Evidence that there was a Russian hospital in La Mola, in the port of Mahón

The Diario Menorca published in its “Mira Menorca” section on January 30, 2023 a research paper, a finalist for the 2023 Andrés Casasnovas Award, which provides documents on an enclosure that left no trace.

Under the heading “In the footsteps of Catherine the Great’s Armada”, the article narrates the island’s ties with the Russians during the second half of the 18th century, specifically between the years 1768-1774 of the Russo-Turkish war.

On the land of La Mola, leased from the British Government, by Teodoro Alexiano and at the request of Alexei Grigorievich Orlov, Grigori’s brother, Catherine II’s favorite, warehouses for weapons and material storage, a hospital, a church/chapel with a cemetery, as well as gardens to grow vegetables for the wounded and sick.

Port Mahon in Menorca thus became the bulwark of the Russian fleet in the Mediterranean during the war against the Turks.