Devesset is a small town located north-west of the department of Ardeche, in the Auvergne-Rhone-Alps region, on the edge of the Haute-Loire.
On the plateau of Vivarais and Lignon, in a preserved environment, Devesset developed with the implantation in the twelfth century of a commandery of the Hospitallers of Saint John of Jerusalem.
Until the Revolution, the village depended on the Knights of Malta.
During the Second World War, the village, which was essentially agricultural, was part of a network of communes around Chambon-sur-Lignon, where the Resistance was particularly active. A large part of the population hosts and hides Jewish families (800 people were gathered and hidden, including many children, and then some of them drove to Switzerland). In 1988, the inhabitants of Chambon-sur-Lignon and the neighboring communes of which Devesset were collectively recognized "Justes des Nations" by the memorial Yad Vashem, a unique fact in France.
But Devesset, with its population of about 300 inhabitants, is now also famous for its 51-hectare lake, an artificial water reservoir built in 1974 with a popular recreation area in this mid- altitude).
