Fort Leonardo (), also known as Fort San Leonardo or Fort San Anard, is a polygonal fort in

Żabbar Żabbar ( ), also known as Città Hompesch, is a city in the Port Region, Malta, Port Region of Malta. It is the seventh largest city in the country, with an estimated population of 15,648 as of January 2021. Originally a part of Żejtun, Żabbar ...

Malta Malta, officially the Republic of Malta, is an island country in Southern Europe located in the Mediterranean Sea, between Sicily and North Africa. It consists of an archipelago south of Italy, east of Tunisia, and north of Libya. The two ...

. It was built between 1872 and 1878 by the

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

between the villages of San Leonardo and Żonqor above the shore east of the Grand Harbour.

History

Fort Leonardo was built between 1872 and 1878 by the

, as part of a programme of improvements to Malta's fortifications recommended in Colonel Jervois' Report of 1866. The fort was to be called Fort Tombrell but the name was changed to Fort Leonardo when construction began. Its layout is complicated, with a smaller inner fort forming one corner within the larger part of the fort that contains the gun emplacements. The fort was initially armed with 11 inch rifled muzzle-loading guns, which were later superseded by 9.2 inch breech loading guns. In 1882, Żonqor Battery was built about a kilometre away from Fort Leonardo. The battery was manned by the gun crew and garrison stationed in Fort Leonardo. Fort Leonardo was used for coastal defence in

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. On 17 May 1942, the fort helped repel an attacks by at least four Italian E-boats. The fort remained in use by the British military until the 1970s.

Present day

Fort Leonardo was rented to a cattle farmer in 1973 for an annual sum of €93, and was used as a farm until the early 2010s. The fort itself is still in reasonable repair, though a house has been built inside the ditch and the ditch in-filled to create an access. The seaward ditches are all in good repair. A modern construction, possibly a reservoir, alongside the shoreward side of the fort detracts from its original appearance, and the approach to the main gate has been mined for rubble and is substantially damaged. In 2011, a 60-metre high communications tower of the telecommunications company GO was approved to be built on the glacis of the fort. In 2014, it was proposed that the fort would be turned into a boutique hotel. Din l-Art Ħelwa said that the fort should be restored, but its military context should not be lost as was done with Cambridge Battery on Tigné Point. In 2015, the government made a proposal to include Fort Leonardo in the campus of the American University of Malta, which was to open in 2016, on the condition that the fort is rehabilitated and opened to the public. This proposal was not implemented, as the campus was split up between Dock No. 1 in Cospicua and Żonqor Point in Marsaskala. In May 2015, opposition MP Jason Azzopardi also proposed that the site should be opened for the public.

References

{{Forts in Malta Leonardo Military installations established in 1878 Żabbar Leonardo World War II sites in Malta Limestone buildings in Malta Military installations closed in the 1970s 19th-century fortifications