Exposition

La métallurgie

  • Mettalurgical Industry

    The Châtillonnais region is particularly suited to the metallurgical industry due to the presence of three essential ingredients for its growth: water, iron ore, and wood. Along the three valleys – the Seine, Ource, and Aube – structures for the extraction and transformation of iron were established throughout the 18th century.

    This exhibition, which was once part of the museum's permanent collection, returns to our galleries for three months. It’s a great opportunity to (re)discover this fascinating craft that sustained the region for centuries.

  • The Sainte-Colombe-sur-Seine forge

    Through models, engravings, and photographs, discover the Sainte-Colombe-sur-Seine forge, a major industrial site of the 19th century in France.

    The blast furnaces were built in 1777 and later transformed in the 19th century by Marshal Marmont into an English-style factory with blast furnaces and puddling furnaces powered by coal. This was the golden age of the forge: by 1850, it boasted 16 puddling furnaces, 8 reheating furnaces, 3 rolling mills, and 500 horsepower, powered jointly by water and steam.

  • Vue intérieure de la forge Marmont, Sainte-Colombe-sur-Seine, Théodore Thévenin, 1848, Lithographie

    Le puddleur

    The “puddleur” (furnace worker) “loaded a load of cast iron weighing 225 kilos, which had to yield 195 kilos of iron... At arm's length! Using an iron poker, the puddler stirred, pierced, felt and “stirred” the molten iron inside the furnace. Finally, at the decisive moment, which he judged by his esteem, ... he extracted from the furnace a white tumor, with an unbearable glow, full of flaming pustules. Mesh headdresses on their faces, sheet-metal anemids on their shins, the master roll-formers stood opposite each other on either side of the rotating cages with fluted cylinders, ...and they passed, caught and re-passed in the flutes the bar that was turning from red to blue. Production was launched into the circuit of the annealing furnaces and the series of rolling mills ... where the unscrambler - a child - directed the jet of iron macaroni spurting out of the last cylinder in fiery volutes.”

    Extracts from the memories of Robert Delavignette, Birama.

  • The forge today

    In 1915, the Marmont forge disappeared, replaced by a cable factory whose buildings were moved to the railroad tracks where ArcelorMittal now stands. This last episode is illustrated by a wall of contemporary photographs by Claire Jachymiak.

    “The reportage at the wire-drawing plant in Sainte-Colombe-sur-Seine focuses on the buildings' remarkable heritage features. The elevated photographs emphasize the verticality of the architectural lines, placing the viewer at an angle that also accentuates the impressive perspectives of the industrial spaces. These immense spaces are sometimes punctuated by bright colors that bring out the predominant unity of tones: grays, wood, black and white".

    Claire Jachymiak

  • Mettalurgical Industry
  • The Sainte-Colombe-sur-Seine forge
  • Le puddleur
  • The forge today

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