See me at my best, Fort San Pedro.

Cebu is indeed a home ground of cultural artifacts. It was said that this island serves to be the witness of series of events that made Philippines as what it is now. Some memoirs were recognized and some were left astray, some were acknowledge and some were kept.  History sites and documents are the ones who kept the memory alive even until today.

Fort San Pedro, which is located in Cebu, is a great help in refreshing the bygones.  This monument that functioned in different ways for the past centuries. The construction was defined having a total of 2,025 square meters, with walls that are 20 feet high and 8 feet thick, the establishment rise 30 feet from the ground. Though this fort is the smallest in the island of Philippines, the challenges make it bigger and boulder compared from the other monument.

The fort was named after the Spanish flagship, San Pedro which was headed by a conquistador of Spain Miguel Lopez de Legazpi. It was first built with logs and muds that was soon became the area where Spaniards settled. Fort San Pedro was described as  a triangular shape, made of stones and mortar, and with three bastions named La Concepcion,(southwest side),  Ignacio de Loyola,(southeast) and San Miguel (northeast).

A part of the monument was the area that personnel who manned the fort lived; this zone is called “Cuerpor de Guardia” and “Vivende del Teniente” as where the fort lieutenant stayed.

         

The fort was said to have a big role in Philippine History, it was first built for Spanish settlement, became a prison for the rebel Filipinos way back on the Philippine Revolution, turned into an American Warwick Barracks and soon became the area of knowledge when fort was turned over by an American Commodore George Dewey . It became the first classrooms where Cebuanos received their first education.

             

On World War II, Fort San Pedro was used as a prison camp and fortification for Japanese soldiers, served as a hospital when battle for freedom was fought and soon after, fort became the army camp.

Fort San Pedro stands still in Cebu, went under construction using coral stones to look the same way as it was before. The fort became a miniature garden of Cebu Garden Club, an office of some government agencies, and a mini zoo in Cebu.

Today, the fort is now a museum-park in Cebu, a space where you can trace the history. An area where Spanish artifacts, documents, paintings, sculptures, sword fragments, cannons, helmets and porcelains that were exhibited.

Even today, You will be able to witness and see the Philippine history  by visiting the fort that is located in front  of Plaza Independencia.