A bit of history

There are many historic things to be discovered in our beautiful chateau. One of them is the old hydraulic lift that used to be here. A famous French engineer and friend of Gustav Eiffel named Felix Edoux invented the hydraulic lift in 1867. He in fact installed the lift in the Eiffel Tower that went from the second floor to the top floor - a lift that was still working in 1983! Felix Edoux was from the neighbouring village and at some point he installed one of his hydraulic lifts in the chateau. 

Remnants of this lift are still in the chateau - the water tank, the heavy metal chain to lift the lift car and the wheel which it turned around. At some point we will put these on display in the chateau.

Today whilst removing the ceiling in what will be a walk in wardrobe we found where the chain came down from above. The old beams had been cut to make way for the chain. Not the neatest cut job I have seen! Quite a lot of the 1500's wattle & daub insulation is still intact though.