David Whitley takes a day trip from Paris, and discovers a city brimming with history.
National Stud
The shiny-coated stallion, clearly in “Don’t you know who I am?” mode, lets out a majestically contemptuous whinny as he is dragged over the cobbles. His show jumping glory days are over, but he has the demeanour of one not wanting to admit it as his handler yanks his leash, trying to get him from stable to paddock.
The haughty occupant of Compiègne’s National Stud building shares more than a few characteristics with the town itself. It’s a city that undoubtedly lives in the past, chest puffed out in pride, but the posturing is understandable given the amount of history it’s soaked in.
Compiègne has seen capture, surrender, victory and imperial excess over the years. And, like a grand old dame who insists on wearing her best dress to nip to the shops, everything has been primped and spruced in a manner deemed fitting.
Place de l’Hôtel de Ville
Place de l’Hôtel de Ville, the main social hub, is a case in point. The town hall itself is a fabulously fancy gothic creation, and laid out in front of it are a series of immaculate flower beds and shining benches that pigeons appear too scared to even contemplate doing their business near.
At the other end is a strident statue of Joan of Arc, sword by her side and pennant of war in hand. That it looks so triumphant is an outrageous display of cheek on the commissioner’s part, as Compiègne was where the French heroine was captured by the Burgundian forces before being handed over to the English to be burned at the stake.
The civic pride is felt way beyond the central square, with grand boulevards, mansions and gardens projecting a certain grandeur, but none come close to the Château de Compiègne.
Château de Compiègne
This royal and imperial residence is a testament to opulence and, for a while, it was the most important building in France.
The palace got its current look courtesy of King Louis XV, who ordered Jacques-Angel Gabriel to reconstruct it from scratch in 1751.
Changes were made under Napoléons I and III (or, more pertinently, their wives) and the present state of the rooms is a complete mish-mash of styles. All of them have undergone period reconstruction – it’s just that it’s more than one period that’s been used as a template.
This makes walking round the Château a tremendously baffling experience, like eating a pizza where a different chef has prepared each slice, never knowing whether the next mouthful will be plain pepperoni or anchovy and pineapple.
For example, there is the Council Chamber, which is rather solid and plain in a straight neo-classical style, with the paintings allowed to provide the colour and character.
Shortly afterwards, you step into a frightening blaze of pink. The walls, chairs, bedchamber and dressing screens are all in an eye-popping magenta, showing the sort of restraint you’d usually associate with a sweet-toothed child let loose in an ice cream parlour.
Marie-Louise’s misfortune
And, if it looks bad as a fussy aesthete, then spare a thought for poor Marie-Louise – the original Napoléon’s second wife – who had to sleep there. The décor and furnishing of the room were entirely the choice of Joséphine, Napoléon’s first wife.
Never known for her saving ability and frugality, the plans for her boudoir were so lavish that it took nearly two years for them to be completed. By the time the room was ready in 1810, the emperor had divorced Joséphine, taking Marie-Louise of Austria as his wife within three months of the ink drying on the paperwork.
Unfortunately for the new empress, so much time and money had been spent on the room that there was no chance of it being torn apart and replaced by something a little more tasteful.
Party time with Napoléon III
It was Bonaparte’s nephew, Napoléon III that provided the Château’s halcyon days, however. He was particularly fond of Compiègne and would spend three months of the year there, throwing his legendary Séries.
These were major-scale receptions that were held for a week at a time, guests being invited up to eat, drink, hunt and generally make merry whilst looking out on to the gardens.
Petit Parc and Grand Parc
Those gardens are now Le Petit Parc and Le Grand Parc, and there surely cannot be anywhere better in the whole country in which to just laze about on a summer’s day.
Splitting the flowerbeds, luxuriant lawns and equestrian cross-country course is the quite splendid Avenue Des Beaux Monts.
This is a 4.5km entirely straight stretch of turf that disappears over the horizon, created so that Marie-Louise wouldn’t miss her former home at the Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna. It comes all the way up to the reception room at one end and disappears deep into the forest at the other.
It’s in that dense, sprawling forest that Compiègne’s other major historic site can be found. Those who didn’t know would just assume that someone had just made a pretty clearing for no apparent reason, but this is where the senseless trench slaughter of World War I finally came to an end.
The end of World War I
In November 1918, trains carrying representatives from German and Allied commands headed in top secret to this out-of-the-way location on a barely used train line.
The two opponents sidled up to each other under a veil of secrecy, and began to discuss surrender conditions in the private carriage of Marechal Foch, the Supreme Commander of the Allied forces.
After a few days getting agreement from on high, the Armistice was signed on November 11th.
There is a replica of the carriage in a small, volunteer-run museum right next to the spot where the German surrender took place. That the original carriage isn’t there is due to the last major historical event that took place in Compiègne.
French surrender in World War II
In an act of symbolism, Adolf Hitler insisted that the French surrender in World War II would be signed in exactly the same carriage, in exactly the same spot.
Amongst an early version of a media circus, bands played triumphant music and cameras rolled as the carriage was removed from its shelter and hoisted back onto the tracks.
The carriage was later burned, while the statue of Foch erected at the site was only spared because Hitler wanted him to look continually at the site of France’s humiliation.
Today, the statue stands out above the memorials, towering above at an immaculately-kept clearing, visited every day by those who regard him as a hero. Unsurprisingly, he looks as proud as the city that hosts him.
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