- Département
- Marne
- Site
- Champagne crayeuse, on the Suippe, east of Reims
- Inhabitants
- 349 (as of 1 January 2023)
- Source
- Wikipedia, eigene Zusammenfassung
Saint-Hilaire-le-Grand is a small village on the Suippe in the Champagne crayeuse, east of Reims. Vineyards play no part here; it is known for its history, from Roman times to the First World War.
Location
Saint-Hilaire-le-Grand lies in the Marne département, north of Châlons-en-Champagne and east of Reims, about 35 kilometres from Reims. The village belongs to the canton of Argonne Suippe et Vesle and had 349 inhabitants on 1 January 2023. Its residents are known as Charbodiers. The D 931 runs through the village from Valmy to Reims en Champagne airport. It forms part of the Voie de la Liberté, which commemorates the liberation of France in the Second World War and is marked with its own kilometre stones.
Landscape and viticulture
The village sits in the Champagne crayeuse, the flat chalk landscape of the region. Fields dominate the scenery here: according to Corine Land Cover, a good 65 per cent of the commune's area was arable land in 2018, around 25 per cent scrub and grassland and a good 8 per cent woodland. This statistic lists no vineyard area at all. Saint-Hilaire-le-Grand is therefore not a wine village and holds neither grand cru nor premier cru status. For anyone travelling in Champagne it is more a place on the edge of the routes, with a view of the countryside that forms the hinterland of the famous wine-growing areas.
The Suippe flows through the commune. The Cheneu, a small stream twelve kilometres long, rises within the commune and joins the Vesle at Livry-Louvercy. The climate is oceanic. The nearest weather station, at Mourmelon-le-Grand, recorded an average of 10.6 °C and around 651 millimetres of rainfall a year for 1991 to 2020.
The village belongs to the canton of Argonne Suippe et Vesle and had 349 inhabitants on 1 January 2023.
History
The area was already settled in Roman times. The map of the territory of the Remi in the museum at Reims places the station of Basilia here, on the Roman road to Verdun. Remains from that era include an underground aqueduct between Jonchery-sur-Suippe and Reims, a necropolis near the Ferme du mont Levrat and the line of the road itself. The name goes back to Hilary of Poitiers. The village was formerly called "le Ménissier", probably after the workers who spread marl on the fields. During the Revolution it briefly bore the names Hilaire-le-Ménissier and Montain.
In the First World War the village was badly hit. After the Battle of the Marne, German troops withdrew and from 13 September 1914 dug in north of the village. Fierce trench fighting followed at times. The church was destroyed, and its ruin became famous for the tower clock that remained stuck in place. It was rebuilt in 1925.
Things to see
- The rebuilt village church
- The military cemetery for Russian soldiers who fought on the French side in the First World War
- The Russian Orthodox chapel of 1937 beside the cemetery
- The Voie de la Liberté with its kilometre stones
If you want to get to know Champagne away from the cellars and vine slopes, you can build Saint-Hilaire-le-Grand into your plans as a quiet stop on the way between Reims and the chalk plain. A glass of champagne is then better enjoyed in one of the villages where it actually grows.
Pictures
0 %