Valognes is situated in the Cotentin Peninsula , southeast of Cherbourg. Valognes station has rail connections to Caen, Paris and Cherbourg.
The town was built not far from the Gallo-Roman town of Alauna or Alaunia , from where the town derives its name. It was a fortified stronghold under the Norman dukes and French monarchs. Also here, William the Conqueror received the news that the barons of Cotentin and Bessin were conspiring to kill him, enabling him to escape to Falaise.
Edward III of England took Valognes without resistance, spent one night there and then pillaged and burnt the city. It would be a kind of resort for English aristocratic visitors until the s. Of the friaries of the Capuchin and Conventual friars and the abbey of Benedictine nuns, which existed in Valognes prior to , only the latter remains and was transformed into the hospice of the Rue des Religieuses.
The 14th-century church of Notre Dame had a dome dated , the only example of a Gothic dome in France. The whole building was destroyed in during the Battle of Normandy.
Thus the town was known as the Versailles of Normandy for its aristocratic mansions and palaces, as well as the quiet, mysterious ambience and exclusivity of its streets. This was the Valognes of Barbey d'Aurevilly.
