Vidocq was no doubt the father of the now famous French detective police, and its unsavory origin has been often quoted against it. The authorities themselves were ashamed of using such means for the repression of crime, and after ten or a dozen years Vidocq was dismissed from his employment, only to resume it, after the Revolution of 1830, in a private and unofficial character, secretly approved of by the authorities. He still hoped to return to the Préfecture, and sought to bring it about by proving his value. One of his agents concerted with several old convicts to carry out a burglary in a rich man’s house. Vidocq was able to give early information, and the police were in a position to capture the burglars in the act. Such an arrest brought much credit to Vidocq, who was reinstated in his old office. But the thieves were in due course arraigned for trial, and one of them informedagainst Vidocq’s agent, as having suggested the crime. The judge ordered the arrest of the agent. Vidocq reported that he had left Paris, and was not to be found. Again the thieves accused. The judge now learned that the agent was actually employed under Vidocq, and the agent was then taken, tried and sentenced. Vidocq was again discredited, and the detective office or bureau, now known as the “Police de la Sûreté,” was re-organised on a new and perfectly straightforward basis.
The character of Vidocq looms large in the annals of French crime. His was a strange personality, and he did some wonderful, although unworthy, not to say infamous, things. A good picture of him is preserved by M. Moreau Christophe, long Inspector General of French prisons. Vidocq, he tells us, was gifted with extraordinary audacity. His courage was almost unexampled. He had an amazing fertility of resource, and was endowed with remarkable physical strength. He belonged in turn to the two extremes of society. He might late in life be called an honest man, but he certainly had been a thief. His nature was strangely contradictory and had two sides, both in manners and in conduct. He was garrulous yet discreet; always a boaster, yet cunning and secretive. Although prompt to execute, he was much given to thought before action; when he seemed to make a chance stroke it was the result of careful previous calculation. His appearance was peculiar. Of middle height, but built likea small Hercules, he had a large head, carried on a short, sinewy neck. His yellow hair was thick and close grown; he had a flat nose, open nostrils and a large humorous mouth, fleshy cheeks with salient cheek-bones, small, piercing green eyes, which glittered under prominent thick eyebrows. A phrenologist was called in to examine his head without knowing his name, and reported on his cranium as combining three types: “that of a liar, a diplomatist and a sister of charity.” To this M. Moreau Christophe adds the suggestion that he would have been better described as “an ape, a fox and an old humbug.”
Vidocq’s character was despicable, but his underground methods, exercised for the protection of society, were largely adopted by the police of the day. If the ex-thief thief-taker betrayed his old associates, his action contributed to the reduction of crime; but there was no such excuse for the official guardians of law and order who encouraged, indeed actually manufactured, crime. Men who had come into power at the Restoration stooped to support their authority by seeking to prove that the monarchy was still threatened by conspirators, eager to reëstablish the fallen régime. Rumors of dangerous plots were constantly current, and, as they were mostly insignificant or imaginary, it was necessary to invent them. For this purpose a special police was called into existence, known at the time as thePolice provocative. Agents wereemployed to instigate and incite those who were unguarded in the expression of their Bonapartist leanings to join in some combination against existing authority. Traps were laid, sham conspiracies started and simple folk drawn into them, only to be betrayed and denounced by the treacherous agents, who had led them on. Often enough honest workmen were persuaded, by specious counsels and unlimited drink, to band themselves together to overthrow the government; and when committed beyond explanation or avowal they were arrested and thrown into gaol. This system of provocation largely prevailed under the Bourbons. A very shabby trick was played upon Colonel Caron, who was concerned in the so-called conspiracy of Colmar. He had been arrested on suspicion, but was released and was living quietly at Colmar, when a secret agent came to him, pretending to be in trouble with the police for his known political leanings. Colonel Caron opened his heart to this traitor, revealed particulars of a plot in progress, all of which were duly carried to the Prefect, who gave the agent orders to lead his victim on. A rising was planned, and everything was ready. Colonel Caron put on his uniform to head the conspirators, and when he rode out with cries of “Vive l’Empereur,” he was arrested by his own supposed followers, who were agents in disguise. For this he lost his head, while the police agents were handsomely rewarded.
The Saumur conspiracy was similarly fatal to General Berton. He had long been more than suspected of heading a conspiracy centred at Saumur, for the necessary evidence had been gained through the abominable practice then in force of tampering with private correspondence in the post. The warrant for his arrest had been issued, but he saw the officers approaching from his window and escaped through a door leading into the garden. The authorities were determined to take him and sent a secret agent to hunt him up. The agent ran into him at length at Thouars, where he was in hiding with a supposed fellow conspirator, an ex-sergeant Wolfen, who was in reality another agent of the police. The general was presently arrested and tried as a traitor, and in due course suffered death.
Another case on all fours with these was that of Colonel La Bédoyère, who, to make the story blacker, was denounced by a police officer under the greatest obligation to him. This Colonel La Bédoyère was an ardent adherent of the Emperor Napoleon, whom he had joined on his return from Elba. He was engaged at Waterloo, and found it advisable to disappear after the Hundred Days. He took refuge in the country, and was safely concealed for some months; but then, in the teeth of the strong protests of his friends, came back to Paris, where he was arrested and thrown into the Conciergerie. Some devoted friends arranged forhis escape from prison, but they could not see their way to passing him out of Paris. Release from the prison was to be effected by buying over an employé with a bribe of 10,000 francs, but the rest was not easy, and there were no generous English officers to offer the same help that had been given to La Valette. When the agent, above mentioned as being under obligation to La Bédoyère, was found, he promised to see the Colonel safely through the barrier. When all had been satisfactorily arranged, the scoundrel went straight to the Prefect, and gave information, both of the intended escape and the persons who were to assist in it. Shortly after this La Bédoyère was sentenced to death and was shot, while the agent received promotion and a considerable sum as a reward. The sequel is worth telling as a proof that Nemesis waits on such contemptible conduct. The man was looked upon with disfavor even by the police, retired into private life and became engaged in a commercial undertaking, which presently failed. His misfortunes deepened. He was constantly a prey to remorse, and eventually he took his own life.
Whatever the faults of the system of police espionage and criminal detection, of which Vidocq was the first to make systematic use, it was the premier attempt at anything like a well equipped detective organisation ever made; and as such it must be regarded as the foundation of the whole detective establishment of the police system of to-day.
How French justice secures convictions—Services of spies and informers utilised—The “coqueurs” or “moutons” largely found in French prisons—Baseness of the average “mouton”—One youth plans the murder of his own father—Another offers to murder his cell-companion to save him from the scaffold—The skeleton of Madame Houet brought to light after thirteen years—Clever detection in the case of Lacenaire—A whole series of murders exposed, committed by this bloodthirsty assassin—Some remarkable cases—Detection often follows—The difficulty of disposing of the remains—L’Huissier, Prevost, the “woman of Clichy” and Voirbo.
