Carentan: late 18th century public wash house

The town of Carentan is without any historical panels other than those devoted to the events of 1944. (Perhaps the Normandy landings are considered to be its only significant commercial asset.)

Fortunately I possess a book which provides extensive historical and architectural information about the town; it is essential reading.


In 1784 the elders of Carentan decided that the town's 2,300 inhabitants needed a decent public wash house. This would replace an earlier lavoir built on this site, which was in the garden of the town's convent. No expense was to be spared - indeed, this was to be a showpiece fit for a king.

Two years later, in June 1786, the work was completed, and the land had been donated by the convent to the town.

Water comes from the many springs in the hill directly behind. It is collected in a large stone basin just behind the lavoir, and enters the basin through the mouth of a finely sculpted dolphin - this should be visible if the photo is viewed in its enlarged version. The angled stones (or coping stones) on the rim of the basin were used for rubbing, beating, rinsing and wringing out.

The rectangular basin is 15m long and 8m wide. Its covered surround is over 2 metres wide, and there are beams on three sides of the building for hanging out the wet laundry after washing. At the bottom right of the photo can be seen a metal sluice gate serving as overflow.

This luxurious facility cost 10,544 livres.

Users of the lavoir had to pay a fee for its use. In 1910 25 centimes were charged for washing a "wheelbarrow-full" of laundry.

The lavoir remained in use until in the 1930s. Within the last decade it has been carefully restored, and it is reputedly the only building of this type in Normandy.


I discovered from a different source that King Louis XVI visited Carentan on 22 June 1786 to inspect works on the town's port. Whether he also inspected this brand new lavoir is unknown. What is known, however, is that seven years later he had been deposed and taken to the guillotine .... and the Terror was about to start.

Perhaps no historian in the town has realised why the lavoir came to be built in such a lavish style. This royal connection ought surely help provide the impetus for an explanatory panel to be erected on this site. (The French love foreign royalty; but even if they are now set in their republican ways, this site is of considerable social, historical and architectural interest.)