The People of Gibraltar

2019 - Patios de la Buena Vista - Gibraltar

Patio Danino - Patio Rio
Patio Caballero - Patio San Jose
Patio la Cuadra - Patio Los Mulos

I have only been able to identify a few patios within Buena Vista which as I discussed in my introduction encompassed a largish area. I suspect that once upon a time there were very many more but as long forgotten old buildings are demolished or replaced . . . our memories fade. The few I have been able to trace will have to do.

Patio Danino

Danino’s Ramp is an important offshoot from Willis’s Road - perhaps best considered as the Buena Vista’s Main Street. Danino’ Ramp consists of a rambling and incomprehensible maze of narrow up and down passages all having been given the same name and into which one might suspect it would be possible to get lost forever. The end result was that the entirety of Danino’s Ramp came to be known as Patio Danino.

My guess is that the name comes from Mr Domingo Danino who is mentioned in the 1865 Report by the Sanitary Commission and who was probably responsible for more than one of the buildings found within Danino’s Ramp.

Danino’s Ramp

(All three photos - 2019 - Acknowledgements to Anthony Aquilera)

Danino’s Ramp generally, has been sensitively renovated but it is highly unlikely that the area looked anywhere like this in the mid 19th century. According to L.A. Sawchuk in his Deadly Visitations, for example, in the 1870s, there were 42 families made up of 243 people living in Patio Danino. Many of the heads of households were coalheavers - at the time one of the toughest and worst paid jobs on the Rock. Overcrowding was the norm for the poorer classes on the Rock and the Patio was no exception - in this case four families of nine people each lived in a single room.

Patio Danino - aka Patio Anino in colloquial patois - is located at the bottom end of the eastern side of the Ramp - is one of only two patios I can name in this particular area.

Bottom left is the rear end of a long building which appears to be Patio Danino - Middle right with roof statues just visible is Arengo’s Palace (Date unknown)

Patio Rio

According to somebody who was born in Patio Rio:

It’s the first alley on the right going up Willis’s Road officially known as Danino’s Ramp

Another ex-resident states that:

Patio Rio goes from the Willis Road end right across to its Palace Gulley end next to the car park building constructed just a few years ago opposite the old grammar school.

Palace Gully looking west towards Willis’s Road (2019 - Anthony Aquilera)

Another perhaps less likely suggestion is that it was in Willis’s Passage which forms part of the “Danino” complex. It was still standing in the mid 20th century but probably no longer exists.

Patio Caballero

This patio may have occupied the same building as Patio Rio in Willis’s Passage as it is described by the following Danino's Ramp resident as being “above” Patio Rio.

Danino's Ramp is not just one location although it is the address name for a specific area. It can be divided into roughly four parts. Upon entering from Willis's Road there's an alley where there were a couple of shops on the 'back' of the first of the larger buildings.

The shops, one of which was owned by my ancestors, sold foodstuffs. Between that building and the next, was what they called 'El Patio Rio' which is what it became during heavy downpours. The area above 'Patio Rio', was known as 'El Patio Caballero'.

Higher up and parallel to this, there was another alleyway . . . at the north end of which there were 'Los Gallineros' where people kept chickens and doves. I clearly remember a wooden ladder above the Gallineros which enabled people to access Calpe Road. There was a further level higher up which backed onto the Rock's undergrowth.

The Rev R. Stewart Patterson in an article in an 1884 edition of the magazine Notes and Queries suggested that Danino’s “Place” was known as el Patio de los Caballeros in pre 1704 days. Whether Danino’s Place is synonymous with Danino’s Ramp or indeed was anywhere near it - is a matter of opinion.

Patio San Jose

Another Willis’s Passage patio of which I know little about other than its name. One of its ex-inhabitants suggests that his family lived in several of the flats that made up the patio for at least four generations.

Willis’s Passage (2019 - Anthony Aquilera)

Patio de la Cuadra - Patio de los Mulos

Willis’s Road

When commenting on the top photo of Willis’s Road somebody who lived close by suggested that the Patio de la Cuadra was on the right but further down the road. I am no entirely sure as to what he meant. Nor is the older but similar bottom photo of any great use either. The name suggests that it was once a stable but I have no idea if this is so.

However, somebody else’s memory was also jogged when viewing the same top photo and suggested that Patio los Mulos could be found on the right half-way up the hill - which leads me to the inevitable conclusion that the place was used as a stable for mules rather than horses.