Creusot - Expo Paris 1900

The Creusot pavilion, with its enormous dome, surmounted and flanked by cannons of all calibres which seemed ready to cannonade everything around them, dominated the course of the Seine at a considerable height.
In truth, this pavilion did not only contain war material, for there was an extraordinary locomotive in its dimensions: it was a machine invented by M. Thuile, who had been killed while testing his machine at high speed. It was expected to produce remarkable results in terms of power and speed. Naturally, Le Creusot did not want to split up its exhibition, but it was the war machines that dominated its pavilion. Here was a marine machine capable of developing a power of 17,000 horsepower and of controlling the three propellers of the cruiser "Kléber"; further on, and right next to the electrical equipment, which the establishments in question were now routinely manufacturing, here were types of steel and nickel armour plates such as the various navies of the world had ordered from our gigantic metallurgical factory; then there were examples of that artillery which had recently proved its worth in the Transvaal campaign. We shall mention in particular a large gun of 24 centimetres calibre, which weighed 23,000 kilograms by itself, and whose turret with armour represented a formidable weight of 220,000 kilograms! In the middle of all these destructive devices, whose very power was an argument for the disappearance of the war, one could see a plan in relief of the Creusot establishments.

©Louis Rousselet - L'Exposition Universelle de 1900