French justice has always been open to the reproach of using unworthy means to arrive at its end, commendable enough in itself—the conviction of the criminal. The services of spies and informers have always been utilised in a clandestine fashion. The rule has long obtained, and indeed is still in force, of employing an agent to insinuate himself into the confidence of accused persons to worm out secrets and betray them to the authorities. The most favorable opportunity is offered by the intimacy of cell association, and it is seldom that the spy fails to come upon the secret, however carefullyconcealed. The system is still in force, and has been tried in notable recent cases, such as that of the truculent and mysterious Campi, the murderer. Thecoqueurs, the unofficial attachés of the police, are as old as the hills, and are to be found in every country; but their ignoble business is perhaps more widely followed in France than elsewhere. They are of two classes, those at large and those in confinement,—the latter being very generally found in French prisons. The first class live with and on the criminal class, in whose operations they ostensibly take part, so as to gather the knowledge that makes them useful to the police; but they are actively engaged in them when they find it safe and profitable. More often they prefer to inform and take the reward, but when times are bad they have been known to invent imaginary schemes and persuade their friends to undertake them, betraying the dupes when they were compromised and fully committed.
The treacherous business of provocation is said to have been carried further in the troublous times of the second Revolution. The police were then directly charged with having invented a serious disturbance in order to make short work of a number of political prisoners. In 1832 St. Pélagie was full of such prisoners. There was great unrest within the prison, mutiny was constantly imminent, and the discontent was encouraged by an absurd rumor circulated that they were being poisoned bythe authorities. It was a period of great effervescence in Paris, for the cholera, then a new and fearful epidemic, was raging, and the story was spread that the government was actually propagating it in order to reduce the number of its political foes. At last the disturbance came to a head, and there was a serious outbreak. The prisoners rose in revolt, smashed the furniture, ill-used their keepers and by degrees gained possession of the inner gates. At the same time an insurgent band, consisting of a couple of hundred Republicans, had assembled and were bent upon breaking open the prison to release their friends. It was believed to be a concerted movement, and was on the point of success, when the troops arrived. A large body of the municipal guard advanced, and, dispersing the crowd, entered the prison, where their attack was violently resisted. The revolted prisoners were formally ordered to surrender, but sturdily refused. The troops felt compelled to open fire, and many casualties resulted. When peace was restored, the ringleaders were arrested and removed, and brought to trial at the Assizes, where many were sentenced totravaux forcés. The authorities were then charged, as has been said, with having instigated the disturbance, but no proof of this accusation was ever produced, and the Prefect of Police indignantly repudiated the charge.
Sainte PélagieFamous as a place of detention in Paris for political prisoners on their way to the guillotine during the French Revolution, holding at one time as many as three hundred and sixty persons.
Sainte Pélagie
Famous as a place of detention in Paris for political prisoners on their way to the guillotine during the French Revolution, holding at one time as many as three hundred and sixty persons.
The business of themoutonis one of great danger, and calls for considerable address. Detectionor even suspicion that a man is so employed enforces him to vindictive retaliation. He may expect sooner or later to be roughly handled, probably murdered. These are the individuals who share the cell of the accused on purpose and draw him into conversation and unguarded admissions, which will be brought in evidence against him, or they help the judge in his line of interrogatories, the French method of prosecution. There is a larger class ofmoutonsknown in prisons as themusique, composed of all who from the moment of arrest are prepared to confess their evil deeds, name their associates and reveal their whereabouts and how they might be taken. Often themusiciensare retained on the service of the police, and inhabit a prison for months together, or so long as they can be useful during a protracted trial.
The baseness of the averagemoutonis almost inconceivable. No ties of blood or association are respected. Brother will denounce brother, a father his son. Cauler tells a story of a young thief, who interested him and whom, after receiving much valuable information from him, he permanently engaged as amusicien. One day another prisoner came to the chief of police to give him some facts about his young protégé. The latter had confided to him that he knew a certain way to effect his escape, if he could only lay his hands on a substantial sum of money. “You can get it for me, if you choose. When you are released go to the bankinghouse of Monsieur ——. My father is the cashier, and keeps his safe on the entresol, first door to the right. He is always alone between four and five of an afternoon, making up his accounts. Ring the bell, and when he opens the window say you came from me, and have a particular message for him. He will be sure to admit you, and directly you enter stab him in the heart. You will find his keys in his inner breast pocket. Open the safe, take out all the cash, keep half, and let me have the rest when next we meet.” M. Cauler was greatly horrified, and sent at once for hismusicien, whom he taxed with this supposed crime. The lad tried to deny it, but was confronted with his intended accomplice, and confessed. “Take him away,” cried the indignant police officer, “never let me see him again.”
Another story is told that may well be placed along with the above, in proof of the base ingratitude of which a convict may be guilty. A man had been sentenced to death, and was awaiting execution with horror, not so much from dread of the guillotine as of the disgrace that would fall upon his family from such a case in its records. A fellow convict also sentenced to death sought to console him. “You dread the dishonor of the public execution,” said he. “I’ll tell you how you can avoid it, and die in another way.” “Suicide, do you mean?” “Not at all,” was the reply. “Listen to me. I have not the smallest hope of a reprieve; the proofs are overwhelming. Now, noone can be executed twice, so I may safely kill as many people as I choose. I will tell you what I will do for you. I have a knife concealed in a safe place, and some night when you are sound asleep, I will come and make short work of you. It need not hurt you, for I will do it with one blow.” Strange to say the man, over whom death hung with absolute certainty, disliked the idea of losing his life a day or two before the inevitable time. He went at once to the governor of the Conciergerie, where he was lodged at that time, and told the whole story, saying he went in fear of his life, and wished to be put in another part of the prison. The friendly murderer was highly indignant when he heard of this treachery, and next time a man complained to him of his impending disgraceful death, advised him to throw himself over the staircase and take his own life.
The origin of the wordmusiquemay interest the curious reader. It arose from the practice of collecting together all thecoqueursand spies having secret information in a circle, when the recognition of some unknown new arrival was considered essential. The latter was then placed in the middle of the circle, very much as a bandmaster stands when surrounded by the musicians. An objection to this custom was that the quality of these informers was thus revealed, and exposed them all to the vengeance of their victims and their friends. Strange means were adopted for circulating the news. The sameChenu mentioned above tells us how, when he was in the exercising yard, a projectile dropped at his feet, launched by some hand beyond the walls. When picked up it proved to be a small pellet made of chewed bread. “Un postillon,” cried someone, and all gathered round in a group to hear the message, which was known by that name, contained in the piece of bread: “Avril, who is now in Bicêtre through the treachery of Lacenaire, wishes all friends to know.”
