Editing Laval (section)

==<FONT COLOR="#CCCC00">'''HISTORY OF LAVAL'''</FONT>==
'''The lords of Laval are of a dynasty which has made a mark in the history of France'''. The "Grande Rue" was for several centuries one of the principal ways into Brittany.

After the Hundred Years' War (1337 to 1453), during which the town had been taken and re-taken by one army and another, '''the fifteenth century marked a new period of expansion'''. The walls were completed by the addition of a powerful artillery fort in an innovative design, the Tour Renaise. The lords, governors of Brittany, which country's independence was formally ended in 1491, spent a large sum on building a prestigious hall near the keep of their castle. They built a grand vault for the interment of the lordly family in the Minster of St. Tugal. '''The town of timber framed buildings was partially rebuilt'''. The urban aristocracy built elegant houses and turrets in the upper town around the Rue des Cheveaux. The Abbots of Clermont preferred to assert their rank with carved decoration on panels (consoles) set between the members of the timber framing of their grand town house and in the manner of a cornice below the eves guttering.

During the Second Republic, the Second Empire and the early Third Republic the city saw its zenith. During this period a number of linen factories and foundries sprung up in the city and it began to thrive economically. On November 21, 1871, the Samelaine Monument was inaugurated to remind the Lavallois of their historic feats. The Museum for the Fine Arts and Sciences was completed in 1897 at the Herce Place next to it the Perrines, the terraced gardens and scenic promenade overlooking the city.

Between 1914 to 1918, with the Great War, many sons of the city died on the battle fields of Flanders to defend their home country against the onslaught by the Imperial German army, stalling the development of the city. In the period between 1918-1939 a new upper class emerged in the city, until in 1940 when the Democratic France was raided by the forces of Nazi Germany and Laval was occupied by the German Army. During the time of occupation the city suffered severe hardship, with Laval's Jewish inhabitants being deported to Death camps and many Lavallois taken Prisoner of War, having to work partially under slave-like conditions in the War Industries of Nazi Germany. The German occupation forces of Laval proved to be utmost brutal, with arbitrary internments, torture and executions of Laval's citizens being almost a daily occurrence. With its vicinity to the English Channel, however, there was the horizon of Liberty on the other side of the Channel, where the Free French Government under General de Gaulle prepared the liberation of France. With the freedom of their city in mind, the French Resistance Movement of Laval, thus, inflicted on several occasions serious casualties on the German occupiers facilitating the liberation of France by the Allied Forces on D-Day. The German occupation was terminated in the afternoon of August 6th, 1944, when the U.S. Third Army under General Patton liberated Laval for good.

'''''More informations about the History of Laval on the [[wikipedia:Laval]] !'''''