Roullet-Saint-Estèphe Removals

Mosnac

Mosnac is two miles northeast of Châteauneuf-sur-Charente and eight miles west of Angoulême, on the left bank of the Charente.

It is four miles from Hiersac, Nersac and Roullet and eight miles from  Jarnac.

No major road passes through here – the village is served by the D 423 and D 422, which crosses the Charente and connects Mosnac to Saint-Simeux. The D 699, road from Angoulême to Châteauneuf and Jonzac, is about a mile away.

The town is crossed by the Angoulême-Saintes line which runs along the Charente and passes through the village. But the closest station is Châteauneuf, served by TER to Angoulême, Cognac, Saintes and Royan.

The most important hamlets are Liège, la Voûte, Les Sandons, les Touillets, and the town also has many farms.

Mosnac is on the edge of a limestone plateau, like many of the Charente communities.

The Vélude, a small tributary coming from Saint-Estèphe, crosses the town and the Fontaines stream, perhaps a former backwater of the river, passes between the town and the river to flow into the Vélude. Two ponds, old sand pits, also occupy the floodable part of the valley near the village.

People have lived here for centuries – two sarcophagi were found near the hamlet of Liège, one in stone and the other in a tegulae chest, with ceramic fragments.

In the Middle Ages, Mosnac was owned by lords who reported directly to the counts of Angoulême.  Aymar Mosnac and Solomon Mosnac owned the area between the 12th and 14th centuries. Then through marriage this land passed to Geoffrey, lord of Vaux-Rouillac, before being shared in the 16th century between the two brothers, John and Chaplin Mosnac. One half passed by marriage to the Augeards, and the other half to Henri Pelletan, Lord of Rouffignac.

In 1633, Hippolyte de La Place, widow of Jacques Le Musnier, sieur de Lartige, who had bought the two estates in 1602, exchanged the seigneury of Mosnac for the château d’Ardenne, which belonged to the de Forgues family. The latter possessed Mosnac family until the end of the xvii th century, which then passed to the family of Sainte-Hermine, who also owned the Barrier.

The bridge crossing the Charente to join St Simeux was built in the early xx th century 12.

The wine is an important activity of Mosnac, located in Petite Champagne. Some producers sell cognac, Pineau des Charentes and vin de pays on the property.

The GR 4 hiking trail from Royan to Grasse crosses the village.

Nersac

Nersac is six miles west of Angoulême, on the road to Châteauneuf (the D 699 ) and on the left bank of the Charente, downstream from Angoulême. It has about 2,500 residents and a proud industrial past.

Nersac is also crossed by the D 41, which connects it to La Couronne  and to Trois-Palis by the beautiful Meure bridge over the Charente.

The Angoulême – Royan line also crosses the town, which had a station there, but which was recently closed.

Pombreton, on the D 41 halfway between Nersac and La Couronne, on the edge of the Boëme valley, is the most important hamlet. It is almost attached to the village of Nersac, as well as that of La Couronne by a succession of houses.

Other, smaller hamlets invlude the Fleuranceaux, the Meure and its bridge over the Charente, the Fontenelles, the Fuie, the Pontreau. Chez Bernier, La Garde and Île sous Garde are to the south-west of the town. Fleurac, to the northeast, not far from Saint-Michel, is known for its castle and its mill, a former paper mill.

The town is mainly on a low plateau overlooking the valley of the Charente, and cut by the valley of the Boëme.

The Charente, navigable between Angoulême and the ocean, is now used by pleasure boaters. The Mothe lock is in the town, and the old towpath temporarily used the left bank there.

Many mills were once here – and some remnants are still in evidence. One was turned into a paper mill in 1978, then taken over by the association Friends of the paper tradition and Angoumois neighbouring provinces, which restarted paper making, manufacturing handmade paper from linen and cotton using 17^th century techniques. It is now a museum.

Nersac was an important place in the paper industry. The paper mill in Pont-Huillier was built in 1628 and became a paper factory in 1841. In 1890, it was bought by Deschamps, de Vœuil, and transformed into a felt factory for stationery. By 1935 the Sagebien type water wheel had been replaced by two Francis turbines.

The pulp mill on the Boëme was built around 1850, on the site of a former wheat mill It ceased its activities around 1920.

There were two other felt factories, one transformed into a carpenter’s and the other a tannery.

The Château de Fleurac, towards Saint-Michel, overlooks the Charente and is surrounded by terraces with railings and moats.