The revelations of an ancient comrade served in a rather remarkable case to bring home a great crime, which for nearly thirteen years had remained undiscovered. An old convict, named C——, in 1833, came to the police, and offered at the price of 500 francs to give them full information concerning the murder of the Widow Houet, and to indicate how the body might still be found. This murder had occurred in 1821, in the rue Saint Jacques, and was that of an aged woman of seventy, possessed of a considerable fortune. She was the mother of two children, a boy and a girl. The latter was married to a certain Robert, who had been a wine merchant, and who was not on the best of terms with his mother-in-law. One day a stranger, whose identity was not fixed till much later, called on the Widow Houet, who was alone, having sent her servant out some distance. The visitor after a short parley left, taking the old woman with him, and she was never seen again.After this disappearance suspicion fixed on the son-in-law, Robert, who was arrested, and with him a friend named Bastien, who had also been in the wine trade. Nothing came of the inquiry which followed, and both the accused men were released. Three years later they were again arrested on supposed fresh evidence, but were again released. At last the man C—— came forward with full particulars. Robert, it appeared, had approached Bastien with proposals to murder the old woman, whom he hated. As Robert had never paid over the share promised, Bastien confided the whole story to C——, and showed him the copy of a letter he had written his accomplice, in which were the following words:
“Do not forget the garden of the rue de Vaugirard 81, you know. Fifteen feet from the end wall and fourteen from the side one. The dead sometimes come back.” Bastien had carefully preserved the plan of the garden, on which was marked the spot where the corpse had been buried. This garden belonged to an isolated house, which had been rented by Robert, and Bastien was engaged in digging a deep pit in it. He bought a cord, provided himself with quicklime; then one Sunday morning he called upon the Widow Houet, with a message from her daughter and son-in-law, that they expected her to lunch in the new house. Here let Bastien speak for himself: “The old woman knew me well as a friend of her children, and accompanied me in a cart to the rue de Vaugirard. On enteringthe garden and reaching a quiet corner, I slipped my rope round her neck and strangled her. When certainly dead I buried her, threw in quicklime, covered up the grave and went to breakfast. There was one guest short, but Robert asked no questions. I knew he was satisfied with me. I had done my part in the business, but he would not perform his, and never yet has he paid me my price, the half share of the widow’s fortune. After waiting patiently all these years and finding him ever after deaf to my demand and unmindful of my threats, I resolved to denounce him, through you.”
This was the message brought by C——, and in response, warrants to arrest the Roberts, man and wife, were issued by the police. The culprits had already left Paris, but were followed and brought back. Meanwhile Bastien was taken into custody after a hand to hand encounter. He was searched, and in a pocketbook found upon him were the plan of the garden and the compromising papers relating to the Widow Houet’s estate. The case was clear. Nothing remained but to verify the facts by disinterring the corpse. It was necessary to proceed with great caution, lest the body should be removed by friends of the accused. A watch was set upon the house now occupied by a master pavier, and his sympathies were enlisted by warning him that he was to be the victim of a midnight robbery. He consented to allow two agents of the police to be stationed in the garden, and they took post there for severalnights in succession, but nothing happened. At last after careful examination the position of the buried body was fixed by Bastien’s plan, and a party of diggers from the great cemetery of Père La Chaise came, accompanied by a doctor, to open the ground. The body of a woman was come upon at considerable depth, in fair preservation thanks to the quicklime. The rope was still around her neck, and she still wore a gold ring. The evidence was conclusive as to the murder, but the criminals were allowed the benefit of extenuating circumstances, and the capital sentence was commuted totravaux forcésfor life.
About this same date a murder was committed in Paris, which will always fill a prominent place in French criminal records, from the hideous personality of the principal performer. Few members of the race of Cain are more widely known than the bloodthirsty monster, Lacenaire, of whom the saying is preserved: “I think no more of slaying a man than of taking a drink of water.” His detection and delivery to justice were due to the help afforded by treacherous confederates, who played themusique. The circumstances, with some account of the central figure, and the methods pursued, may well find a place here.
On December 14, 1834, an old woman, the Widow Chardon, residing in the passage Cheval Rouge of the rue St. Martin, was brutally done to death, and her son, who lived with her, was alsokilled. Both had been struck down with the same hatchet. The state of the premises, locks forced, furniture smashed, their contents strewed about the room, showed plainly that robbery had been the motive of the murder. A fortnight later another murder was attempted, and was all but successful, upon a banker’s clerk, who called, in the French fashion, to collect money on a bill or note of hand, which had been due, and was payable at the private address given by the acceptor, by name Mabrossier, No. 66, rue Montorgueil. The clerk climbed to the fourth floor, where he found the name Mabrossier inscribed in white chalk upon the outer door. He knocked, and was admitted into an empty room, where two men were evidently awaiting him. The door was slammed, and he was attacked murderously. The clerk was young and muscular, and fought sturdily for his life, uttering such loud cries for help that the miscreants were alarmed, and fled down-stairs out of the house.
The only clue to the outrage was the name Mabrossier, and he was known sufficiently well to the concierge, who gave a description of him. The machinery of the police was set in motion, by which the names of all who pass the night in hotels and common lodging-houses are inscribed day by day on the register, and the name Mabrossier was found finally in a low den kept by one Pageot. Close to it was another name, Ficellier, recorded the same day, and the landlord remembered and described hisvisitor. The portrait exactly fitted a certain François, at the time in custody, having been arrested within the last few days for fraud. The landlady, when pressed, also admitted that Mabrossier had previously been a lodger under the name of Baton.
The police pieced together the scraps that were coming to hand. M. Cauler, who was in charge of the case, openly taxed François with being Ficellier, and, on the shrewd suspicion that Baton was Mabrossier, arrested him, but was forced to release him for want of more definite evidence. Then a prisoner in La Force volunteered the fact that Baton was the intimate of one Gaillard, who sometimes passed under the name of Baton, but who, in one of his disguises, corresponded exactly with the much wanted Mabrossier. The next step was a hunt for Gaillard, and the name was soon found on another hotel register. They knew him well, there, and when asked whether he came often, or had left any traces, a bundle of songs was produced and a letter, said to be in his handwriting, containing an offensive diatribe on the prefect of police. Suddenly a light broke in on the police. The writing of the word “Mabrossier,” chalked upon the door in the house, where the assault was committed, was identically the same as in this letter.
