Longpré-les-Corps-Saints

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Commune of Longpré-les-Corps-Saints
Location
Administration
Country	France
Region	Picardie
Department	Somme
Arrondissement	Abbeville
Canton	Hallencourt
Intercommunality	Communauté de communes de la Région d'Hallencourt
Mayor	Alain Drouvin (2001-2008)
Statistics
Elevation	6 m–98 m (avg. 22 m)
Land area¹	8,06 km²
Population² (1999)	1561
- Density	193/km²
Miscellaneous
INSEE/Postal code	80488/ 80510
1 French Land Register data, which excludes lakes, ponds, glaciers > 1 km² (0.386 sq mi or 247 acres) and river estuaries.
2 Population sans doubles comptes: residents of multiple communes (e.g. students and military personnel) only counted once.

Longpré-les-Corps-Saints is a commune in the Somme département in the Picardie region of France.

Contents 1 Geography 2 Population 3 History 4 Places of interest 5 See also 6 External links 7 Notes

[edit] Geography

Situated on the D3 and D216 junction and on the banks of the Somme River, surrounded by peat fen, some 12 miles southeast of Abbeville. The railway from Paris to Boulogne-sur-Mer has a station here.
An earlier local railway ^[1] , once carried freight and some passengers. It opened in 1872 and closed in 1993.

[edit] Population

Population Growth

1962	1968	1975	1982	1990	1999
1858	1902	1857	1641	1519	1561
Census count starting from 1962 : Population without double counting

[edit] History

Les Corps Saints is named after the thousands of supposedly holy relics (the bones of saints, pieces of the ‘true cross’ etc) brought back by Crusaders from the Holy Land. The region was quite wealthy, thanks to the exploitation of the peat, found here in abundance.^[2]

A collegial church was established here, and by the 13th century had attrached the attention of Popes, notably Innocent III and Gregory IX who granted it their protection. It was called at that time “Longpré -les-Corps-Saints”. The relics would be promenaded though the streets, a practise which still goes on nowadays.

.

Longpré was burnt down twice by the English during the Hundred Years War, the first time just before the Battle of Crécy, the second time before the Battle of Agincourt.
Pope Eugène IV had the badly-damaged church rebuilt in 1437,^[3].

During the Wars of Religion, to avoid the Huguenots, the inhabitants of Longpré ran way. The clergy of the collegial church, the canons, took refuge at Saint-Vulfran’s abbey in Abbeville. Afterwards, the collegial chapter was restored, but it was never as great as in its earlier days. By the time of the French Revolution, there were only 10 canons.

On the 28th December 1870, during the Franco-Prussian War, the Germans fought and killed 8 and wounded 15 combatants and civilians. 60 French prisoners were taken
From the 28th May to the 6th June 1940, French troops were engaged in defending the town against the panzers of General Rommel. The town was reduced to rubble. 90% of the town was destoyed and the spire of the church collapsed.

[edit] Places of interest

• The church
• The 1870 war memorial, listing 5 dead
• The 1914-1918 war memorial, listing 42 French dead.
• The British war cemetery 1914-1918 contains the remains of 78 British & Commonwealth troops and one French soldier.
• Memorial to the Battle of France, June 1940

[edit] See also

Communes of the Somme department

[edit] External links

• Eric Bailly’s history of the village (French)
• Postcards from between the two world wars. (French)
• Photos by Eric Bailly (French)
• Longpré-les-Corps-Saints on the Insee website (French)
• Longpré-les-Corps-Saints on the Quid website (French)

[edit] Notes

• This article is based on the equivalent article from the French Wikipedia, consulted on February 29th 2008.

Coordinates: 50°01′N 1°59′E / 50.017, 1.983