Châteauroux

Châteauroux, a town of central France, capital of the department of Indre, situated in a plain on the left bank of the Indre, 88 m. S. of Orleans on the main line of the Orleans railway. Pop. (1906) 21,048. The old town, close to the river, forms a nucleus round which a newer and more extensive quarter, bordered by boulevards, has grown up; the suburbs of St Christophe and Déols (q.v.) lie on the right bank of the Indre. The principal buildings of Châteauroux are the handsome modern church of St André, in the Gothic style, and the Château Raoul, of the 14th and 15th centuries; the latter now forms part of the prefecture. The hôtel de ville contains a library and a museum which possesses a collection of paintings of the Flemish school and some interesting souvenirs of Napoleon I. A statue of General Henri Bertrand (1773-1844) stands in one of the principal squares. Châteauroux is the seat of a prefect and of a court of assizes. It has tribunals of first instance and of commerce, a board of trade-arbitrators, a branch of the Bank of France, a chamber of commerce, a lycée, a college for girls and training colleges. The manufacture of coarse woollens for military clothing and other purposes, and a state tobacco-factory, occupy large numbers of the inhabitants. Wool-spinning, iron-founding, brewing, tanning, and the manufacture of agricultural implements are also carried on. Trade is in wool, iron, grain, sheep, lithographic stone and leather. The castle from which Châteauroux takes its name was founded about the middle of the 10th century by Raoul, prince of Déols, and during the middle ages was the seat of a seigniory, which was raised to the rank of countship in 1497, and in 1616, when it was held by Henry II., prince of Condé, to that of duchy. In 1736 it returned to the crown, and was given by Louis XV. in 1744 to his mistress, Marie Anne de Mailly-Nesle, duchess of Châteauroux.