It was now well known that Gaillard was wanted, and assistance was offered by another inmate of La Force, Avril by name, who declared that if let out for a week he would put Gaillard into the handsof the police. Nothing came of this boast, and Avril went back to gaol. Recourse was again had to François, who was fetched from the prison to be interrogated at the Prefecture. In the cab, en route, François made a clean breast of everything. He knew all about the murder of Mother Chardon; he had heard the whole story from the principal actor, Gaillard, who had thus a second and more serious crime to his charge than the attack on the bank clerk.
Gaillard’s identity was next placed beyond all doubt. Avril, the same prisoner who had fruitlessly sought Gaillard through Paris, confided to the police that the murderer had an aunt of the same name, a well-to-do person, who lived in great retirement. A visit was paid to her, and inquiries made as to her nephew, “Gaillard.” “His real name is Lacenaire,” she replied, “and I never wish to see or hear of him again. He is a miscreant, and I constantly go in fear of my life for him.” So the search was narrowed down to the real man Lacenaire, who fortunately was arrested at this very moment under the name of Levi Jacob, on attempting to pass a forged bill of exchange. He was brought at once to Paris, and, when visited in his cell by the head of the police, readily confessed himself the author of the crimes, of which he was suspected. When asked to name his accomplices, he refused until he heard that both François and Avril had informed against him, when he turned uponthem and gave them completely away. They had betrayed him, and he would not spare them! It served him right for taking accomplices!
This was the burden of his recital in the many interviews he had with the police. “Always work alone, it is the only safe method. Partners and comrades can never be trusted.” Lacenaire gave many proofs of this from his own personal experience. Once at Lyons he was returning home from an orgie, when he met on the bridge of Morand a well-dressed gentleman, upon whose white waistcoat glittered a fat gold chain. The man staggered slightly, and was clearly under the influence of drink. They were quite alone together upon the bridge, and Lacenaire fell upon him, seizing his throat with one hand and emptying his pockets with the other. Then, after he had secured the watch and chain and well-filled pocketbook, he lifted the victim in his arms and threw him bodily into the river Rhone, which flowed rapidly beneath. “I never heard who this man was, nor did I think of the incident again,” said he. “Having worked alone, I was never discovered.” Again, when residing in Paris, just after his release from prison, he frequented the gaming-house, Palais-Royal, and watched the lucky players with the idea of following them in the street to rob and murder them. He followed a man, who had won 30,000 francs, and, catching him in a lonely place, threatened him with his life unless he surrendered at once the contentsof his pockets. The approach of a passing patrol frightened Lacenaire, who took to his heels without the plunder. He escaped because he was alone. Had he been trammelled with an accomplice they would probably have got into each other’s way, or at least Lacenaire would have been obliged to think of some one beside himself. “Had I not worked with Avril in the murder of Mother Chardon, he would never have been able to betray me.”
The life and death of Lacenaire attracted considerable attention. There was much to interest the public, albeit unhealthily, in the personal record of this remarkable criminal, who came of decent parents, had been well educated, and yet yielded to the most ignoble passions; who from petty thief passed through all the phases of commonplace crime until he threw off all restraint and became a wholesale murderer. While honest society viewed him with horror, he became a hero to his fellows, who would have imitated him had they dared, but were satisfied to glorify him, to tattoo his name upon their breasts and to accept him as their chief and model. He was born in a village near Lyons, and graduated with honors at the college. Then he went to Paris and read law. When his father’s failure in business left him without resources, he enlisted, served for a time, came back to Paris and soon lapsed into crime. He could not bear the idea of an empty pocket, and was ready for any evil deed, that would fill it. The first committal to prison introduced himto friends, by whom he was willingly led astray, and prepared him for the criminal designs that took possession of him. When finally tried for his life, he was no more than thirty-five, and had been guilty of at least thirty heinous offences. His execution undoubtedly rid the world of a monster.
Some of the more atrocious and abominable crimes of French evil-doers will fitly find a passing reference here. They are mostly characterised by the traits peculiar to the worst side of the Frenchman,—of devilish ingenuity in design, savage resolution in performance, cynical apathy and indifference in the face of the forthcoming results, alternating often with sham emotion and hypocritical grief. Types re-appear constantly, crimes are repeatedly reproduced, generation after generation, by criminals who lack all originality in their actions, generally inspired by the same motives. The greed for gold, the craving for sensual self-indulgence, consuming passion and bitter jealousy and an unappeasable thirst for revenge, have at all times influenced the weakly moral sense and accomplished the most diabolical deeds. In murder cases, the disposal of the body is one of the chief difficulties that faces the perpetrator of the crime. It may be possible sometimes to leave the tell-tale evidence upon the theatre of the crime, but the danger of detection is greatly enhanced thereby, and murderers have therefore usually adopted some other plan of concealing or removing the corpse. There is nothingnew under the sun, and some of these methods of disposal are to be met with in the earliest criminal records, and have found imitators down to the present day. One case may be quoted in which a number of workmen repairing the Pont de la Concorde fished a large parcel out of the water, and on opening it found it contained human remains. The bundle had been cleverly packed and tied in a common corn-sack, with an outer cover of packing-cloth. Shortly afterwards a second parcel, exactly similar in form and contents, was found at no great distance from the first. It was presently learned that a woman named Ferraud, otherwise Renaudin, who had lived in the street des Egout Saint Martin, had recently changed her domicile, and had been helped in the move by a certain L’Huissier, a furniture maker. Nothing more had been heard of him until a near neighbor vouchsafed his new address. L’Huissier was found there, in bed, surrounded by the effects of the murdered woman. He had let her an apartment in the same house, and accompanied her there; had secured her property and promptly killed her. Then he had made up his parcels, and, hiring a hand-barrow, wheeled his burden to the river, to which he consigned it. The case is interesting as one of the first instances of dismemberment as a means of disposal.
Forty years later human remains were found in the bedroom of a hotel in the rue de Poliveau, and were presently discovered to be those of a milkwoman,who employed Barré, a notary’s clerk, who concerned himself with the investments of any one who would trust him. The milkwoman was one of the number. She had come to Barré’s rooms to charge him with the sale of certain scrip, but was murdered when off her guard. Other similar cases were those of the “Woman of Clichy,” whose husband murdered her and buried her on the banks of the Seine. The criminal here was an old soldier, wearing the military medal, and nicknamed the “decoré.” A third case was that of Prévost, a police sergeant, who had killed a tailor’s traveller, who had called upon him in the hopes of disposing of some of his stock. When arrested and brought to trial it was proved that this was the second murder of which Prévost had been guilty. His first victim had been a housekeeper to a gentleman, who had made her his heir. She desired to buy the good-will of a small business, and consulted Prévost, at whose advice she realised part of her property, and brought it to him to complete the purchase. She dined with Prévost, having the money in her pocket, and was put out of the way that he might secure it.
