 |
| Source: Dr. Michel Planas, History of the 4th Company, p. 41 |
We established our camp in a rich and huge château facing the plain at the foothills in Combovin ...
The 4th Company returned to the château in the foothills. The château belonged to a “collaborator” with the Vichy government and we did not care too much about the annoyance we caused to his family. I have rigged up my radio in a huge ball room, among marble statues and columns in front of a picture window overlooking the fields gently sloping toward the Rhone River 10 miles to the West.
The next day a patrol brought four Americans, who escaped after their tanks were destroyed in a battle. Thereafter Americans, became everyday visitors in the château. Intelligence officers, airfield building engineers and many others used to come and see us.
--Arthur Lubinski, c1974
We cross PEYRUS and will settle in the farms south of CHATEAUDOUBLE ... We return to Chateaudouble where we arrive around 10 p.m. and receive the first contact of an American car machine gunner.--Michel Planas, 1955
My mother found a handwritten account of his time in the maquis in Grandpa's personal effects after he died in 1996, and filed it away; 25 years later when I started on this project, she passed it to me. I believe he wrote it during the summer of 1974, while his oldest child was dying from complications of multiple sclerosis. During the war, he and my grandmother had worked so hard and suffered so much in their struggle to survive, and they won; saving themselves and their daughter from the Nazis. But, 30 years later, in the midst of safety and prosperity, he couldn't protect his little girl from a deadly disease. It was obvious even to five-year-old me that losing her wrecked our family.
Grandpa never told his children about the castle, and when I recorded him in 1988, he didn't mention it then either. I'm guessing he didn't find it relevant - it was just a place to sleep, albeit much nicer than most of his FFI accommodations.
It took me a while to figure out which chateau it could be. For one thing, I had assumed "château" meant mansion, when a closer translation is actually "castle." Additionally, there are two towns in France named "Châteaudouble": one in the Drôme Department and one in the Var Department, both located in southeastern France. Dr. Michel Planas's map above confirmed it was the one in Drôme. The term translates to "double-castle" or "two castles," which has a certain amount of romance. When I remembered to use French search terms, and did an image search for "chateau de chateaudouble drome," it came right up.
The castle in question is square with a courtyard in the center, and two square towers and two round ones. You can see it from Chateau Road which runs just behind the stables/gatehouse:
The gatehouse (the building immediately adjacent to the road) is called "La Salle des Dragons" or "Hall of Dragons," which is evocative of a George R. R. Martin novel. Dragon is a cognate between the two languages, but in French, "dragon" refers both to the mythical animal and to dragoons:
 |
| French dragoon of the Volontaires de Saxe regiment, mid-18th century |
Originally, dragoons were mounted infantry that carried firearms, but unlike traditional cavalry units, they dismounted to fight. The term "dragoon" originated from a type of blunderbuss pistol called a dragon. Because the gatehouse was originally the stable for the castle, I think a more accurate translation would be "Dragoon's Hall," or perhaps "Dragoon's Barracks."
Based on my grandfather's description, I think the ballroom must have been situated between the two round towers on the back of the castle, which faces west:
 |
| Google Maps Round towers are on the west side of the castle, and it is 10.61 miles/17.1 km to the Rhone River. |
 |
| View toward the west. Source: Patrice Besse Real Estate |
For the longest time, I couldn't find any photos of the interior, but eventually I stumbled upon real estate listings for the castle when it was put up for sale in the fall of 2023. The asking price was a cool €3.0 million ($3.4M).
As I went through the real estate photos, I kept Grandpa's description of westward-facing picture windows, marble columns, and statues in mind, paying particular attention to what was visible through the windows, and the dining room seems like an excellent candidate for Grandpa's ballroom:
 |
| The view from the door/window looks like it might be westward. |
That looks like it overlooks "the gently sloping fields toward the Rhone River, 10 miles to the west." I'm not concerned with a lack of statues, which can be moved. I don't see any columns, though they may not be visible in the picture, or perhaps he was referring to the vertical gray wainscoting. My guess is that he would have set up his radio in the window on the right. Good lord, those polished stone floor tiles are lovely.
 |
| Grandpa's radio window in the back left? Source: Patrice Besse Real Estate |
More details - the "radio window" had internal shutters, and was in the corner next to an interior door and a fireplace. And look at that painting:
Here's a view of the west side of the castle. I'm fairly certain the exterior doorway in the ballroom (dining room) isn't the one nestled against the right tower, but is just to the left of that. I think the radio window is the one to its left, located in the middle of the three that are easiest to see.
 |
| West side of the castle. Note the mountains toward the east. Grandpa always talked about how exhausting they were. Source: Patrice Besse Real Estate |
Other details in the above picture: a significant retaining wall is visible in the foreground, with a few statues along its length. There is also a pit or pool (possibly a fountain?), and nestled against the building, there is a terrace or patio with some (probably modern) lawn furniture, though I'd guess something like it existed at the time.
 |
| Terrace with outdoor furniture. Radio window in the center. Source: Patrice Besse Real Estate |
 |
| Fountain pit and statuary along the retaining wall. Source: Patrice Besse Real Estate |
Here's a little YouTube video with a photo collage and some AI-generated narration, but it gives a pretty good sense of what the place looks like, both inside and out.:
I could be wrong about this being the castle Grandpa described, but there is pretty strong evidence that supports it:
- This place is almost exactly 10 miles (10.61 miles using the measure distance feature in Google Maps) from the Rhone River, just like my grandfather said.
- There are picture windows with a westward view that matches his description ("in front of a picture window overlooking the fields gently sloping toward the Rhone River")
- According to both Grandpa Arthur ("A few days later, on August 31 or September 1") and Michel Planas ("17 août-31 août"), they were in Châteaudouble during the time period in question. They also both describe returning to the castle or town, and American visitors.
- The "ballroom" of my grandfather's description seems to fit the quite large dining room in the modern photos, and it has picture windows like he described.
- The (apparent) lack of marble columns and statuary inside the ballroom, though there are statues on the property and many other trappings of significant wealth, and Grandpa could have been speaking poetically. Other features of the room could match his description if he misremembered the details after 30 years (columns vs. wainscoting), or if the columns were there, but not visible in the photo.
I'd love to know more about the owner of the chateau in the 1940s who may have been named Bourg (some sites call the castle "Château du Bourg," though that name could be much older -- or newer -- than the name of the owners in the 1940s). According to my grandfather, the castle was commandeered from a Vichy collaborator, and if I could confirm this, it'd be another very strong piece of evidence in favor of this castle. However, I have no wish to harm the descendants of the 1940s-era owners, so I doubt I'll bother to research their political leanings.
Bibliography:
- Planas, Michel. History of the 4th Company 2nd Battalion FFI of Drôme or; Three Doctors from the Same Family in the Maquis. 1955.
- Youtube video of Châteaudouble
- Patrice Besse Real Estate listing for Châteaudouble (lots of pictures!)
- Right Move Real Estate listing for Châteaudouble (pictures are greyed out on the main page, but if you click on a picture it launches a slide show, and they are in full color there).
- Lovely photo in a Flickr photostream, that includes the early history of the castle.
- Castles of France entry for Châteaudouble
No comments:
Post a Comment
Neither spam nor mean comments are allowed. I'm the sole judge of what constitutes either one, and any comment that I consider mean or spammy will be deleted without warning or response.