 The first prominent immigrant community to the town were Italians who escaped the fascist regime of Benito Mussolini during the 1920s and 1930s.They were soon followed by Spanish immigrants, also escaping fascism in their homeland under Francisco Franco.Following the First Indochina War in 1954, in which Vietnam won its independence from France, Vietnamese troops who fought alongside the French were brought to metropolitan France as a recognition for their loyalty to the country and for fear that they would be persecuted by the new independent government.