IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF ❘ HAUSSMANN IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF HAUSSMANN
Georges-Eugène Haussmann is credited with inventing Paris, revamping its boulevards and parks to create the city we know and love today. Hazel Smith explores
“
…I passed the square of Les Halles, then open to the sky,
through a number of red umbrellas of the fishmongers; then Rue des Lavandières, Saint-Honoré and Saint-Denis. The Place du Châtelet was quite wretched at this time… I crossed the old Pont-au-Change, which later I had to have rebuilt, lowered and widened, then followed the line of the former Palace of Justice, on my left the sorry huddle of low dives that then dishonoured the Île de la Cité, which I would have the joy of razing completely – a haunt of thieves and murderers… Continuing my route by the Pont Saint-Michel I had to cross the poor little square that the waters of Rues de la Harpe, de la Huchette, Saint-André-des- Arts and de l’Hirondelle all spilled into, like a drain.”
The footsteps that Georges-Eugene Haussmann took as a young law student would have a profound effect on the footsteps Parisians were to take for the next 170 years. As Napoleon III’s Prefect of the Seine, Haussmann transformed Paris, demolishing its ancient character in favour of a modern, clean one. Born in 1809 at his family’s townhouse at 55, rue du Faubourg-du-Roule, Haussmann was a sickly little boy who spent his early years with his grandparents in Colmar in Alsace. His frailty led to an obsession with cleanliness that would later manifest itself in his civic works.
A PRIZED PREFECTURE His grandfather had been a general in Napoleon Bonaparte’s army, and Haussmann claimed he himself had been a Bonapartist from the cradle. While strolling in the Tuileries with his much- adored grandpa, a five-year-old Haussmann, dressed in a miniature regimental uniform, spied his hero, Napoleon, and saluted him, crying out, “Long live the Emperor!”.
At eight, Haussmann attended an elite private school near Sceaux, a banlieue south of Paris and then, at 11, he was
50 ❘ FRANCE TODAY Jun/Jul 2023
enrolled at the Lycée Henri IV, next to the Pantheon, known as the most challenging school in Paris. The naturally inquisitive Haussmann quickly rose to the head of the class. Thirsty for knowledge, he said: “One can cram a great many things into a schedule beginning at 6am and lasting to midnight and beyond.” He studied music at the Paris Conservatory, and Haussmann’s characteristic quest for order was evident in his musical choices: every sonata was to have three well-balanced movements; every symphony four. He preferred the reliable works of Bach, Handel and Haydn over the free, Romantic works of his fellow student, Berlioz.
“SOME OF PARIS’S
HISTORIC QUARTERS, MALINGERING AS INSALUBRIOUS SLUMS, WERE DESTROYED”
Now a sturdy and broad-shouldered 6ft 2in, the route Haussmann used to walk from the Church of Saint-Augustine (which is still there today) to his class at the Faculty of Law of Paris on the Place du Panthéon was a walk through time; from medieval squalor to 18th-century order. Paris’s meandering streets and old buildings held no charm for him, they just added to his abhorrence of disorder. Haussmann fought in these streets during the July Revolution. For six days and nights, he battled without rest, even capturing one of the Royal Guard. In recognition of his valour he requested a position in the French civil service, rejecting the military path favoured by his family. Haussmann was given the position of secretary general of the prefecture of Vienne in spring 1831. For almost two decades Haussmann held sub-prefecture positions, from Poitiers to Bordeaux. He was an able
administrator, but despite his diligence, his career moved laterally – rumours of his arrogance preceded him. Haussmann became entrenched in workaday civic concerns – a desperately needed road system in Nérac, a clock tower in need of repair in Saint-Girons… In the Gironde, he not only improved the schools and streets, but made inroads with the bourgeoisie. He married Bordeaux native Louise-Octavie de Laharpe in 1838 and they had two daughters, Marie-Henriette and Fanny-Valentine. Haussmann’s fortunes continued to improve. He vociferously supported Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte, nephew of the Emperor, as the presidential candidate for France. In 1848, when Louis-Napoleon was invested as the country’s first elected president, he promoted his ally Haussmann to the post of Prefect of the Var. Haussmann took on a more political role, redrawing electoral
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132
