently to Pompeu Fabra University (UPF). More than 33 years later, the landscape has completely changed. That parade ground is now the central plaza of the university campus, and the last remaining military vestiges in the area—the military housing on Wellington Street—will begin to be demolished this Wednesday. These are the five apartment blocks at the intersection of Wellington and Villena Streets. Despite their precarious state of repair—they were built in 1888—some apartments were still inhabited until three years ago. Now UPF is beginning work to demolish these buildings and gain space to expand the university's facilities and also for the Old Fish Market project, one of the research complexes being built in the area in conjunction with the Ciutadella del Conocimiento (Citadel of Knowledge).

With the demolition of these houses, a process that began the moment the university acquired the property has come to an end. This process involved various negotiations with the families of military personnel who still lived there. "With the demolition of the Wellington houses, we are building the future of UPF," celebrated the university's rector, Laia de Nadal. In a statement, she emphasized that the new space will allow for the design of a "more ambitious, interdisciplinary university with innovative spaces to promote knowledge." During the demolition, approximately 320 ashlar blocks, each weighing one ton, will be extracted from the lower part of the building. UPF will now donate these stones—which come from the historic quarries of Montjuïc—to the City Council, which will store them on two municipal plots while it considers their future use. One possibility under consideration is their use in one of the projects related to the redevelopment of Montjuïc mountain.

The Last Ones of the Philippines

The houses now being demolished—workers could already be seen removing asbestos-containing materials this Tuesday—were part of an agreement reached in 1868 between Barcelona and the Ministry of War. In exchange for ceding the Ciutadella—which was to host the 1888 Universal Exposition—the Ministry demanded the construction of two military barracks—Jaime I and Roger de Llúria—along with adjoining pavilions and houses to accommodate the families of the occupants.

As he explained in an article In this same newspaper, the writer and anthropologist Xavier Theros noted that in 1899, the famous heroes of Baler, the last of the Philippines, resided in these barracks, and that they appeared in a portrait in the courtyard wearing their colonial uniforms. During the Civil War, it was the Carl Marx Barracks, where the POUM (Workers' Party of Marxist Unification) trained, among them the English writer George Orwell. After the war, the Military Courts were established there, and it functioned as a Recruitment Office, through which several generations of Barcelonans forced to perform military service passed. This area was, in fact, one of the hardest hit by the fascist air raids during the Civil War, and even now, bullet holes and shrapnel damage from those bombs can still be seen on the facade.