The most famous case of all is one of the most recent, and made the reputation of M. Macé, the well-known chief of the French detective police. Here a suspicious parcel had been found in a well in the centre of an apartment house. A second parcel was presently recovered, with identical contents. Both parcels were tied up in black glazed calico, theends of both were knotted in a peculiar way, and both were stitched with black cotton. These facts threw suspicion upon some journeyman tailor. It was soon discovered that an inmate of the apartment house, who was a working sempstress, received the visits of a tailor, who brought her work. Attention was thus directed to this man Voirbo. His antecedents were investigated, and it was found that an aged man, a miser with means, often in Voirbo’s company, had disappeared. The crowning point in this case was the cleverness shown by M. Macé in discovering that the dismemberment had taken place in Voirbo’s own rooms. The tiled floor in the living room sloped in one direction, and M. Macé, readily judging that if a body had been disposed of in the room, the blood would have flowed that way, at once emptied a decanter upon the floor. The running water led him to a spot under which, when laid bare, a quantity of dark matter, proved later to be dry human blood, was disinterred. Voirbo was challenged with the crime, and confessed, but before execution committed suicide.
Crimes of the character indicated above are numerous enough in the criminal annals of France, but they by no means constitute the whole of her calendar of crime; and in the next chapter we pass on to others not less fearsome.
Parricide—Benoit and his mother—Donon Cadot—Combinations for crime—Soufflard and Le Sage—The mysterious case of Madame Lafarge—A strange story—The Duc de Choiseul-Praslin kills his wife in the faubourg St. Honoré—Evidence clearly against him—Poisons himself and escapes justice—Suspected in Paris that special favor was shown him on account of his rank—Failure of justice in this case one of the supposed causes of the French Revolution of 1848.
The crime of parricide was so little conceivable in ancient law that no mention of it appears in the early codes. Six centuries of civilisation elapsed before the Roman law-makers devised a special penalty for the child who slew his parent. The guilty offspring was sewn up in a leather sack, and drowned in the sea; in this it was the custom later to enclose a dog, a cock, a viper and a monkey. The case of Benoit, quoted below, was by no means isolated. At the trial of Edward Donon Cadot in 1844, the public prosecutor admitted that there had been ninety-five parricides in France in the course of ten years. Only a short time before had the special penalty inflicted in addition to death, that of mutilation by striking off the offending hand, been suppressed.
The causes that have inspired this horrible offence are in all cases generally the same; either the impatient heirs, weary of waiting for their inheritance, have hastened the departure of the obstacle, or they have resented the duties imposed on them by the prolonged existence of an aged and useless parent. These reasons have too often weighed in France, especially with the peasant class, at once avaricious and greedy, and the most hideous stories of the savage cruelty of children towards their parents are to be found in French criminal records; and this even in quite recent times.
A singularly savage instance of matricide is on record; that of Frederick Benoit, who murdered his mother at Vouziers, in 1832, and committed a certain murder at Versailles, for which he suffered death in Paris. This Benoit was the third son of the Justice of the Peace at Vouziers. The father was in the habit of visiting a mill he owned at some little distance, and passing the night there. Madame Benoit, when left alone, was always a prey to apprehension, for they kept a considerable sum in cash in the wardrobe, near her bedroom. This fact was known to young Benoit. One night, when the judge was absent, an alarm of robbers was raised, and several neighbors rushed in. Frederick met them on the threshold with the news that the thieves had escaped by the window, but he begged some one to rouse his mother at once. On entering her room she was found lying dead upon her bed, with herthroat cut from ear to ear. Death must have been instantaneous, but her head was enveloped in a woollen petticoat, undoubtedly to stifle her cries.
Circumstance did not support the theory that thieves had broken into the house. All the windows had been securely closed at bedtime. The shutters could be opened only from within. Besides there were no signs of muddy footmarks brought in from outside, where it was raining hard. Nor, last of all, was the existence of the money in the cupboard, 6,000 francs in gold, known to any one outside the family circle. The inquiry seemed naturally limited, therefore, to the persons actually occupying the house that night,—Frederick Benoit and a young girl, a cousin, who served as domestic. As the boy was barely twenty and the girl not seventeen, the police could not bring themselves to suspect them. Several arrests were made, but guilt could not be fixed upon any one. Then all at once the second murder was committed by Benoit, who killed a youthful companion, with whom he was on the most intimate terms. They had occupied a room together in a small hotel at Versailles. At midday Benoit had gone out, but no sign was made by the other. In the evening, about 7 o’clock, the servants went up and found the door locked from the outside. They entered by another door, and discovered the body of the second young man with his throat cut. “Precisely as my mother was killed,” remarked Benoit,when subsequently arrested, and brought into the presence of the body at the Morgue.
Witnesses now appeared, who had heard the deceased declare that his life was in danger from Frederick Benoit. “I know what he has done, and he will certainly kill me some day to save his own skin.” Benoit was accordingly arrested. A search in his lodgings in Paris revealed a razor case, from which the razor had been removed, and a quantity of gold inserted, wrapped up asrouleauxin fragments of theConstitutionnelnewspaper, to which his father, the judge, was a subscriber. Further incriminating evidence now came from the last confession of the girl Louise Feucher, his cousin, to the effect that she had been his accomplice in the murder of Madame Benoit. She had fled from the house in Vouziers to Paris, and fallen into bad ways, which had led to her imprisonment in Les Magdelonnettes, where she entered the hospital, and died.
Frederick Benoit was duly convicted, sentenced to death and executed. It came out in the course of the trial that his mother had had a strong presentiment of impending evil. On the night of the murder, when her husband was absent, she carefully inspected the house with her son, the intending parricide, and made all secure. “The nights are long (it was the month of November); we never know what might happen,” she said, closing all doors and shutters, and looking to the locks andfastenings. She could not protect herself from the danger already within the house. Her murderer was in a room close by, and he accomplished his purpose with a single blow, while she still slept, and passed, without a struggle, instantaneously from life to death.
M. Donon Cadot, a prosperous banker of Pontoise, was found murdered in his offices on January 15, 1844; and suspicion fell upon his second son, who lived with him. He was a widower. His household was limited to one general servant, and his economy was so rigid that he passed for a miser. No doubt he was very illiberal to his son. On the day named, one for the settlement of bills and notes of hand, the banker was at his desk by 9 o’clock, ready to meet his engagements, and transacted business for a time, but at the half hour the doors were found closed, and the son, answering for his father, declared that he had been called away for a time. He had not returned by four in the afternoon, and the son on the premises, Edward, summoned an elder brother, who lived in the town, to attend to the business of the bank. Together they found a sluggish stream of mingled blood and ink, flowing under the office door. Forcing it they discovered the lifeless corpse of their father within. He had been battered to death by some heavy instrument.
