Alminhas da Ponte, Porto

Alminhas da Ponte is a bronze relief made in eighteen ninety-seven by the sculptor Teixeira Lopes, created to preserve the memory of a catastrophe on the Douro. It marks the twenty-ninth of March, eighteen oh nine, when people fleeing Marshal Soult’s attacking French forces died on the Ponte das Barcas. The bridge itself was an ingenious floating crossing: twenty boats were fastened across the river and decked over for people, animals, and carts.

As Porto fell during the First Battle of Porto, residents and retreating defenders surged towards Gaia. The crushing pressure and terror of the fleeing crowd brought down the bridge linking the two banks. The precise death toll cannot be fixed, but the usual estimate is about four thousand lives.

This small memorial carries an immense scale of grief. Candles and flowers are still placed here in remembrance. A local legend adds one intimate act of courage: Orlando Beirão Valente, a clerk, made sixteen crossings to carry elderly people and children to safety, before falling into the river on his seventeenth journey.