1914

Bordeaux: Harvest from September 24th a few months after World War I began. Quality nudged up this year, but initial high hopes for a brilliant vintage did not prove correct. Harvest month was also the moment when the government moved from Paris down to Bordeaux as German troops approached the French capital. They stayed for four months. In Pauillac the Rothschild families of Mouton and Lafite opened a hospital and provided barrels of wine for the patients and staff. At Pontet Canet, wives and families of soldiers who had been sent to fight were given 1 franc per day.