2023-12-26 10:03:27
“I do not want us to dig up the hatchet between Alsace and Lorraine, but we want to repair a 152-year-old damage,” immediately warns Étienne Meire, mayor of Raon-lès-Leau (Meurthe -et-Moselle). He and his counterpart from Raon-sur-Plaine (Vosges), Denis Henry, wish to recover 2,000 ha of forest, currently owned by the neighboring Alsatian commune of Grandfontaine (Bas-Rhin).
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“To understand this history, we must go back to 1871 when Prussia annexed Alsace and Moselle. Our two villages fought the German presence and never crossed over to the German side. On the other hand, the woods of our two communes were recovered by the Prussians and attached to Grandfontaine, then under German annexation,” explains Étienne Meire. A wooded area still owned by the Bas-Rhin commune, a century and a half later, when it has become French again.
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