Château Lagrange: Charles de Brane
The property came into the possession of Charles de Brane, but tracking down specific details on this individual has been near impossible. It is broadly assumed (and it makes sense) that he was a member of the same family who at one time or another also owned Brane-Mouton (today better known as Château Mouton-Rothschild), Château Brane-Cantenac and one or two other domaines. Exactly how Charles was related to Bertrand de Brane, his son Joseph de Brane and grandson Hector de Brane, proprietors of these two estates, has eluded me though. I would usually find some clue in old dictionaries of the French nobility, but strangely the Brane family don’t make an appearance in these. Perhaps they weren’t quite noble enough?
It seems likely that it was during the Brane era that vines were first planted here; the early and middle years of the 18th century being the time at which many of the classed growth estates of the Médoc were established. These first wines were sold, perhaps unsurprisingly, under the name of Brane-St-Julien.
Jacques Arbouet
After Charles de Brane established the vineyard, the property subsequently passed to Jacques Arbouet. Jacques was a member of the local bourgeoisie, but he seems to have done rather well for himself, as on July 13th 1721 he married Marie de Brane, the daughter of Charles de Brane. He made his mark on the estate, as I suspect it was Jacques who was responsible for the construction of the château that still stands here today. A trawl through local records reveals a Jacques Arbouet, a surgeon, resident in nearby Saint-Sauveur-Médoc. I suspect this was the same Jacques Arbouet (surgeons and doctors are, after all, very bourgeois) and this suggests the château was built sometime after that record was made, in 1734.