The motive of the crime was revealed by the forced safe and empty drawers of the desk. Everything of value, bills, bank-notes, cash and a quantityof plate had been carried off. The first named, many hundred in number, and amounting in all to some 300,000 francs, being unnegotiable, were returned by post. Other bills, however, were presented, and the bearer of one of them was traced to his home, where a number of the papers were found in the same handwriting as the envelopes which had come through the post. This fixed the suspicion on a man named Rousselot, and he was brought to confess that he had participated in the crime. He had committed it at the instigation of the son Edward, who was moved by greed and jealousy. A long trial followed, resulting in the conviction of Rousselot and a sentence of life at the galleys, but the evidence was not deemed conclusive against the son, and he was released.
A common feature in French crime has always been the systematic organisation of offenders in bands, where a number of them contrive to act in concert under chosen leaders. There have been many of these associations from time to time working on a wide scale and doing enormous damage. Thechauffeurs, so called from their methods of torture to extort confessions of hidden wealth, were a product of the revolutionary epoch, and a revival of the baneful bands, that have constantly ravaged France from the Middle Ages. The extensive operations of Cartouche, one of the most daring and successful of thieves on a large scale, were rivalled by the terrible band directed by Hulin in the forestof Montargis, and the exploits of Pontailler, who worked close up to the walls of Paris.
The depredations of a number of the worst criminals spread terror through the capital in 1836 and the years immediately following. Now again, as when Vidocq was charged with pursuit and discovery, serious robberies were of constant occurrence, and were rightly attributed to associated action. Very many ex-convicts, those regularly released, and yet more who had made their escape from durance, were at large. Some five or six thousand infested Paris alone. The police were ever on the alert, but failed to put their hands upon the ringleader, until all at once an atrocious murder was committed in broad daylight in the populous quarter of the Temple.
Among the respectable dealers of that neighborhood was a family named Renaud, father, mother and daughter, who kept a shop for the sale of mattresses and bedding. One afternoon in June, Renaud meant to take his wife and daughter for a walk, and sent the girl to their private residence, hard by, to help her mother to dress. She found the rooms securely locked, and, thinking her mother was within, asleep, went down to ask her father if she should be awakened. On her return she met a man coming down in a hurry, and a second, following. But still her mother’s door was closed. Still no answer came to her knocking, and she again sought her father, who now ascended and broke into theroom with a hatchet. Madame Renaud was lying dead upon the floor, bearing many wounds. It was subsequently found that a bag of gold had been abstracted from the room, a quantity of silver money and several pieces of plate. Beyond question the strange men first seen were the authors of the crime. As the men reached the street a woman had met them, and heard a sound of silver rattling down on the pavement. Some one also cried after them: “Here! You’ve dropped a silver spoon;” and the smaller of the two paused to pick it up and run on. Others noted them as they passed, and that their clothes were much stained with blood. But they went on, and entered a café, where they called for two glasses of sugared water. Their haggard looks attracted attention, and they were seen using the water bottle to wash their hands below the table. Evidently disturbed, and dreading further observation, they got up and hurriedly left the café.
The description given of these two men fitted with that of a couple of convicts recently released from Toulon. Search was made for them, and, as it progressed, the police came upon several confederates, all members of a gang in which these two, by name Soufflard and Le Sage, were leading spirits. With a third, called Micaud, they formed the executive of this criminal association. They had all been at Toulon together, and were known there as the most violent and intractable prisoners. When a new act of insubordination was planned,a new series of thefts, this trio always originated or were concerned in it. Le Sage in particular was a terror to his keepers. He had a sister of the same type as himself, a half savage peasant woman, who hawked bread about in a basket, but whose real occupation was that of spy, who hunted out jobs for execution, promising great profit to those who could bring them off. She had trained a small son to assist her, a precocious child, who was an adroit thief on his own account. Inspired and guided by these chiefs, a number of lesser practitioners were kept constantly busy. Crimes multiplied throughout Paris; jewellers’ shops were broken into, and private apartments by force or with false keys; shops were explored by pretended purchasers of goods, and their weak points laid bare and a descent made next night.
Le Sage, who had been locked up for a brief space in La Force, was, on his release, informed by his sister of the chances offered by the Renaud establishment in the Temple. He saw at once that robbery could hardly be effected without violence, which he did not shrink from, but he wanted a stalwart companion. Soufflard, who was also at large, was thirsting for some “big thing,” and willingly joined in the attack upon the Renauds. The crime once committed, the police were soon on the track of the murderers, guided by the indications of false friends. Le Sage was taken first, and easily identified. Soufflard, who had three separate domiciles, andwas very wary, was only caught through the help of a jealous comrade, who denounced him. Trial and conviction rapidly followed, but Soufflard after the sentence, evading the supervision of the warders, who were removing him to the Conciergerie, swallowed a quantity of arsenic, and died of the effects. Le Sage also committed suicide by hanging himself in his cell.
Crime is of no class, and in all countries and in all ages, high born offenders, as well as low, have stood in the dock to answer for their misdeeds. There are two cases about this period that may be quoted here in proof of this particular statement; one the alleged poisoning of her husband by Madame Lafarge; the other, the horrible murder of the Duchesse de Choiseul-Praslin by her husband, the Duke, at their mansion, the Hotel Sebastiani in the Faubourg St. Honoré, Paris. Both take rank with the most celebrated cases, and attracted extraordinary interest, which has but little abated even now.
The case of Madame Lafarge is still an unsolved mystery. Grave doubts as to her guilt prevailed, and many learned lawyers have maintained that she was the victim of judicial error. The accused, Marie Fortunée Cappelle, was a young lady in good society, well educated and well bred, who had married a manufacturer at Glandier in the Limoges country, not far from Bordeaux. She was the daughter of a colonel in Napoleon’s Artillery of the Guard. Shewas well connected. Her aunts were well married, one to a Prussian diplomatist, the other to Monsieur Garat, the General Secretary of the Bank of France. Her father had stood well with Napoleon, had held several important military commands, and was intimate with many of the nobles of the First Empire. Marie lost her parents early, and, being possessed of a certain fortune, a marriage was sought for her in the usual French way. She was not exactly pretty, but was distinguished looking, with a slim, graceful figure, a dead white complexion, jet black eyes and a sweet, sad smile.
