Calle de Bernardino Obregón
Recalls Bernardino de Obregón, a soldier turned nurse of the poor and founder of the Obregón congregation in 16th-century Madrid.
Bernardino de Obregón came to Madrid as a knight of the Order of Santiago, hardened in Flanders. His turn came, so the story goes, on Calle de Postas: a street sweeper stained his uniform, he answered with a slap, and, moved by the humility with which the man begged his pardon, he laid down his arms to care for the sick.
He devoted the rest of his life to the court hospitals and founded the congregation of nursing brothers who, after his surname, came to be known as the obregones. He died in Madrid in 1599 in the odor of sanctity. Calle de Bernardino Obregón, in the Palos de la Frontera neighborhood, carries his name within Arganzuela.