Rochefort, Charente-Maritime

Rochefort
Port de Rochefort.JPG
Rochefort is located in France
Rochefort
Administration
Country France
Region Poitou-Charentes
Department Charente-Maritime
Arrondissement Rochefort
Canton Chief town of 13 cantons
Intercommunality Pays Rochefortais
Mayor Bernard Grasset
(2008–2014)
Statistics
Elevation 0–29 m (0–95 ft)
(avg. 5 m/16 ft)
Land area1 21.95 km2 (8.47 sq mi)
Population2 25,797  (1999)
 - Density 1,175 /km2 (3,040 /sq mi)
INSEE/Postal code 17299/ 17300
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.
Rochefort seen from Spot Satellite

Rochefort is a commune in south-western France, a seaport on the Atlantic Ocean. It is a sub-prefecture of the Charente-Maritime département.

Contents

History

In December 1665, Rochefort was chosen by Jean-Baptiste Colbert as a place of "refuge, defense and supply" for the French navy. Its military harbour was fortified by Louis XIV's commissary of fortifications Vauban. Between 1666-1669 the king had the "Corderie Royale" (then the longest building in Europe) constructed to make cordage for French ships of war. The making of cordage ceased in 1867, and in 1926 the arsenal of Rochefort was closed. The building was burned by occupation forces in 1944 and left abandoned for twenty years. Today it has been restored for municipal and tourist purposes.

Another infrastructure of early Rochefort from 1766 was its bagne, a high-security penal colony involving hard labour. Bagnes were then common fixtures in military harbours and naval bases, such as Toulon or Brest, because they provided free labour. During the Jacobin period of the French Revolution (1790-95) over 800 Roman Catholic priests and other religious who refused to take the anti-Papal oath of the "Civil Constitution of the Clergy" were put aboard a fleet of prison ships in Rochefort harbor where most died due to inhumane conditions. This was in effect one of the first "concentration camps" in the world.

Off Rochefort, from the island of Île-d'Aix where he had spent several days hoping to flee to America, Napoleon Bonaparte surrendered to Captain F. L. Maitland aboard HMS Bellerophon, on 17 July 1815, ending the "Hundred Days".

Rochefort is a notable example of 17th-century "ville nouvelle" or new town, which means its design and building resulted from a political decree. The reason for building Rochefort was to a large extent that royal power could hardly depend on rebellious Protestant La Rochelle, which Cardinal Richelieu had to besiege a few decades earlier. Well into the 20th century, Rochefort remained primarily a garrison town. The tourist industry, which had long existed due to the town's spa, gained emphasis in the 1990s.

The Rochefort arsenal, in 1690.

Miscellaneous

The town gained some fleeting fame with Jacques Demy's musical movie Les demoiselles de Rochefort (The Young Girls of Rochefort) (1967), starring Catherine Deneuve, her slightly elder sister Françoise Dorléac, Gene Kelly and George Chakiris (Bernardo from West Side Story).

It is home to a unique style of bridge called a Transporter bridge, (built 1900) named Pont transbordeur de Rochefort.[1]

Births

Rochefort was the birthplace of:

International relations

Twin towns — sister cities

Rochefort is twinned with:

Points of interest

Traditional blazon of Rochefort

External links