Par
Frank Baudouin
Published on
Dec 3 2024 at 5:54 p.m.
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While dismantling an old oak floor in the old house he is restoring in the town of Silfiac (Morbihan), Christian David came across an unusual object on Thursday November 28, 2024. “Between two joists, I saw a bottle…”
Oh, not the pint or the little grandpa, but rather the cruet like a syrup bottle with its little cork stopper. Locked inside for ages: a sheet of paper rolled up on itself…
“Immediately, I said to myself that it was like the bottles in the sea, that there would certainly be a message…
There are the bottles that are thrown into the sea at the mercy of sea currents, like ambassadors of an anonymous story, of an ephemeral hope. And then, there are the earth bottles, a sort of time capsule whose secret it contains derives from their fortuitous discovery…
A 15 franc stamp
Aged 62, Christian David is retired. He was a craftsman in the town. Silfiac Multiservices was him. A handyman, he still is and it is he who is restoring “from A to Z” the house at 7 rue Paul-Le Bourlay, which he bought last June. “Its owner died in 2020. The house had been for sale for two years…”
Since then, Christian has dismantled partitions, removed paneling from the ceiling, broken concrete slabs… Until the day he tackled the parquet flooring on the ground floor and got his hands on this bottle with its mysterious contents.
The paper is actually a piece of envelope on which are written the names of the craftsmen who installed the parquet floor. There is a 15 franc stamp and the postmark indicates the date June 9, 1955.
In blue ink is indicated: Work done by Le Fur Roger, Séglien, Bieuzent, carpenter Silfiac. The names of the owners follow: Mr. and Mrs. Le Pape, Silfiac.
“I was really upset. It touched me »
The night following this discovery, I was very upset. It touched me. It's been 69 years since this bottle saw the light. I thought I had to share this story…
The name of Bieuzent not unknown
Arriving in Silfiac in 1987, Christian David knows everyone. And the name of Bieuzent is not unknown to him. He then contacted Daniel Bieuzent, the former mayor of the town, aged 89 and a former carpenter, to show him the bottle and its message… “I told myself that Daniel would certainly know something, especially since he had found a similar bottle in the church when they were doing work…”
A former clog maker
Daniel Bieuzent looks at the piece of envelope. “It’s definitely my father.” It was he who laid this floor… Yes, the owners were Mr. and Mrs. Le Pape. He was a former clog maker, who then worked at the Post Office in Séglien.”
A native of Sainte-Brigitte, Félicien Bieuzent arrived in Silfiac in 1934.
We were a carpenter's family. Up to eight of us from the same family worked together.
Félicien Bieuzent was active until December 31, 1975. He died in December 1982.
“1955… I was 20 years old”
Visibly moved Daniel Bieuzent returns the envelope to its discoverer: “1955… I was 20 years old. It makes me think of my youth, of the people we worked with. In 1955, I actually worked in this house with my father. But, I don't remember this bottle. The bottle must have been the workers' idea, but I don't remember it. »
“I’m going to do the same…”
Christian David will keep the small bottle that he found between two chestnut joists. “The envelope? I'll frame it! And I think I'm going to do the same too: I'm going to hide a bottle with a message somewhere in the house…” See you in 69 years to discover its contents…
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