MADAME LAFARGE. (From a Contemporary Print.)MADAME LAFARGE.(From a Contemporary Print.)
This strange effusion was read with consternation not only by Lafarge, but by his mother, his sister, and her husband. A stormy scene followed between Lafarge and his wife, but at length he won her over. She withdrew her letter, declaring that she did not mean what she wrote, and that she would do her best to make him happy. “I have accepted my position,” she wrote to M. Garat, “although it is difficult. But with a little strength of mind, with patience, and my husband’s love, I may grow contented. Charles adores me, and I cannot but be touched by the caresses lavished on me.” To another she wrote that she struggled hard to be satisfied with her life. Her husband under a rough shell possessed a noble heart; her mother-in-law and sister-in-law overwhelmed her with attentions.Now she gradually settled down into domesticity, and busied herself with household affairs.
M. Lafarge made no secret of his wish to employ part of his wife’s fortune in developing his works. He had come upon an important discovery in iron smelting, and only needed capital to make it highly profitable. His wife was so persuaded of the value of this invention that she lent him money, and used her influence with her relatives to secure a loan for him in addition. Husband and wife now made wills whereby they bequeathed their separate estates to each other. Lafarge, however, made a second will, almost immediately, in favour of his mother and sister, carefully concealing the fact from his wife. Then he started for Paris, to secure a patent for his new invention, taking with him a general power of attorney to raise money on his wife’s property. During their separation many affectionate letters passed between them.
The first attempt to poison, according to the prosecution, was made at the time of this visit to Paris. Madame Lafarge now conceived the tender idea of having her portrait painted, and sending it to console her absent spouse. At the same time she asked her mother-in-law to make some small cakes to accompany the picture. They were made and sent, with a letter, written by the mother, at Marie Lafarge’s request, begging Lafarge to eatoneof the cakes at a particular hour on a particular day. She would eat one also at Glandier at the same moment, and thus a mysterious affinity might be set up between them.
A great deal turned on this incident. The case containing the picture and the rest was despatched on the 16th of December, bydiligence, and reached Paris on the 18th. But on opening the box, one large cake was found, not several small ones. How and when had the change been effected? The prosecution declared it was Marie’s doing. The box had undoubtedly been tampered with; it left, or was supposed to leave, Glandier fastened down with small screws. On reaching Paris it was secured with long nails, and the articles inside were not placed as they had been on departure. Lafarge tore off a corner of the large cake, ate it, and the same night was seized with violent convulsions. It was presumably a poisoned cake, although the fact was never verified, but Marie Lafarge was held responsible for it, and eventually charged with an attempt to murder her husband.
In support of this grave charge it was found that on the 12th of December, two days before the box left, she had purchased a quantity of arsenic from a chemist in the neighbouring town. Her letter asking for it was produced at the trial, and it is worth reproducing. “Sir,” she wrote, “I am overrun with rats. I have tried nux vomica quite without effect. Will you, and can you, trust me with a little arsenic? You may count upon my being most careful, and I shall only use it in a linen closet.” At the same time she asked for other drugs, of a harmless character.
Further suspicious circumstances were adduced against her. It was urged that after the case had been despatched to Paris she was strangely agitated, her excitement increasing on the arrival of news that her husband was taken ill, that she expressed the gravest fears of a bad ending, and took it almost for granted that he must die. Yet, as the defence presently showed, there were points also in her favour. Would Marie have made her mother-in-law write referring to the small cakes, one of which the son was to eat, if she knew that no small cakes, but one large one, would be found within? How could she have substituted the large for the small? There was as much evidence to show that she could not have effected the exchange as that she had done so. Might not someone else have made the change? Here was the first importation of another possible agency into the murder, which never seems to have been investigated at the time, but to which I shall return presently to explain how Marie Lafarge may have borne the brunt of another person’s crime. Again, if she wanted thus to poison her husband, it would have been at the risk of injuring her favourite sister also. For this sister lived in Paris, and Lafarge had written that she often called to see him. She might, then, have been present when the case was opened, and might have been poisoned too.
Lafarge so far recovered that he was able to return to Glandier, which he reached on the 5th of January, 1840. That same day Madame Lafarge wrote to the same chemist for more arsenic. It was a curious letter, and certainly calculated to prejudice people against her. She told the chemist that her servants had made the first lot into a clever paste which her doctor had seen, and for which he had given her a prescription; she said this “so as to quiet the chemist’s conscience, and lest he should think she meant to poison the whole province of Limoges.” She also informed the chemist that herhusband was indisposed, but that this same doctor attributed it to the shaking of the journey, and that with rest he would soon be better.
