troops and in the treaties of Campo Formio and Lun�ville, the county of Saarbr�cken was ceded to France.
After 1815 Saarbr�cken became part of the Prussian Rhine Province. The office of mayor Saarbr�cken administrated the urban municipalities Saarbr�cken and St Johann, and the rural municipalities Malstatt, Burbach, Brebach, and Ru�h�tte. The coal and iron resources of the region were developed: In 1852, Saarbr�cken got a railway connecting the Palatine Ludwig Railway with the French Eastern Railway, the Burbach ironworks started production in 1856, the Saar up to Ensdorf was channeled since 1860, and Saarbr�cken was connected to the French canal network.
At the start of the Franco-Prussian War, Saarbr�cken was the first target of the French invasion force which drove off the Prussian vanguard and occupied Alt-Saarbr�cken on 2 August 1870. Oral tradition has it that 14-year old French Prince Napol�on Eug�ne Louis Bonaparte fired his first cannon in this battle, an event memorated by the Lulustein memorial in Alt-Saarbr�cken. The French left Saarbr�cken on 4 August 1870 and were driven away towards Metz in the Battle of Spicheren on 6 August 1870.
In 1909 the cities of Saarbr�cken, St Johann und Malstatt-Burbach merged and formed the major city of Saarbr�cken with a population of over 100.000. Saarbr�cken became capital of the Saar territory established in 1920: under the Treaty of Versailles (1919), the Saar coal mines were made the exclusive property of France for a period of 15 years as compensation for the destruction of French mines during the First World War. The treaty also provided for a plebiscite, at the end of the 15 year period, to determine the territory's future status, and in 1935 more than 90% of the electorate voted for reunification with Germany, while only 0.8% voted for unification with France. The remainder wanted to rejoin Germany but not while the Nazis were in power. This 'status quo' group voted for maintenance of the
