Historical summary (2)
French Revolution
During the French Revolution, in 1790, France was divided in departments (administrative divisions), based on geographical or historical considerations. The department of the Haut-Rhin (Upper-Rhine) tallies more or less with our Upper-Alsace Region. The prefecture, which holds the departmental administrative functions, is Colmar. Belfort was one of the "sous-préfectures" (under-prefectures), which holds some other departmental administrative functions.
An identity stemed from the wars
In less than one century, 3 new wars between France and Germany occurred. Alsace and Belfort once again were pushed into the foreground.
The first one began in 1870 during the French "2nd Empire". The ambitious Emperor, Napoleon III, wanted to play a leading role in Europe. However he did not have the genius of his uncle, Napoleon I. Beyond the Rhine, a powerful military power has risen, Prussia. The war, declared in July, was lost by September. France was then occupied by Prussian and Russian armies.
During this disastrious conflict, Belfort had been glorious.
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In 1813 and 1815, these fortifications withstood the resistance to long sieges (113 days in 1813). They were modernized between 1817 and 1840.
In 1870, Belfort was again laid under siege by Prussians for
103 days. Despite bombing, people never resigned, when the
rest of the country crumbled. For this heroic resistance, french
negociators of peace refused to cede Belfort to Prussia with Alsace
and Lorraine. They even achieved keeping territories of french culture
around the city. Finally the border corresponded watershed
between the Rhine and Rhône that more or less, tallied the
linguistic border of roman and alemanic idioms, leaving only 13
french-speaking villages in Germany.
Between 1871 and World
War I, French politicians spoke of revenge, of recovering Alsace
and Lorraine. At the time, no one thought to give Belfort
and its precincts another name than "Haut-Rhin". Belfort
became a symbol of patriotism. Many monuments were built, the most
popular was "The Lion", sculpted by Bartholdi who also
sculpted the Statue of Liberty in the United States. The Lion
was sculpted on the façade of a rock of the main fortification’s
building. The Lion recalls the courage of the city. A square
of the city is called the Three-Sieges square.
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In 1918 after the end of World War I, Alsace and Lorraine returned to France. The Belfort precinct could have been joined back to Haut-Rhin but for economic reasons, it became a new department, one of the smaller in France, and was called the "Territoire de Belfort".
In the 1970's, the decree of "Régionalisation" put this department in the Franche-Comté region.
Conclusion
The history of all this area has often been tumultuous.
Frequently it has been put in opposition between France and Germany.
Today the goal of this department with its old sister area of Montbéliard is to take advantage of its geographical situation and make its place, beside Alsace, as part of the heart of Europe.