Château Lamothe-Bergeron

The château

In the 14th century Lamothe belonged to the Captal de Buch, and the story told of him, which Charles Cocks and Édouard Féret were still printing in the 1922 edition of Bordeaux et ses vins, the reference book of the Bordeaux trade, is that he sold 10 harvests of his wine in advance to pay a ransom. The Bergeron name came with François Jacques Marie de Bergeron, who lived from 1760 to 1810. William Franck, whose Traité sur les vins du Médoc first appeared in 1824, lists Lamothe under Bergeron in that first edition, and in 1855 Armand d’Armailhacq, a Pauillac grower who published a book on the vines and wines of the Médoc that year, puts Mme veuve Bergeron’s Lamothe, 25 hectares, among the bourgeois supérieurs of Cussac, second there only to Lanessan.

In 1868 Abdon d’Armana, whose wife Caroline Le Quien de La Neufville was a niece by marriage of the last Bergeron, built the present château in the Second Empire style, and under him the wine made its name. At the international exhibition of 1879 it won a gold medal diploma for its 1874, 1875, 1877 and 1878, and the English edition of Cocks and Féret in 1883 recalled the Moniteur Vinicole of August 1878, which protested that so excellent a wine was only a superior bourgeois growth. By 1922 the name was printed Lamothe-de-Bergeron, under Daniel Exshaw, with 27 hectares making 60 to 70 tonneaux (the old Bordeaux measure of a crop, 900 liters, or 4 barrels). The estate was in the first Crus Bourgeois classification, in 1932. A fire damaged the château in 1957, the merchant house Mestrezat bought the estate in the early 1970s, the château reopened to visitors in 2015 after 18 months of restoration, and in November 2019 it was bought by the CAPSSA, a mutual-aid institution for social security staff.

The 65 hectares lie between Margaux and Saint-Julien, a mosaic of gravel and sandy clay terraces around the château, gravel and pebbles on the Cussac plateau, and marl and clay to the south. A replanting plan launched in 2021 runs to 2030 and aims at 55% Cabernet Sauvignon and 5% Petit Verdot, with Merlot kept on the cooler parcels. Two hectares of white were planted in 2022, and the first white, 80% Sauvignon Blanc, 16% Sémillon and 4% Muscadelle, is the 2024. The reds are fermented parcel by parcel in stainless steel and concrete and aged 12 to 14 months in barrels of 225 and 400 liters, the larger preferred. The estate is certified Haute Valeur Environnementale (High Environmental Value, the French state’s environmental certification for farms) and Terra Vitis, and it was a Cru Bourgeois Supérieur in the classifications of 2020 and 2025. Charles Lemoine is managing director, David Denechaud technical director and Julie Marenaud cellar master.

At a glance

Appellation

Haut-Médoc

Commune

Cussac-Fort-Médoc

Classification

In the first Cru Bourgeois list, 1932; Cru Bourgeois Supérieur, 2020 and 2025

Owner

The CAPSSA, since November 2019

Direction

Charles Lemoine, managing director; David Denechaud, technical director; Julie Marenaud, cellar master

Vineyard

65 hectares; a replanting plan from 2021 to 2030; 2 hectares of white planted in 2022

Soil

Gravel and sandy clay terraces; gravel and pebbles; marl and clay Terroir of Haut-Médoc →

Farming

Haute Valeur Environnementale; Terra Vitis

Cellar

Parcel by parcel in stainless steel and concrete; 12 to 14 months in barrels of 225 and 400 liters

Wines

Château Lamothe-Bergeron, red and, since 2024, white; Demoiselles de Bergeron; Château Romefort

The house

A Second Empire château of 1868, restored and reopened in 2015

In history

A gold medal diploma in 1879; 27 hectares under Daniel Exshaw in 1922