Cartagena, Your Active City
THE CITY
Since the 16th century, there was an image of a crucified Christ, in the cathedral of Cartagena. According to different legends and traditions of the city, the Christ had been sculptured by the angels (as fray Pedro de Cordoba said) and found going down in the water of a river in our diocese ( version from the original constitutions of our Brotherhood). It has also been said that the Christ had arrived floating on the sea towards the coast or found in an abandoned in a ship cellar. During the 16th and 17th centuries, this brown skinned Christ, popularly knows as “Cristo Moreno” (Brown Christ), was taken to the streets in order to request for water and to fight against illnesses. Every Good Friday the Christ was taken from the top of the hill where the cathedral is to the main square in the city.
After the hard drought the city suffered in 1689, the cathedral chapter decided to take out to the streets the Brown Christ to request for water. When the image arrived at San Ginés square, Don Pedro de Colon de Portugal y de la Cueva, duke of Veragua and general captain of the Royal Spanish galleys, knelt submissively at the Christ, holding his 22 months son, Manuel, in the throes of death. He asked for mercy to the Christ of Soccour, and the baby miraculously recovered, thanks to the Brown Christ.
After this miraculous healing, the Duke of Veragua decided to fix a chapel in the cathedral of Cartagena to enthrone the image which had saved his son from death. He also founded a Brotherhood to devote a procession to the Christ of Soccour. The 2nd of February 1691, Antonio Medina Chacon, Bishop of Cartagena, signed the constitution of the Brotherhood (Archivo Municipal de Cartagena). This chapel goes together with the Dukedom of Veragua. The Brotherhood was founded with this name: Noble, devote, illustrious and pontifical Brotherhood of the Lords of the Holy Christ of Soccour in Cartagena, although this is not the current name of the Brotherhood.
The Brotherhood was composed by 33 brothers, all of them city noble Lords. They were in charge of maintaining the image of the Christ (enthroned in the chapel on the 21st January 1691) and managing the expenses of the Brotherhood. Some days later, on the 9th February, Manuel de Colon de Portugal was buried under the chapel high altar, who died two years after his miraculous healing. The boy’s mortal remains are still under the old cathedral.
Throughout the 18th century the Brotherhood is still maintained by the aristocracy and the Dukedom of Veragua, but in the early years of the 19th century this maintenance stops. There are economic problems emphasised by the Napoleonic invasion, as Fernando VII needs money to finance the resistance against the French forces. These are very hard times for the Brotherhood, which sees how the Cathedral is removed to Santa María de Gracia Church as the Old Cathedral becomes damaged, mainly because the ceiling has fallen down. The Old Cathedral remains only open to visit the Christ of Soccour. The Brotherhood asks for funds to restore the Cathedral, but the lack of agreement makes this impossible. The Bishopric abandons the Cathedral and it gets ruined, that is why the Brotherhood disappears in 1821.
In 1879, the Brotherhood is made up again, and the Cathedral is trying to get fixed since 1833, but getting no results. Along the years the Holy Christ of Soccour Chapel got recovered, financed by the Brotherhood and the Council Hall of Cartagena, directed by the architect Carlos Mancha. In this second era the Brotherhood got the name of: Brotherhood of the Holy Christ of Soccour. The brothers tried to get back the dukedom of Veragua’s funds but they failed, being the people from Cartagena the only source of money.
The Old Cathedral has been restored along the years up to the beginning of the 20th century, when Victor Beltrí finished it definitively. Several architects such as Francisco de Paula and Oliver Rolandi show in their texts the magnificent works of art, as in the altarpiece and the fresco paintings you can appreciate in the chapel.
In September 1936 the image of the Brown Christ and the altarpiece are destroyed due to the Spanish Civil War. Thus, the Brotherhood looses all their patrimony and disappears once again.
The Brotherhood is made up again with the name of: Illustrious and Royal Brotherhood of the Christ of Soccour by a group of Cartaginians led by Jerónimo Pérez Hernández, on the 4th March 1961. José García Cervantes is elected as Major Penitent of this third era on April. The Bishopric of Cartagena approves the new Statutes on the 24th November of the same year, taking their procession to the streets on March from the ruins of the Old Cathedral. In the year 1978 the Christ was accompanied by the image of the Virgin of Consolation Solitude by Manuel Ardil. In 2002 the image was changed for another image by José Hernández Navarro from Beniaján (Murcia).
When the new statutes were approved in October 1999, the Brotherhood was divided into two, namely the Holy Virgin of the Consolation Solitude and the Holy and Royal Christ of Soccour.
The brotherhood keeps on taking out its Via Crucis with austerity and tradition, recovered years ago, which again fills the fervent heart of Cartagena, being a loyal companion to the two images: The Holy Virgin of the Consolation Solitude and the Christ of Soccour.
Sergio Martínez Soto
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