Best museums in Paris & France

About our Best museums in Paris & France Guide Book. In fact, the whole of country is a large historical museum with its ancient castles, houses, basilicas, monuments and memorials. But in this section, based on the author’s personal experience over the past 25 years and 100 years of experience of our team, we have compiled a catalog of the most interesting museums, as well as our author’s description of collections and events.
Our transport and tourism company “Union of Taxi Drivers in Paris and Nice” was founded in 1924 by participants of the First World War who fled from the criminal authorities in Russia after the 1917 revolution. Yes, it was the officers and generals, emigrants, who worked in Paris as ordinary taxi drivers, but they compiled a list of the best museums in France and developed the best tourist routes. These veterans of the First World War, and then the Second World War, were actively involved in the study of history, and donated their uniforms, weapons, and documents to the National Military Museums of France. They passed on their experiences and memories to the next younger generation. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, new emigrants arrived in France, mainly from Russia and Belarus, including Cold War veterans. Now our team consists of taxi drivers, licensed guides, museum workers, as well as professional historians of various fields. For descendants of veterans of the First and Second World Wars, for lovers of military history, for our friends and colleagues, we conducted original tours not only in France, but also in former French colonies and military bases around the world. These author’s tours are based on our own archives, memories and documents that we “inherited” from our older comrades. A special place in our publications is occupied by the Eastern Front and the Cold War, where we have unique exclusive archives and extensive experience in battlefield tours. Our specialty is BB1/BB2/Cold War, but we also do classic, sightseeing and offbeat tours to places we find interesting for our friends and colleagues. We post all this information in our descriptions, guides and reference books below. Once again, briefly. Below we post not only a description of museum collections in France, but also exclusive archives on important events in world history from our own collection. We apologize in advance for the quality of the initial automatic translation of texts from French, Russian and German. Gradually, with the help of our friends and colleagues from the USA, we are correcting translation errors. Part of the collection has already been transferred to the National Museums of France and the USA. The use of our text and visual documents is permitted as long as a link to the source is provided, Guide to Paris and France Paris33.org. We publish only part of our archives, we provide more as request.

The Best “Classic” Museums in France:

Nevertheless, I would like to single out some local history and military history museums in France, which are most interesting to fans of military history from the United States, Canada and Australia, especially on the topic of the First and Second World Wars. In addition to state museums, we also include here virtual, that is, regimental museums of veteran military organizations of the Russian Imperial Army in France, which once were here, but for various reasons ceased to exist.

The Best Military, Historical and Technical Museums in France:

  • Tank Museum in Normandy – Airfield A10 – D-Day armored vehicles
  • National Naval Museum of France in Toulon
  • Mount Faron, memorial to the Allied landings in Provence
  • Great War Museum in Meaux (First World War), Meaux city
  • Armistice, the Glade of the Truce memorial and RR carriage in Compiegne
  • Museum of the Life Guards Cossack Regiment (Courbevoie) near Paris
  • Air and Space Le Bourget, Aviation and Cosmonautics (Paris)
  • Museum of Naval Aviation of the Navy in Rochefort
  • Museum of the Order of the Legion of Honor (Paris), history and Russian cavaliers
  • National Museum of the Resistance – French partisans and underground fighters (“Death to the fascist occupiers” in French)
  • Prefectures of Police. High-profile crimes and bandits’ weapons
  • Cavalry Museum (Saumur)
  • Engineering Troops (Angers) at the School of Military Engineers
  • Automobile Museum Reims Champagne. Cars, motorcycles and the special exhibition dedicated to the First World War.
  • Military Museum de l’Abri de Hatten (Maginot Line, Alsace-Lorraine)
  • Museum of the Foreign Legion (Aubagne) and Museum of Military Uniforms (Puyloubier)
  • “Traditions of the House of Champagne de Castellane”  in Epernay
  • Wine Museum in Paris
  • Museum of fine ironwork (Rouen, Normandy). From keys to antique weapons
  • Blockhouse, air defense bunker and a collection of artifacts of the Second World War (Honfleur)
  • Maritime, ethnographic and folk craft (Honfleur, Normandy)
  • “Association of Guilds of Merchants and Artisans” (Musée du Compagnonnage), Tours, Loire Valley

Fortifications in France and Belgium: Castles, Fortresses, Forts, Bunkers:

  • Loire Valley Castles (Chateaux), check on the map
  • Middle Ages. Battles for the island of Corsica
  • Museum of the History of Normandy (Caen Fortress)
  • “Fort Bastille” (Grenoble, French Alps)
  • “Verdun Citadel“, the Underground Fortress of WW1 battle
  • “Fortress (Fort) Douaumont” (Verdun WW1 battlefield)
  • “Fort de la Pompelle” fortress (Reims, World War I and Russian brigades in France)
  • Forts in France and Belgium, list

WW1 – WW2 Battlefields in France and Belgium Guide:

WW1 – WW2 – Cold War World Famous Battlefields & Museums Guide:

Historical events presented in the museums of Paris and France:

* The French Revolution – Army Museum
* “The Capture of Paris in 1814”, the Museum of the Army in Les Invalides, the Museum of the Life Guards of the Cossack Regiment in Courbevoie and in Brussels
* Cossacks in Paris in 1814 – the Museum of the Army in Les Invalides, the Museum of the Life Guards Cossack Regiment in Courbevoie and the Royal Museum in Brussels
* “Flight of the Eagle” or 100 days of Napoleon in 1815. – Army Museum (Invalides)
* Russian-French Union – Museum of the Navy in Toulon
* Camp de Mailly, tank range, training center for Russian special brigades
* The hero city of Ypres and the gas attacks of the Germans
* The first tank battle on the Somme – the tank museum of Saumur (Loire), a museum in Meaux
* Russian Expeditionary Force in France (Russian brigades and legion of honor)
* Cars in France, fragments of history and companies. Automobile Museum in Reims (Champagne)
* The path of the Cossack from Lemnos to Paris – Museum of the Life Guards Cossack Regiment
* Tunisia is a colony of France and Russian Bizerte. Museum of the Navy in Toulon

* ROVS against OGPU-NKVD secret wars in Paris

* D-Day Normandy – Museums in Normandy, Squadron “Normandie-Niemen”
* Eastern battalions, Cossacks and Hi-Wi’s in France – museums in Normandy
* Resistance movement and partisans
* Order of the Legion of Honor, – Museum of the Order of the Legion of Honor

Cold War Guide: USSR – Soviet Army – KGB Encyclopedia

Contemporary World: wars, local conflicts, weapons and uniforms

  • Russian Army Uniform & Insignias 1992 – 2024
  • War in Yugoslavia: 1999 Russian Airborne Forces attack on Pristina airfield
  • War in Syria: ISIS armored vehicles (trophies)
  • Syrian turning point: temporary and traveling exhibition 2017-2019

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