Battery No. 2 annexed to the Castle of San Joaquín

Santa Cruz de Tenerife · Category: Memory · Subcategory: Sites of memory · Year: 1586-1762

This battery, along with the nearby No. 1, are heirs of those old installations established in 1586 at the initiative of Governor Juan Núñez de la Fuente, in the surroundings of La Cuesta (today the upper part of Cuesta Piedra), with the clear objective of defending the island's main city, La Laguna, in case of a possible invasion inland, once the defensive lines of the port of Santa Cruz were broken.

Abandoned at the time, these small military constructions were resumed in 1762 when the Island Council approved a war prevention plan against possible external threats.

Battery No. 2 was located at a lower altitude than No. 1, about 230 metres above sea level and about 5 kilometres from the coastline. It had a simple guardhouse, rectangular in plan, with an area of almost 23 square metres distributed in a single space roofed with a sloping tiled roof. It sheltered about eight soldiers.

This small defensive installation was armed with two iron pieces that were protected by a simple parapet built in dry stone. It had a sentry box next to the entrance.

The battery was declared inadequate for the Army's needs in 1924. Six years later it was sold to a private individual who demolished it to build a civil construction.

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