The castle Foucaudie was built in the 16th century and has two square towers, one dating from the 16th century, with watchtower, fancy holes aliasing and muskets. They surround a terrace resting on arcades and accessible by a beautiful monumental staircase. The two outer turrets, dating from the 17th century, are round and covered with pepper shakers.

Unusually, since 1952, La Foucaudie has been the town hall of Nersac, and it also includes the post office.

Mouthiers sur Boëme

Mouthiers-sur-Boëme is located six miles south of Angoulême and four miles south-east of La Couronne, away from the main roads.

In 2017, the town had 2,436 inhabitants.

Like much of the region wine production plays a part in agricultural activity.

The main employer here is the Lippi La Fence group, the leader in the metal mesh manufacturing market. ISO-9001 certified, the company employs nearly 400 people at six sites in France, and works daily with suppliers from around 20 countries around the world.

The other major employers are the Régis Maurice butcher and the local home help association ADMR.

Mouthiers has a town hall, a post office, a multi-purpose hall, a multi-sport hall, a MJC, a media library and a home for the elderly.

The town has a few hamlets, some of which have developed as a result of urbanisation and the proximity of Angoulême: Le Rosier to the northeast, Grand Guillon to the north-west of the town, overlooking the Boëme valley, Gersac to the southwest, les Naulets and les Fayards to the east, Morinaud, Chez les Rois, Chez Reignier to the south, not to mention Rochandry to the west of the village at the foot of the castle. The new districts on the road to Angoulême to the north of the village are the Croix Ronde, the Agriers and the Justices.

The village of Mouthiers was built on the banks of the Boëme, which is a left bank tributary of the Charente. The lower valley is occupied by numerous peat bogs and ponds. There are a few fountains such as the Cassottes near La Forge and the Hunauds near La Roche à Calvin in the Gersac valley. To the north, the Fontaine du Roc stream is a tributary of the Charraud, which passes at the northern limit of the municipality, as well as the Font de Quatre Francs stream which forms the northeastern limit.

A sculpted frieze 3m long, from the Magdalenian period of between 18,000 to 18,500 years ago,  shows very ancient human occupation. The entrance to Mouthiers, a roundabout at a place called Peuplier Major, on the road to Angoulême, has since 1999 a roundabout with a reproduction of the frieze of the Chaire-à-Calvin, made by Emmanuel Pierre, surmounted by a group of three metal horses by Michel Vallat, a monasterial artist.

The rock shelter of the Chaire-à-Calvin owes its name to Jean Calvin, who came to preach the reform from the top of a pulpit carved into the rock.

Pierre David, who discovered the frieze in 1926, described it from left to right “a headless bovid, then a gravid-bellied equine and a scene of horses mating”. It is the only work of parietal art still in place in Charente and visible to the walker.

The Abri des Rois contains objects dating from the early Aurignacian and the remains of Homo sapiens.

A fortified habitat was occupied during the Neolithic and the Bronze Age, to the northeast of the town, the Fort des Anglais which is a prehistoric entrenchment.

A first church was built in the 6th century by Saints Cosmas and Damian.

In the 12th and 13th centuries Mouthiers was on a north-south variation of the via Turonensis, route of pilgrimage to Saint Jacques de Compostela.

The fountain of Saint-Damien, near the Logis de Forge which is nowadays called the source of the Cassottes, was a place of passage for these pilgrims.

A primitive castle was built on the rock where the current castle is located, hence the name of La Roche Chandéric, now La Roche-Chandry, then La Rochandry or Rochandry, thus forming the “four Rocks of Angoumois “, with La Rochefoucauld, La Rochebeaucourt and Rocheraud.

During the Hundred Years War the castle was the object of great covetousness between the English and the French. It was taken and taken back and in 1387 by Louis de Sancerre, Marshal of France chasing the English and ordering its demolition, but the English took it back, then were driven out again in 1416 by the Lord of Barbazan, captain of Charles VII who had it demolished.

Jean de La Rochandry had it the rebuilt in the 15th century.

A paper mill was built in the 18^th century in Forge where, around 1830, high-quality paper was produced, including that of certain banknotes of the Russian tsars.

The Rochandry paper mill was built in 1845. Then in 1850 the Servant banker, from Angoulême, bought the remainder of the ruins and had the current castle built – ruining himself in the process.

The parish church of Saint-Hilaire was built in the 9th century and rebuilt in the 12th century. The bell tower of the xiii th century openwork Gothic windows. This octagonal bell tower was once topped by a spire which was demolished in 1735 after being struck by lightning.