The husband chosen was a certain Charles Pouch Lafarge, a man of fair position, but decidedly the inferior of Marie Cappelle. He was in business as an iron master, and was deemed prosperous. He said he had a large private residence in the neighborhood of his works, a fine mansion, situated in a wide park, where his wife would be in the midst of agreeable and fashionable society. Great, almost indecent, haste was shown in arranging and solemnising the marriage. Within five days the bride started for her new home, and quickly realised that she had been completely befooled. M. Lafarge at once showed himself in his true colors as a rough, brutal creature, who treated his wife badly from the first. The family seat at Glandier was a fraud. It was a damp, dark house in a street, surrounded with smoky chimneys. The park did not exist, nor did the pleasant neighbors. She had been grossly deceived,and the reality was even worse than it appeared, for Lafarge was in serious financial difficulties, and had been obliged to issue forged bills of exchange to keep his head above water. The unhappy and disappointed wife, when face to face with the truth, made a determined effort to break loose from Lafarge. On the very day of her arrival at Glandier, she shut herself up in her room, and wrote him an indignant yet appealing letter, in which she threatened, if he would not let her go, to take arsenic. And this, her first mention of the lethal drug, was remembered against her in later days, when she was tried for her life.
Peace was patched up between the ill-assorted couple, and Marie was persuaded to withdraw her letter and promise to do her best to accept the position, and make her husband happy. “With a little strength of mind,” she wrote to an uncle, “with patience and my husband’s love, I may grow contented. Charles adores me, and I cannot but be touched by the caresses he lavishes on me.” He must have been willing enough to secure her good graces, for he wanted her to part with her fortune to improve his business. He had discovered a new process in iron-smelting, which promised to be profitable, and his wife lent him money to develop the invention. Then he hurried to Paris to secure the patent, and while absent from Glandier, where his wife remained, the first event occurred on which the suspicion of foul play was based. Madame Lafargewas now so affectionately disposed that she desired to send her portrait to her husband. The picture was to be accompanied by a number of small cakes prepared by the mother-in-law, and Marie Lafarge wrote to beg her husband to eat one at a particular hour on a particular day. She would do the same at Glandier, and thereby set up some mysteriousrapportwith her husband. When the parcel arrived, the picture was found within, but no small cakes, only one large one. The box had been tampered with. When it left Glandier, it was screwed down. It reached Paris fastened with long nails. Lafarge, on opening it, broke off a part of the large cake, and ate it. That night he was taken violently ill. The cake presumably contained poison, but the fact was never proved, still less that Marie Lafarge had inserted the arsenic, which it was supposed to contain. The evidence against her was that she had bought some of this baneful drug from a chemist at Glandier. The charge was definitely made, but on weak evidence, the chief being the purchased arsenic and her manifest agitation when the news came from Paris that her husband had been taken ill. On the other hand, there was nothing to show that she had substituted the large poisoned cake for the small ones, or that no one else had handled the parcel. Here crept in the notion of another agency, and the suggestion that some one else might have been anxious to poison Lafarge. This idea was by no means extravagant, and it cropped up more thanonce during the proceedings, but no proper attention was paid to it. Had the clue been followed, it might have led inquiry to the possible guilt of another person.
Lafarge returned from Paris a good deal shaken, but the doctor promised that with rest his health would be restored. On the contrary it got worse, and with symptoms which to-day would undoubtedly be attributed to arsenical poisoning. Marie Lafarge would have constituted herself sole nurse, but the mother-in-law would not agree, and would never leave her alone with her husband. Witnesses deposed to having seen Marie take a white powder from a cupboard, which she mixed with the chicken broth and medicine given to Lafarge. Another witness declared that the patient cried out “that his medicine burnt out like fire.”
All this time Marie Lafarge did not conceal her possession of arsenic. She bought it openly to kill rats, she said: a very hackneyed excuse. It had been bought through one of Lafarge’s clerks, Denis Barbier by name, upon whom rested strong suspicion from first to last. Barbier was a man of bad character, passing under a false name. He had been the secret accomplice of Lafarge in passing forged bills, and a shrewd theory was advanced that all along he was scheming to supplant his master and take possession of his property after he (Lafarge) had been made away with. Barbier’s conduct was such that the Prussian jurists who investigated thetrial afterwards declared that they would have accused him of the crime rather than Madame Lafarge.
The trial was no doubt conducted with gross carelessness. A post-mortem was made, but not until it was insisted upon, and it was very imperfectly performed. When at length the corpse was disinterred, only an infinitesimal quantity of arsenic was at first found in the remains, but when the most eminent scientists of the day were called in, it was established by M. Orfila that the deceased had been poisoned. The circumstances of the case fixed the guilt upon Madame Lafarge. She was very ably defended by the famous Maitre Lachaud, but the jury had no doubt, and condemned her by a majority of voices. At the same time she was given the benefit of extenuating circumstances, and sentenced totravaux forcésfor life, with exposure in the public square of Tulle. This decision, although supported by science, was not universally approved. Many believed in her innocence to the last, and the number of her sympathisers was legion. She endured her imprisonment at Montpelier, where she remained for many years, engaged almost continually in literary work. Her “Memoirs” and a work entitled “Prison Hours” were largely read. She also conducted an enormous correspondence, for she was permitted to receive and send out an unlimited number of letters. No less than six thousand passed through her hands. At length in 1852she petitioned the head of the State, and was released with a full pardon by Napoleon III.
It is impossible at this length of time to settle a question so keenly debated by her contemporaries. The possibility of her having served for another’s crime hardly rests on any very strong basis, and the circumstances that led to her arraignment were very much against her. It must not be forgotten, moreover, that she was charged with a crime other than that of theft, and was convicted of it. In this again she may have suffered unjustly. A school friend, who had become the wife of the Vicomte de Leautaud, accused her of having stolen her diamonds, when on a visit at her house. Marie Lafarge freely admitted the diamonds were in her possession, and pointed out where they might be found at Glandier, but she refuted the accusation of theft, and declared that the Vicomtesse had entrusted the diamonds to her to be sold. Her former lover threatened blackmail, and Madame de Leautaud was driven to buy him off—this was Marie’s explanation, which Madame de Leautaud repelled by declaring that it was Marie Lafarge who was threatened, and that the diamonds were to be sacrificed to save her good name. In the end, the case was tried in open court, and Madame Lafarge was found guilty, although there were many contradictory facts. It was strange that the Vicomtesse so long refrained from complaining of the theft, and made so little of the loss. Marie, on the other hand, scarcely secreted thejewels, and was known to have a number of fine loose stones, for which she variously accounted—one story being that they were a gift, another that she had owned them from childhood. A sentence of two years’ imprisonment was passed upon Madame Lafarge, but it merged in the larger term, when she was convicted of having poisoned her husband.
