Synopsis [masquer]
1 History of the commune
1.1Old history
1.2 French presence
1.3 First factory
1.4 Two hamlets: only one heart
1.5 Ministerial dispatch of March 22, 1856
2 geographical Reference marks
3 Illustrations, old photographs
4 notable Families
4.1 Mayors until 1962
4.2 Notaries
4.3 Priests
5 to know for your genealogical research
5.1 Schedules of opening of the town hall
5.2 Examinations of the parochial registers
5.3 Solicitors records
5.4 Patronyms
5.5 Remarks
6 Bibliography
7 useful Bonds (external)

In 1830, there was on this site called “Haouch ez Zaouia” only of the dwarf palm trees and lined caper plants. The places were uninhabited.

Bou-Haroun did not exist, the presence of many koubas maraboutic of which that of venerated “Bou Haroun” located in a ravine is probably at the origin of the name of the village. Initially simple hamlet of Téfeschoun, the village is located between this ravine and that of Sidi-Hassine, more-known under the name of “Ravine of the robbers”.

At that time, Algeria was with the confluence of several migratory currents.

As of on June 6 1831, Ferrer Jéronomo, originating in Calpé arrives at Bou-Haroun, the men only come, they shelter beside their boat, in the poor huts of reeds or boards or sometimes in caves.

Safety improving the women are not long in joining them, contributing to the improvement of their domestic comfort.

Many families originating in continental Spain and Balearic Islands, in particular from the island of Minorque tested by a severe economic crisis, arrive on the coast.

Well-known of the Italians of the kingdom of Deux-Siciles, the littoral sees arriving of the emigrants originating in the area of Naples and the islands of Procida and Ischia whose economy was completely ruined by the seism of 1883.

A member of the Rotolo family would have been the first to draw his boat on the beach of Bou-Haroun. He will be followed there per many others.

Installed summarily in small houses built on the maritime field, little mobiles, having many children and of old parents, these men accustomed to the whims of the Mediterranean, its frightening grains accompanied by large stormy rains, resist the difficult living and working conditions on their palangriers.

[to modify]First factory
In 1903, the sardine shortage on the Breton coasts encourages the two brothers Thimothée and Jean-Guillaume Ampart to be fixed at Bou-Haroun after having assessed the qualities of the sailor-fishermen of Spanish and Italian extraction.

Knowing their trade of canner well and having a perfect command of the techniques of preparation and assembly, they open in 1909 their first factory.

[to modify]Two hamlets: only one heart
The dwellings built at the beginning of the XXe century on cliff and the property of Mr. Guillaume Prats are more known under the name of Prats village or of the Sluice-gate truss, judiciously qualified by Mr. Maurice historical Pons of core of Bou-Haroun.


A little low on the beach, the maritime hamlet sheltered fishermen originating in Spain and Italy whose majority chose French nationality.

Their children make their military service in the national Navy or the Army of Africa.

In 1904, sixty eighteen families are still unduly installed in a precarious way on the beach. Many is poor, but this poverty does not generate misery. The men work with eagerness and in spite of hard conditions of existence, “they hold where others give up”. They are fed by a puit and two sources, whose water is brackish as soon as the waves break on the beach. The flow of two sources collected on the property of Mr. Prats will be directed towards the village by a control installed on its property.

Mr. Prats commits himself in writing authorizing without allowance the installation as all work which will be undertaken utérieurement for the maintenance of this control.

Lastly, they still do not have a port and must as of three or four hours of the morning to push their palangriers with the sea and the evening to draw them with ground while returning in the water frozen to the chest.

For the prefect of Algiers, these men are at the origin of a resource and an industry of canners salaisonniers. It is thus as fast as possible “which it is necessary to fix them in their making invest their capital in the colony”.

Consequently, thirty-eight families of fishermen having taken French nationality are installed on twelve hectares expropriés on the good arable lands of Mr. Chabert-Moreau. Building plots are sold to the fishermen, with spreading out of the payment over ten years with the help of a intérêtde 5%.

About 1905 and after more than thirty years of waiting, the Bou-Harounais fishermen can finally buy a ground on cliff to build their small house there.

Source: Edgar Scotti Re-examined P.N.H.A (useful bonds)

[to modify]Ministerial dispatch of March 22, 1856

Preparatory school of the Natives
National NavyRecruitment in the national Navy of sailors autochtones in Algeria

At the end of the XIXème century the foreign fishermen become French by application of the laws of 1886-1888 had fixed themselves in maritime hamlets like Bou-Haroun, Chiffalo, Billhook-Navy, like in the districts of the Navy with Oran and Algiers. After one difficult period, the time of fishing to oxen called thus because they drew two by two a net which they went up alternatively. Thanks to a more favorable legislation the number of trawlers doubled passing from 10 to 20 in Algiers, for which it is advisable to add 4 to Ténes, as much to Cherchell and ten the smaller drawn evening on the strike with Bou-Haroun. These hard men with work deferred their hope on their children while allowing them to go to the school. After the second world war of the more modern boats allowed them to widen their fishing zone. The scientists contributed a considerable share. Geologists like Andre Rossfelder and his collaborators Misters Jean CAULET and Lucien LECLAIRE established with the effective assistance of Mr. Robert LAFFITTE a chart and a descriptive note of the funds of the Algerian littoral. It is among these men, whose aïeux ones were sinning of sponge, that recruited the divers which by their work, under the control of engineers, equipped Algeria with modern ports, adapted to the needs for the contemporary merchant navy and with those of combined during the second world war. Requisitioned in 1939 and 1942 the fleet of the trawlers contributed share to the final victory but lost many of its sailors there and the major part of its run units with Oran and Bizerte.

The work little known of these men is still perceptible today on the coasts of Algeria. Their know-how was simply transferred on the old descendants from this time pionnière. To give in memory this maritime world of another time, it was necessary can be to put words where there was not yet.

Robert Davezac - 20/03/2004


Ministerial dispatch of March 22, 1856 Source
[to modify] Geographical reference marks
Click on the chart to increase it

Coastal city Bou Haroun, is to about fifty kilometers in the West of Algiers






[to modify] Old illustrations, photographs
[to modify] Notable families
[to modify]Mayors until 1962
[to modify]Notaries
[to modify]Priests
[to modify] To know for your genealogical research
[to modify]Schedules of opening of the town hall
From 1962:

A.P.C (Popular and Communal Parliament directed by a President)

[to modify]Examinations of the parochial registers
To identify the acts digitized with the C.A.O.M: 1881-1904
[to modify]Solicitors records
[to modify]Patronyms
On the site of GeneaNet
[to modify]Remarks
[to modify] Bibliography
Bou-Haroun Village of Re-examined Algeria P.N.H.A n°58 - Editions of the Great South - 34070 Montpellier




[to modify] Useful bonds (external)
Bou-Haroun Site P.N.H.A
Recovered of “http://wiki.geneanet.org/index.php/Algérie_-_Bou-Haroun”
Category: Algeria