The garden of San Carlos is one of the most unique green spaces in A Coruña. It is a “hortus conclusus” created around the grave of the general Sir John Moore, Hero of the Battle of Elviña, who died in 1809.
At the end of the 18th century, the captain general of Galicia, Carlos Francisco de Croix decided to convert the remains of the so-called "Old Fortress", which was destroyed in the previous century by a powder-keg explosion, into a public garden. In 1830, at the initiative of the British Government, a stone funeral chest dedicated to General Moore was erected on the site, and in 1834, Governor Francisco Marracedo transformed the grounds once again by creating an enclosed garden sheltered from the winds. The project, carried out by the local architect José María de Noya, created an oval space crossed by a set of radial paths starting from the centre, where the grave is located. The vegetation is distributed in flowerbeds, where there are several monumental centenary elm trees, currently included in the catalogue of singular trees of Galicia.
The garden still preserves elements of the old fortress, such as the sentry boxes and the wall, and has a spectacular viewpoint overlooking the city's port.