In the southernmost part of the Bay of Algeciras, where the sandy flysch cliffs overlook the Strait of Gibraltar and the African coast appears just 16 kilometers away, the remains of an 18th-century military fortification that most Algecireños barely know stay buried under earth and vegetation. The Fort of Punta Carnero was a decisive artillery position for decades in defending the bay against British incursions. Today, it is little more than a handful of walls that timidly emerge among bushes and modern water deposits, in the shadow of the lighthouse that an engineer erected in 1864 on its own ruins. The Port Authority of the Bay of Algeciras (APBA) has tendered the first phase of its recovery, an archaeological intervention budgeted at 182,685 euros excluding taxes — 221,049 euros with VAT — and financed through the 2% Cultural Program of the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility.
To understand the scope and significance of this action, it is convenient to go back more than three centuries. The loss of Gibraltar on August 4, 1704 forced Spain to completely rethink the defense of the Bay of Algeciras. The Belgian military engineer Jorge Próspero de Verboom, Chief Engineer of the Kingdoms of Spain, designed an ambitious belt of coastal fortifications in the 1730s that extended from the Atunara battery in La Línea de la Concepción to the fort of El Tolmo, south of Algeciras. The governing principle was lethal in its simplicity: each position had to be able to cross artillery fire with at least one other, so that no enemy ship could attack one point without being caught between two lines of cannons.
The system articulated several categories of works. The large bastioned forts — Santa Bárbara, San Felipe, Isla Verde, San García, Punta Mala, El Mirador — could mount between 4 and 26 heavy caliber pieces. Unbastioned forts like that of Santiago added intermediate power. Small batteries provided spot coverage with few cannons. And a network of lookout towers and provisional guard posts ensured early detection and the ability to deploy portable artillery where needed. The design demonstrated its effectiveness on July 6, 1801, when the British squadron under Admiral Saumarez attacked French ships anchored in the bay. The crossfire from Isla Verde, San García, and Santiago was devastating: the coastal batteries reached over 3,000 meters, surpassing naval artillery thanks to impossible elevation angles from a ship's deck.
Punta Carnero occupied the most advanced position of the entire defensive chain: the exact point where the bay opens to the Strait of Gibraltar. Any fleet attempting to penetrate from the southwest had to pass under its fire. The fort was raised around 1730 on cliffs about 20 meters above sea level. Its central element was a horseshoe-shaped battery with a barbeta facing southeast, capable of housing up to 6 heavy artillery pieces. By 1735, it had 4 cannons of 24 and 1 of 18; by 1796, the complement had grown to 5 cannons of 24 and 2 mortars, with capacity for an additional provisional battery of 6 more cannons. The enclosure included a powder supply, a gear shed, two guard posts — one for an officer and 20 infantry soldiers, another for a corporal and 8 gunners — and a wall with a flared front for fuselage that closed the opening towards land.
Its strategic role was threefold. First, it crossed fire with the Fort of San Diego to the south and with San García to the north, sealing the artillery continuity of the western coast of the bay. Second, the mortars incorporated before 1796 covered the dead angle at the foot of the cliffs, preventing landings where the cannons could not aim. Third, the associated watchtower served as an advance lookout and optical link with the entire chain of forts. Punta Carnero and San García formed an inseparable defensive pair: one controlled the passage of the Strait while the other controlled the route from Getares to Algeciras.
The most detailed plan preserved of the fortification was drawn up by Segismundo Font y de Milans in the 1760s, when this Catalan engineer served as commander of the Engineer Corps in the Campo de Gibraltar. Font, who would later become quartermaster of the army during the Great Siege of Gibraltar (1781-1783) and finish his career as a field marshal, left a document now safeguarded at the Military Culture Historical Institute in Madrid. This plan has been fundamental for the current recovery project, as it allows identifying the spaces of the fort and delimiting excavation areas.
The military life of the fort ended under paradoxical circumstances during the War of Independence. In February 1810, with Napoleonic troops advancing toward the Campo de Gibraltar, the lieutenant-governor of Gibraltar ordered the demolition of all Spanish coastal fortifications in the bay. The logic was relentless: if the French took the forts, they could use Spanish artillery against their own allies and against Gibraltar. On February 14, 1810, Colonel Sir Charles Holloway, Commanding Royal Engineer of Gibraltar, directed the destruction of the main Spanish lines, including the Line of Contravalación that had given rise to La Línea de la Concepción. Punta Carnero was completely blown up. The demolition was carried out with what sources describe as the "supposed acquiescence" of the Spanish military authority of the Campo de Gibraltar, a diplomatic ambiguity that did not disguise the impotence of an allied yet subordinate army. Of the more than 20 fortifications of the original system, the Fort of Isla Verde was the only one to escape British destruction.
The stones and blocks of Punta Carnero were scattered among the rubble and, over time, were pillaged as material for nearby constructions. The supreme irony came in 1864, when engineer Jaime Font and Escolá designed the Punta Carnero Lighthouse directly on the ruins of the fort, even using stones from the fortification. The lighthouse was inaugurated in 1874, and beneath its base and the adjacent constructions lay buried the last visible vestiges of the military enclosure. Today, only two elements peek through the vegetation: the barely legible outline of the semi-circular battery to the southeast and scarce remains of walls on the western side.
