Fuerte de San Pedro
Cebu City, Cebu, Philippines

Which process was violently completed by Conquistador Miguel López de Legazpi (1502-1572), when he dissolved the Rajahnate of Cebu in 1565. No room for alternate forms of government in the Spanish Empire, thank you very much! The Philippines had been so named in 1542 after Spain's King Phillip II (1527-1598), who likely asked, "...where exactly is this place?"

The stone fort may have been built as early as 1630, though date of 1738 is proudly emblazoned on the fuerte's gate, along with the standard-for-Spanish-starforts coat of arms of Spain's ruling house at the time, which in this case was Castille and Leon. The 1738 date may have had something to do with another King Philip, this one the V (1683-1746), inquiring about the state of defenses on the island of Cebu, which occurred in 1739.

The Philippine's Governor-General Tamón responded that the Fuerte de San Pedro was built of stone mortar, with a terreplein upon which guns were mounted. Its largest interior structure was the Cuerpo de Guardia, where the garrison lived. Outside the fort's walls was the Vivienda del Teniente, where its commanding officer was housed. There was a well in the fort, and its powder magazine was located in a structure attached to the northeast bastion, which was named San Miguel. Támon may have also added that the fuerte had just been completed in the previous year, whereupon his masons immediately started carving a "1738" over the gate, to make this statement true, lest the king somehow learn otherwise and lop off Támon's head.

Being a Pope seems as though it would be relatively remunerative, but Peter was primarily a fisherman in his day, and it's unlikely that he could have financially supported the several forts that were named after him: The Castillo de San Pedro de la Roca in Santiago, Cuba, is another Pedroian example.

It appears that life on Cebu wasn't any more arduous than anywhere else in the Philippines during Spain's 333-year administration. The Universidad de San Carlos was established there in 1595, and during the last half of the 19th century it seemed as though things were getting positively liberal: In 1860 Cebu opened its ports to foreign trade, its first independent printing house was established in 1873, and its first periodical, El Boletin de Cebú, was published in 1886. Could an independent Philippines be in the offing? Laughter, of course not.

Filipino freedom fighters were overjoyed when the United States entered the fray against the wicked Spanish in 1898, and cheered when Commodore George Dewey (1837-1917)'s American fleet dispatched its Spanish counterpart with very little in the way of effort at the Battle of Manila Bay (May 1, 1898). Once the Spanish had been defeated on land as well, however, the Filipino expectation of independence was dealt a cruel blow. Spain surrendered Manila not to the Filipinos, but to US troops, who went to great lengths to keep Filipino forces out of that city.

Our fuerte became part of the US Army's Warwick Barracks, and from 1937 until 1941 was converted into a school, where many locals received their formal education. Things plodded along until the Second World War (1939-1945) brought Japanese soldiers to Cebu in August of 1942. The mighty United States had been vanquished, and Japan's slogan "Asia for the Asiatics" sounded just swell to many who had been fighting for Filipino independence...until it was made plain that a more accurate slogan would have been, "Asia for the Japanese, who are particularly cruel and murdery." The Philippines' American occupiers may have been clueless, inept and heavy-handed, but the Japanese were way worse. The Filipinos got back to resisting an occupier, in many cases led by American officers who had escaped the initial Japanese onslaught.

The Fuerte de San Pedro was utilized by the Philippine military as an "army camp" from 1946 until 1950, at which time somebody realized that starforts, as far as being active military installations, were so nineteenth (actually sixteenth) century. The Cebu Garden Club was put in charge of the fort, which they filled with lovely, colorful plant life. The Garden Club is also credited with repairing the fort's inner structures, which were used through the 1950's as offices for various Cebu City governmental entities.

The fuerte's reconstruction was done right, with coral stones being brought in from the sea around Cebu, as the Spanish had originally done. Once the restoration of the fort's main building was completed, it opened as the Cebu Office of the Department of Tourism. Today the fort is operated by Cebu City, and houses a museum of artifacts from the Philippines' Spanish era.