Félix-Étienne Dehau (1846–1934), Knight Commander of the

Order of St. Gregory the Great The Pontifical Equestrian Order of St. Gregory the Great ( la, Ordo Sancti Gregorii Magni; it, Ordine di San Gregorio Magno) was established on 1 September 1831, by Pope Gregory XVI, seven months after his election as Pope. The order is one of ...

, was a scion of a bourgeois family of

Lille Lille ( , ; nl, Rijsel ; pcd, Lile; vls, Rysel) is a city in the northern part of France, in French Flanders. On the river Deûle, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France Regions of France, region, the Pref ...

, France, an art collector, a patron of schools, orphanages and churches, and for 62 years, from 1872 to 1934, mayor of the commune of

Bouvines Bouvines (; nl, Bovingen) is a commune and village in the Nord department in northern France. It is on the French-Belgian border between Lille and Tournai. History On 27 July 1214, the Battle of Bouvines was fought here between the forces of F ...

.Jean-Louis-Clément Pelon
Un "blanc" en pays "rose": Félix Dehau (1846-1934), maire du village historique de Bouvines, figure atypique de notable lillois
in ''Être reconnu en son temps: personnalités et notables'', dited by Maurice Hamon and Ange Rovère, proceedings of the 134th Congrès national des sociétés historiques et scientifiques, held in Bordeaux, 2009 (Éditions du CTHS, 2012), pp. 203-222.

Family

Félix-Étienne Dehau was born in Lille on 22 January 1846, the son of Félix Amé Julien Dehau (1787–1870) and Stéphanie Louise Joséphine Defontaine (1813–1887). On 21 November 1868, he married Marie Claire Adélaïde Lenglart (1849–1940). Between 1870 and 1888 the couple had eight children, Pierre, Félicie, Claire, Madeleine, Marthe, Élisabeth, Henriette and Jean.

Patronage

In 1884, Dehau founded the Ecole Pratique Libre d’Agriculture de Genech (now Institut de Genech) on property that he owned. In 1903, he purchased land in Belgium to rehouse members of a religious order made homeless by the 1901 Law of Associations. These were displaced again by the First World War, and in 1925

Chevetogne Abbey Chevetogne Abbey, also known as the Monastery of the Holy Cross, is a Catholic Benedictine monastery dedicated to Christian unity located in the Belgian village of Chevetogne in the municipality of Ciney, province of Namur, halfway between Brusse ...

was established on the site. Dehau organized the festivities marking the seventh centenary of the

Battle of Bouvines The Battle of Bouvines was fought on 27 July 1214 near the town of Bouvines in the County of Flanders. It was the concluding battle of the Anglo-French War of 1213–1214. Although estimates on the number of troops vary considerably among mo ...

in 1914, rebuilding the parish church and commissioning stained-glass windows depicting the battle. Sixty years before, at the age of eight, he had performed as a page in a historical pageant to mark the rebuilding of what is now

Lille Cathedral Lille Cathedral, the Basilica of Notre Dame de la Treille (french: Basilique-cathédrale Notre-Dame-de-la-Treille de Lille), is a Roman Catholic church and basilica in Lille, France, and the cathedral of the Archdiocese of Lille. An example of G ...

.Abbé Capelle, ''Histoire complète des fêtes célébrées à Lille, en 1854, à l'occasion du jubilé séculaire de Notre-Dame de la Treille, patronne de cette ville'' (Lille, L. Lefort, 1854)
p. 165n

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dehau, Felix 1846 births 1934 deaths People from Lille Mayors of places in Hauts-de-France