Visitor's itinerary

From 1840 to 1914, there is a weight of evidence showing the close links between the army and civilian society.
Contact between soldiers and civilians is largely represented by such symbolic locations as the café, the station, the theatre, and so on.

Illustrations on handkerchiefs, not far removed from the press and popular imagery, echoed this reality. In the atmosphere which characterised the period following the defeat of 1870, the ideology of the Third Republic placed the army at the heart of civilian life, making the passing out ceremony of military service the apogee of a citizen’s education. Even if not all contemporaries were convinced, and at times fierce satire notwithstanding, the image of a “Golden Age” for the army and its relations with civilian society remains characteristic of the Belle Époque.