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Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

The forges of Varigney, located in Dampierre-lès-Conflans in Haute-Saône, found their origins in the 12th century with the installation of a mill and a lock by the Cistercian monks of Clairefontaine Abbey. The site, initially a monastic barn dedicated to agriculture and livestock, benefited from fishing rights and forests granted by local lords such as Jonvelle and Dampierre. The successive donations (1150-1243) consolidated its economic role, with direct exploitation by conversants until the 13th century, when the introduction of farmers marked a turning point.

At the beginning of the 16th century, texts mention an emerging metallurgical activity, but it was in 1728 that Jean-Baptiste Perrier revived a blast furnace on the site, under lease from the Abbey. After the Revolution, the site was acquired by Claude-Antoine Vuilley (1791), then operated by the Galaire-Patret family, which modernized the facilities in the 19th century. In 1834, Jérôme-Auguste Patret built a second fusion workshop, while Albert Ricot (the father of Patret) re-centered the work on the foundry after 1862, producing railway equipment and moulded objects. The chapel of Saint-Éloi, erected in 1874-1875, symbolizes this flourishing industrial era.

The decline began after the First World War, despite innovations such as the enamelling of fonts. The public limited company of the Mills of Varigney, founded in 1919, closed definitively in 1955. Today, remains such as the walls of the blast furnace (1834), the chapel listed in the Historical Monuments (1994), and workers' dwellings remain. The site thus illustrates the transition from a medieval Cistercian barn to a major industrial complex, marked by territorial conflicts between Burgundy and Lorraine until the 18th century.

Varigney was for a long time a "land of supercedence", disputed between the county of Burgundy (Franche-Comté) and the duchy of Bar (Lorraine). A judgment of 1562 definitively links it to Burgundy, but its parish with Dampierre-lès-Conflans (lorraine) explains its integration into this commune in 1790. The Cistercian heritage persists in the spatial organization, while the industrial era has left unique architectural traces, such as the metal arrow of the chapel or stoneware buildings.

Metallurgical activity reached its peak under the direction of Patret and Ricot, with production rising from 300 tons of cast iron in 1786 to 530 tons of cast iron cast in 1863. The site employed up to 250 workers in 1788, but this figure fell to about 40 in 1938. Post-Second World War modernization failed, sealing the end of an industrial adventure that began six centuries earlier with the monks of Clairefontaine.

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