The murder of the Duchesse de Choiseul-Praslin by the husband shocked all Europe, not only on account of the horrible details of the deed, but from the high rank of the parties concerned. The Duke held his head high as the representative of an ancient family, and his unhappy victim was one of the leaders of French fashionable society. She was the daughter of one of the first Napoleon’s famous generals, the Count Sebastian, and when in Paris they resided at the Sebastian Hotel in the Faubourg St. Honoré, in the Champs Elysées. In August, 1840, the family came from their country seat, the magnificent Chateau of Vaux, constructed by the famous Fouquet, Louis XIV’s finance minister, who fell into such irretrievable disgrace, and died after long years of close imprisonment.
It was not a happy marriage, although ten children had been born to them. But the Duke and Duchess had become estranged as the years passed by, and were practically separated. Although still residing under the same roof, they held no communication with each other. What is now calledincompatibility of temper was the cause, and the Duke was a masterful, overbearing man, who wanted his own way, and had his own ideas as to the bringing up of his children. He would not suffer his wife to have any voice in their education and management, but claimed to control them completely through their governesses, who were quickly changed if they failed to give satisfaction. One at last was found to suit, and the fact served to suggest a motive for the crime. Whether or not there was really an intrigue between this Madame Deluzy and the Duke, it was strongly suspected, and the Duchess certainly detested her. The Duke put the governess in a false position. He preferred her society, and lived much with his children committed to her charge, in a remote wing of the house.
These relations continued unchanged for several years, and the Duchess, although consumed with jealous rage, would have ended them by pleading for a divorce. Here the King and Queen intervened, and sought to reconcile husband and wife. Madame Deluzy left the Praslins to take a situation at a school, the head of which, not strangely, asked for a personal character from the Duchess. Curious stories had been put about, which must be cleared up before the new governess could be engaged. The Duchess refused pointblank to give a certificate, although the mistress came in person with Madame Deluzy to seek it. No doubt the Duke took this refusal in very bad part, and it isbelieved a violent quarrel ensued, although no record of it was preserved. But it is a fact of the utmost importance as supplying the motive for the crime committed the same night, or rather in the small hours of the following morning.
At four o’clock agonized cries disturbed the sleeping household. They proceeded from the Duchess’s apartment, and were compared by those who heard them to the yells of a lunatic in a fit of fury. Frantic ringings of the bell, rapid and intermittent, were the next sounds, followed by deep groans, the thud of blows and the fall of a heavy body. The servants rushed down, and found an entrance through doors, which had been locked from within. All the external doors and shutters giving upon the gardens were closed, their fastenings intact; only that of an antechamber, leading to the staircase which communicated with the Duke’s bedroom on the floor above, was open. He was apparently still undisturbed, and it was not until the servants had penetrated to the inner apartment, where they found the Duchess lying prone in her nightdress and deluged with blood, that the Duke appeared on the staircase. He was greatly agitated, asked excitedly and repeatedly what had happened, and struck the wall and his head with his hands. When he saw the corpse he cried: “Who can have done this? Help! Help! Fetch a doctor. Quick!”
The doctors arrived, and close behind them the commissaries of police, who began their investigationimmediately. That murder had been committed was clear from the slashed and stricken state of the corpse. There were quite a dozen wounds. The throat was cut down to the bone, the carotid artery and the jugular severed. Gashes in the hands showed that desperate attempts had been made to ward off the murderous blows by catching at the blade of the knife used. The poor woman had fought a hard fight for her life. Later, a close examination of the Duke proved that he had been wounded. His left hand was lacerated, and the thumb had been bitten, deep scratches with nails convulsively used,—all these bore witness to the struggle, and turned suspicion to the Duke. This was strengthened by other telltale facts. His bedroom was in the utmost disorder, water had been poured into the basin to wash off traces of blood, and several garments wringing wet were hung up in the place.
When called upon to state the facts as he knew them, the Duke made a very lame defence. He had roused from a sound sleep by loud cries, but, believing they came from the street outside, he waited until he thought he heard steps in the garden; then he rose, put on a dressing-gown, took a loaded pistol, and went down to his wife’s room. He called to her, but received no answer, and then lit a candle, by the feeble light of which he discovered her where she lay bleeding to death. Overcome with horror, he said, he ran back to his own room to wash offthe blood with which he was now covered, and again descended to join the servants, who had now arrived upon the scene. The replies to the many serious questions put to the Duke were considered highly incriminating, and as by this time the highest officers of justice had reached the spot it was decided that the supposed murderer, whose guilt seemed clear, should be taken into custody. The King (Louis Philippe) was absent at his seaside residence, the Castle of Eu, and a special messenger was despatched to the coast, asking that the House of Peers should be summoned as a high court of justice to deal with the crime.
Meanwhile an order of arrest was issued, and the Duke would have been conveyed to the nearest prison but that a disturbance was dreaded. Great crowds had assembled near the Hotel Sebastian, and feeling ran high against the aristocratic criminal. A day was thus wasted, and when the Duke was removed at length to the Luxembourg lock-up he was too weak to walk, and could barely speak. It was thought at first that he had been attacked with cholera; for that dread epidemic was just then ravaging Paris, and he exhibited some of the symptoms of that disease; but there was presently little doubt that when left unobserved in his own house he had contrived to become possessed of some poison, and had attempted his own life. When searched, on leaving his house, a phial was found in his pocket, containing laudanum mixed with arsenical acid.Remedies were promptly applied, but failed to counteract the evil effects of the strong dose.
The “instruction,” or preliminary inquiry, was, however, continued, despite the condition of the accused and the constitutional difficulties which demanded the intervention of the House of Peers. But the Duke grew weaker hourly, and could frame no replies to the questions, and was beyond doubt dying. At the last, just three days after his commission of the crime, he made full confession of his guilt. Nothing had been proved against Madame Deluzy. She had been charged with complicity, but was in due course discharged.
The crime of De Choiseul-Praslin occurred at a time when political passion ran high, and the reign of Louis Philippe was approaching its term. The feeling against the aristocracy was greatly embittered; the republican opposition was strongly moved by this atrocious murder committed by a Duke and Peer of France upon an unoffending wife. A report gained ground and could not be discredited, that the authorities had permitted him to evade justice; that the story of his death was quite untrue, and that he had been allowed to escape to England. There were people who afterwards declared that they had met the Duke, walking with Madame Deluzy in a London street, and when the funeral took place an attack was threatened upon the hearse so as to verify the matter. All this increased the popular excitement, and the government was fiercelydenounced for daring to shield a titled criminal from the consequence of his acts. No doubt the Praslin murder was a contributory cause of the Revolution of 1848 and the downfall of Louis Philippe.