En un regard
Le château en bref
Château du Masgelier, 10 km from Le Grand-Bourg (Creuse), was built in the 17th century for Louise de La Valière, mistress of Louis XIV; it later served as a farm before falling into disrepair. At the end of 1939, the Œuvre de secours aux enfants (OSE) rented the château, which was run from early 1940 by Jacques Bloch and his wife Hélène, with an international team of around thirty people. From January 1940 the estate took in Jewish children in danger, renaming the place the “Children's Republic” and practising active teaching methods, the teaching of Yiddish and the observance of Jewish holidays; in the summer of 1942 more than one hundred children were housed there, and in total 243 families entrusted one or more of their children to it, amounting to more than 335 children taken in. After the Blochs left in 1943, the home was directed by Rosette Lederman-Markovitch, then by André and Jeanne Klotz, until the site closed in October 1943 in the face of the risk of round-ups. Having become a children's holiday centre after the war, the château remains marked by its role as a refuge during the Second World War.