The first stone was blessed on 7 April 1867 by Monsignor Lequette, the successor of Monsignor Parisis, and the church was blessed four years later, on 29 October.
Built according to an elongated plan with a total of eight bays, the Church of the Sacred Heart is oriented and has an elongated nave with two aisles.
In 1882, Father Debras was already thinking of building a sanctuary dedicated to the Virgin Mary. Seeing the deplorable state of the district known as "Le Cailloux", he intended to echo the Marian devotion of Abbé G. Bellanger (1861-1902) in this somewhat isolated area to the north of the city, while paying homage to the Patroness of Soldiers. Having never seen his work finished, it was Abbé Debout who took over the work in 1906. The new parish was given a vicar, Peugnet, who launched the bulletin "Notre-Dame des Armées" and a subscription in order to collect funds to continue the work on the church.
A new church was built in 1960-62, identical to the old one dating from 1867 and destroyed in 1953.
Its construction, begun in 1223, was only completed after several building campaigns up to the 17th century. Unique of its kind in France, Notre-Dame is probably the only church of Tudor influence in continental Europe. Its external appearance is similar to that of the cathedrals of Winchester, Rochester and Gloucester: it has neither buttresses nor buttresses, unlike most French cathedrals.
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