San Carlos Gardens, Public park in Old Town, A Coruña, Spain.

San Carlos Gardens occupies the site of the old San Carlos bastion in A Coruña's Old Town, laid out as a romantic garden after 1834. Two centenary elms stand among native and exotic trees, and a viewpoint looks over the whole port. The adjoining building houses the Archive of the Kingdom of Galicia.

The site was built as a defensive castle outside the city walls in the 14th century and was joined to the city in the 16th. After the powder magazine exploded on 3 April 1658, killing around 200 people, it was abandoned. In the 18th century Carlos Francisco de Croix recovered it as a garden, and governor Francisco de Mazarredo gave it its present romantic layout in 1834.

The garden holds the tomb of Scottish general Sir John Moore, killed at the Battle of Elviña in 1809. Two plaques placed in 1927 quote Charles Wolfe's poem "The Burial of John Moore" and Rosalía de Castro's Galician elegy. Memorial tablets also honour the 172 men of the Royal Navy who died in the 1890 wreck of HMS Serpent off Cape Vilán.

The gardens are accessible on foot from the city center and feature well-maintained paths for visitors with different mobility levels. Early morning or late afternoon visits allow you to explore the space without rushing.

The building attached to the gardens is the Archivo del Reino de Galicia, the most important historical archive in Galicia, a state-owned centre managed by the Xunta since 1989. At the entrance two plaques remain: one bears the coat of arms of the Marquis of Croix, the other is badly worn. The gardens were renewed in 2022, restoring their original layout.