The mechanism that makes recovery possible has its origin in Article 68 of the Spanish Historical Heritage Law of 1985, which established the obligation to reserve at least 1% of the budget of each state public work for heritage conservation. That percentage increased to 1.5% in 2014 and reached the current 2% with Law 14/2021, hence its name: 2% Cultural Program. The program operates on a competitive basis, and since its inception, it has financed 1,294 projects for a cumulative amount of over 805 million euros. Local entities, autonomous communities, public entities, and non-profit foundations can apply for funds, as long as the properties to be restored are declared Assets of Cultural Interest and are publicly owned and used. In January 2025, the Ministry of Transport presented four projects from State Ports to the program, totaling 2,987,097 euros: the sheds of the Costa Dock in the Port of Tarragona, the Northeast III Buoy in Melilla, the third phase of rehabilitation of the English Cable in Almería — which already accumulates a 5.2 million investment — and the first phase of the Fort of Punta Carnero in Algeciras.
The tender for Phase 1, published in March 2026 with the file number 2026-018, details a precise sequence of archaeological works with an execution period of six months. The intervention begins with the clearing of the area and the removal of two superficial water tanks with concrete bases and remnants of steel pipes occupying the zone. Next, six archaeological test pits will be conducted to delineate the enclosure and locate hidden walls. The central phase is an extensive excavation that will lower the ground under permanent archaeological control to reach the original pavement levels, if preserved. The documentation from the Provincial Commission of Historical Heritage of Cádiz distinguishes two levels in the enclosure: one lower, associated with the artillery battery, and another upper, linked to warehouses and the living area of the garrison. Much of the work will need to be carried out manually, reserving compact machinery only for point support in areas where no emerging structures have been identified. Walls needing urgent consolidation will receive cleaning, stabilization, and plastering with hydraulic lime mortar. A detailed topographical survey will complete the documentation of the actual condition of the fort.
The goal of this first phase is not to restore, but to know what remains. The asset file itself notes that the definition of the work is necessarily open, given that the excavation will provide new information that will determine the scope of the consolidations and will guide subsequent phases toward definitive enhancement. The Fort of Punta Carnero is listed in the General Catalog of Andalusian Historical Heritage as an Asset of Cultural Interest (Monument), protected by the Decree of April 22, 1949, concerning the protection of castles and Law 16/1985 on Spanish Historical Heritage, and also has urban protection in the Municipal General Plan of Algeciras under the designation "Tower of Punta Carnero (sites and remains of fortification)". Processing it as an asset in BIC with non-delegable competence required authorization from the Territorial Delegation of Heritage, which issued a favorable resolution on June 3, 2025.
The site where the fort is located is one of the most unique landscapes in Europe. The point marks the eastern end of the Natural Park of the Strait, declared in 2003, with almost 19,000 protected hectares between Algeciras and Tarifa. It is also a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, Special Protection Area for Birds, and a Site of Community Importance. From the cliffs, the panorama encompasses 360 degrees: to the south, the African coast with Djebel Musa; to the east, the Rock of Gibraltar closing the bay; to the north, the urban arc of San Roque; to the west, the open Atlantic towards Tarifa. The sky above the point is a corridor for one of the largest migrations of gliding birds on the planet. The Punta Carnero Lighthouse, a cylindrical tower of yellow sandstone that rises 19 meters above the ground, was the last lighthouse of the APBA where a lighthouse keeper lived, until 2018. A concession is currently being processed to convert the adjacent houses into tourist accommodation within the "Lighthouses of Spain" project of State Ports. Access to the site is direct via the CA-223 road from Algeciras, and for hikers, the path from Getares to Punta Carnero runs 3 kilometers along the cliff coast, while the Colada de la Costa connects Algeciras with Tarifa via the ancient coastal cattle track.
The recovery of Punta Carnero is not an isolated action. In June 2021, the APBA approved its first Conservation and Enhancement Plan for Historical Heritage, an inventory cataloging 48 immovable elements and 391 movable items. The flagship project is the Fort of Isla Verde, with a cumulative investment of around 2.3 million euros in three phases. The second phase (2020-2021) revealed extraordinary findings, such as a freshwater well predating the 12th century and a possibly medieval Christian burial. The third phase, tendered for about 2.5 million, includes musealization with an immersive virtual reality room. In Tarifa, the APBA has awarded the rehabilitation of the Lighthouse of the Island of the Doves for 603,311 euros to convert it into an interpretation center.
The long-term aspiration is to integrate the recovered fort into the cultural and tourist offer of the Algeciras coastline. The site is associated with the memory of Paco de Lucía — his composition Punta del Faro (1972) evokes this landscape, and the title of Entre dos aguas (1973) refers to the confluence of the Mediterranean and the Atlantic visible from this exact point — and the Algeciras City Council has traced a route dedicated to the guitarist in the area. The plan by Segismundo Font from 1762 will be the guide that archaeologists will follow to find what remains of the semi-circular battery, the guard posts, and the flared front. The question that the excavation must answer is a single one: did anything survive the blowing up by Colonel Holloway, the plundering of the stonemasons, and the weight of 150 years of lighthouse? The six-month period of file 2026-018 will provide the answer.