Skylighters, The Web Site of the 225th AAA Searchlight Battalion: Reims Guidebook

Reims Assembly Area Command — Page 4
(Reproduction of Vintage Pamphlet)

    The present edifice is the third structure on the site. Two of the previous churches have disappeared from view through the course of years, although remnants of these churches have been found. The present Cathedral was begun May 6, 1211 after a fire destroyed the previous Cathedral and much of the city in 1210. Work of building the magnificent structure went on over 200 years and hundreds of artisans worked on the thousands of stone carvings you can see everywhere about the Cathedral. The front of the Cathedral alone contains 530 separate statues, more or less mutilated by the ravages of time and war.

   The towers, rising to a height of 266 feet, are unfinished because the architects, for some unknown reason, failed to carry out their original plans to add pointed spires. The stately interior of the Cathedral, lighted by 100 windows, some of stained glass, is 123 feet high. The original stained glass windows, beautiful work of the Thirteenth Century, were destroyed by the Germans in World War I. The few windows which escaped destruction were removed early in World War II and will soon be restored. The stained glass windows you see now are modern works, done by Reims glassmakers. Priceless old tapestries, put away during the war, will also be replaced.

   One of the first things you'll notice in looking at the magnificent Cathedral is the scarred exterior, a constant reminder of the first World War. The Germans occupied the town in the first week of September 1914 and took over the Cathedral as a hospital. The floor was covered with straw and the Germans moved in their wounded while they proceeded to have a full week of carousing. The Germans, driven out of the town by the French forces, installed themselves, a the edge of the city, where they set up artillery.

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