Gisclard, Albert Victor Hippolyte Léon (X 1862 ; 1844-1909)

He entered the military engineering, took part as captain in the War of 1870 and fought at Villersexel, Héricourt and La Cluse where he contributed to the defense of Fort de Joux. In his career as an officer, he created various types of military bridges and then left the army in 1897 to freely pursue his research. We owe him, in particular, a clever rigid suspension system allowing it to withstand the heaviest loads without deformation and that solved the problem of using suspension bridges for railways. The first bridge of this kind was built in Cerdagne on the metre-gauge line from Villefranche-de-Conflent to Bourg-Madame at a place called Le Paillat; he crossed the ravine called Cassagne 80m above the Têt river. He died on the train which took him after the official tests and which crashed against the rocks