The former celestine convent

It was around 1430 that the Duke of Bedford, brother of Henry V of England, who became regent of France under the name of Henry VI on the death of the latter, established the Celestines in his manor of Chantereine, later called the Joyeux Repos. The convent known as the Célestins successively acquired houses and gardens between the Robec and the Tour du Colombier, as well as near the Place Saint-Hilaire and the ramparts.

In 1449, Rouen became a French possession again and Charles VII confirmed the legitimate possession of the Manoir de Chantereine by the Célestins. The manor was then called Notre Dame du Val de Rouen. The church at the end of the 15th century is known to us from the representation given by Jacques Lelieur in the Livre des fontaines: the interior is 30 feet long and 60 feet wide; the nave ends in an apse with high windows in the flamboyant style and two chapels adjoining each other but with separate roofs. The middle of the roof is surmounted by a small wooden spire containing 4 bells, one of which was later installed in the new chapel of the Hospice General.

In 1562, the Protestants committed irreparable damage to the convent, literally pillaging the premises and expelling the monks. The damage, estimated at 25,000 livres, was the subject of a gift from the king to compensate for the losses.

The Celestine order disappeared at the end of the 18th century, shortly before the Revolution, by decision of the ecclesiastical authorities. Cardinal de la Rochefoucault reunited the priory's property with that of the nearby Saint Nicaise seminary.

As early as 1771, the administrators of the hospices began actively lobbying the king to obtain, but in vain, the relinquishment, free of charge, of the Célestins site, which completely delimited the Hospice General's eastern boundary.

Between 1784 and 1820, the church was demolished, and the land was divided and rented out in parcels. It was at this time, around 1820, that the Hospice General acquired a large part of the estate for 30,000 francs.

In 1960, only the beautiful buildings of the south wing and part of the east wing remained, the only survivors of the four buildings that surrounded the cloister. These stone buildings had 10 French windows and 10 regular windows on the upper floor. Above the ground floor there was a projecting stringcourse which was to cover the roof of the cloister galleries. A beautiful Italian-style gallery originally overlooked the garden. A very large room used as a refectory had panelling and mouldings. The second large adjoining room was reserved for boys with skin diseases and was used as a classroom, as these children often spent several years in hospital. Underneath these two large rooms was a magnificent cellar with ten square stone pillars, which was used as a shelter during the last war. The whole complex was used by the dermatology department and became the site of the internship in 1963.

In the 1970s, the construction of the Félix Dévé pavilion and the central ring led to the destruction of the rest of the convent. The 15th century cellar, which is listed, was supposed to be preserved, but was in fact very quickly filled in.