Solférino - Ligne 12

Solférino is one of the last stations in which the original Nord-Sud Company style of decor has been maintained with its characteristic large ceramic tablets indicating the name of the station. Opened on November 5, 1910, the station is named after rue de Solférino, which is named for the Battle of Solférino. The Battle of Solférino (1859) in which Napoleon III and his alllllies from Piedmont defeated the Austrians in Lombardy. It was the bloody character of the whole campaign that led to the founding of the Red Cross in Geneva in 1863. Source: Paris by Metro by Arnold Delaney