Malakoff avenue is a street in the 16th arrondissement of Paris.
It forms the boundary between the District of Porte Dauphine which is at the west and the District of Chaillot which is at the east.
Malakoff avenue
The road begins in the south at number 50 Avenue Foch and ends in the north on the Boulevard de l' Amiral Bruix and number 89 of the Avenue de la Grande Armée immediately prior to the Place de la Porte Maillot.
Malakoff avenue
This road was created in 1826 in the former commune of Passy.
By an edict of September 5, 1839 the avenue was classified as "route départementale no 9", before taking the name of Avenue de Saint-Denis, which started from Place du Trocadéro (Trocadéro Square).
It took its present name by a decree of August 24, 1864.
Malakoff Avenue towards the Great Army Avenue at the beginning of the 20th century
By an order of July 27, 1936, the part between Place du Trocadéro and Avenue Foch was named Avenue Raymond-Poincaré.
This route owes its name to the battle of Malakoff, a decisive French victory at the siege of Sevastopol during the Crimean War.
Malakoff is the name given to a hill about 100 metres high in the eastern part of the city of Sevastopol. This name is said to come from a certain Michel Malakoff, a sailor whose house was on the side of this hill.
In order to protect the city from a possible land attack, the Russians decided in 1834 to build a fortified line of seven kilometres, consisting of eight bastions arranged in an arc on the heights at the south of Sevastopol. However, the construction of the fortified line was much delayed and less than a quarter of the planned defences had been created when the Allies landed in the Crimea in September 1854.
The structure, known in France as the Malakoff Tower, was actually a large fortress called Korniloff by the Russians. The faces, depending on the configuration of the terrain, gave it a very irregular shape, having some analogy with a rectangle whose long sides were 300 meters long with walls of a thickness ranging from 90 to 150 centimeters.
Plan of Malakoff fort
In the centre of the bastion there was an old tower called the Malakoff Tower. It is completely covered by an earthen embankment and armoured but only its ground floor remained. The name of this tower had eventually been extended by the French to the entire fortress.
During the spring of 1855, the Allies dug new trenches to get closer to the Russian works while on May 19, the French commander François de Canrobert, considered too indecisive, was replaced by Aimable Pélissier who decided to concentrate his efforts on the capture of Malakoff.
After Raglan's death from cholera on June 28, 1855, command of the British forces was given to James Simpson, but Simpson's pessimism led the British government to replace him with William Codrington in August. On the French side, Canrobert was sent back to France for health reasons and command of the 1st Division was given to General Patrice de Mac Mahon, a veteran of Algeria.
The time of the attack was the subject of the greatest secrecy to prevent deserters from informing the Russians. The commanders of the divisions and brigades were only informed during a council of war in the afternoon of September 7, which ended with Pélissier announcing that "Tomorrow, Malakoff and Sebastopol will be ours."
On September 8, 1855, at 7 a.m., Mac Mahon called his officers, gave them an agenda for his troops and informed them that at noon precisely, the fighting would begin at his command.
As in previous days, the bombardment continued on the morning of 8 September with some interruptions. In total, the French deployed 20,000 men supported by 5,000 Sardinians.
Fight at Malakoff. Adolphe Yvon-1859
On September 8, the French succeeded in seizing the fortified position of Malakoff thanks to an assault perfectly coordinated by General Patrice de Mac-Mahon. The fortress then became untenable and the Russians evacuated it after destroying its fortifications.
The capture of the fortress of Malakoff by General Mac-Mahon on September 8, 1855. (By Adolphe Yvon)
It was at this time, it is said, that Pelissier sent one of his officers to ask Mac Mahon if he thought he could maintain his forces. He is said to have replied by these legendary words: "I am there, I remain there".
Patrice Mac-Mahon with the Zouaves at Malakoff, 1855
Three days later, the city of Sevastopol finally surrendered.
Although Sevastopol was defended heroically and its attack would have cost the lives of many Allies, its fall would mark the beginning of Russia's defeat in the Crimean War.
General Pélissier was rewarded for the capture of Malakoff by becoming the first Marshal of France of the Second Empire on September 12, 1855. He received also the title of Duke of Malakoff.
Marshal Aimable Pélissier by Henryk Rodakowski. Versailles Palace Collections
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