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.