Ouvrage Barbonnet - Ouvrage Barbonnet Description

Ouvrage Barbonnet Description

Barbonnet has only two blocks, an entry block and an artillery block, and, like all Maginot fortifications, is entirely subterranean. The Mougin battery is not linked to the Maginot fort. A link had been contemplated and a fully integrated design was prepared in 1929, but the arrangement of Suchet's magazines and concerns about structure and cost prevented work on a link from taking place. In particular, the magazines of Fort Suchet were not considered proof against modern artillery. Block 2 is just to the south of the old fort, outside its walls and facing south, with its galleries, usine and magazines running under the east side of Suchet, at an elevation of 748 metres.

• Block 1 (entry): one machine gun cloche and three machine gun embrasures.
• Block 2 (entry): one machine gun cloche, one grenade launcher cloche, three machine gun embrasures, two 75mm/29cal guns and two 81mm mortars.

Two flanking infantry blocks were proposed but not carried out, one to the south with two heavy twin machine gun positions, a GFM cloche and an observation cloche, and a detached position to the north with a GFM cloche.

A small blockhouse and casemate are located to the south of the main fortification. Casemate Barbonnet Sud was equipped with one FM machine gun and two automatic rifle positions.

Barbonnet's Maginot fortifications were built between November 1931 and February 1935 by a contractor named Borie, at a cost of 10.8 million francs.