The wide street

That same evening the Council of Castile, the top administrative and judicial body of the Spanish crown, issued a proclamation. It outlawed any gathering in public places and ordered everyone to hand over their weapons, from firearms to knives, and with that Madrid passed under military rule. On the second of May, Murat, the French marshal commanding Napoleon's forces in the city, took over the presidency of the governing junta himself.

This street used to be called the Calle Ancha, the wide street, and you can still tell. Where the alleys of the neighbourhood barely let two carts pass side by side, a whole column could move through here, which is exactly why the French troops used axes like this one to push into the quarter.

What happened that evening also turned the city against itself. Spanish officers served on the military commission of General Grouchy that handed down the death sentences, and for the time being the propertied classes seemed to prefer Murat's victory to that of the rebels, who came almost entirely from the working-class districts.

From here the Calle de San Bernardo carries on south, as far as the crossing with the Calle del Pez.