But he got worse, rapidly worse. His symptoms were alarming, and pointed undoubtedly to arsenical poisoning, judged by our modern knowledge. Madame Lafarge, senior, now became strongly suspicious of her daughter-in-law, and insisted on remaining always by her son’s bedside. Marie opposed this, and wished to be her husband’s sole nurse, and, according to the prosecution, would have kept everyone else from him. She does not seem to have succeeded, for the relatives and servants were constantly in the sick-room. Some of the latter were very much on the mother’s side, and one, a lady companion, Anna Brun, afterwards deposed that she had seen Marie go to a cupboard and take a white powder from it, which she mixed with the medicine and food given to Lafarge. Madame Lafarge, senior, again, and her daughter, showed the medical attendant a cup of chicken broth on the surface of which white powder was floating. The doctor said it was probably lime from the whitewashed wall. The ladies tried the experiment of mixing lime with broth, and did not obtain the same appearance. Yet more, Anna Brun, having seen Marie Lafarge mix powder as before in her husband’s drink, heard him cry out, “What have you given me? It burns like fire.” “I am not surprised,” replied Marie quietly. “They let you have wine, although you are suffering from inflammation of the stomach.”
Yet Marie Lafarge made no mystery of her having arsenic. Not only did she speak of it in the early days, but during the illness she received a quantity openly before them all. It was brought to her at Lafarge’s bedside by one of his clerks, Denis Barbier (of whom more directly), and she put it into her pocket. She told her husband she had it. He had been complaining of the rats that disturbed him overhead, and the arsenic was to kill them. Lafarge took the poison from his wife, handed it over to a maid-servant, and desired her to use it in a paste as a vermin-killer. Here the facts were scarcely against Marie Lafarge.
As the husband did not improve, on the 13th his mother sent a special messenger to fetch a new doctor from a more distant town. On their way back to Glandier, this messenger, the above-mentioned Denis Barbier, confided to the doctor that he had often bought
“ON THIS THE MOTHER DENOUNCED MARIE TO THE NOW DYING LAFARGE” (p. 142).“ON THIS THE MOTHER DENOUNCED MARIE TO THE NOW DYING LAFARGE” (p.142.)
arsenic for Marie Lafarge, but that she had begged him to say nothing about it. The doctor, Lespinasse by name, saw the patient, and immediately ordered antidotes, while some of the white powder was sent for examination to the chemist who had originally supplied the arsenic. The chemist does not seem to have detected poison, but he suggested that nothing more should be given Lafarge unless it had been prepared by a sure hand.
On this the mother denounced Marie to the now dying Lafarge as his murderess. The wife, who stood there with white face and streaming eyes, heard the terrible accusation, but made no protest. From this time till his last moments he could not bear the sight of his wife. Once, when she offered him a drink, he motioned, horror stricken, for her to leave him, and she was not present at his death, on the 14th of January. A painful scene followed between the mother and Marie by the side of the still warm corpse—high words, upbraidings, threats on the one side, indignant denials on the other. Then Marie’s private letters were seized, the lock of her strong-box having been forced, and next day, the whole matter having been reported to the officers of the law, apost-mortemwas ordered, on suspicion of poisoning. “Impossible,” cried the doctor who had regularly attended the deceased. “You must all be wrong. It would be abominable to suspect a crime without more to go upon.” Thepost-mortemwas, however, made, yet with such strange carelessness that the result was valueless.
It may be stated at once that the presence of arsenic was never satisfactorily proved. There were several early examinations of the remains, but the experts never fully agreed. Orfila, the most eminent French toxicologist of his day, was called in to correct the first autopsy, and his opinion was accepted as final. He was convinced that there were traces of arsenic in the body. They were, however, infinitesimal; Orfila put it at half a milligramme. Raspail, another distinguished French doctor, called it the hundredth part of a milligramme, and for that reason declared against Orfila. His conclusion, arrived at long after her conviction, was in favour of the accused. The jury, he maintained, ought not to have found her guilty, because no definite proof was shown of the presence of arsenic in the corpse.
This point was not the only one in the poor woman’s favour. Even supposing that Lafarge had been poisoned—which, in truth,is highly probable—the evidence against her was never conclusive, and there were many suspicious circumstances to incriminate another person. This was Denis Barbier, Lafarge’s clerk, who lived in the house under a false name, and whose character was decidedly bad. Lafarge was not a man above suspicion himself, and he long used this Barbier to assist him in shady financial transactions—the manufacture of forged bills of exchange, which were negotiated for advances. Barbier had conceived a strong dislike to Marie Lafarge from the first; it was he who originated the adverse reports. At the trial he frequently contradicted himself, as when he said at one time that he had volunteered the information that he had been buying arsenic for Marie, and at another, a few minutes later, that he only confessed this when pressed.
Barbier, then, was Lafarge’s confederate in forgery; had these frauds been discovered he would have shared Lafarge’s fate. It came out that he had been in Paris when Lafarge was there, but secretly. Why? When the illness of the iron-master proved mortal, Barbier was heard to say, “Now I shall be master here!” All through that illness he had access to the sick-room, and he could easily have added poison to the various drinks given to Lafarge. Again, when the possibilities of murder were first discussed, he was suspiciously ready to declare that it was nothewho gave the poison. Finally, the German jurists, already quoted, wound up their argument against him by saying, “We do not actually accuse Barbier, but had we been the public prosecutors we should rather have formulated charges against him than against Madame Lafarge.”
Summing up the whole question, they were of opinion that the case was full of mystery. There were suspicions that Lafarge had been poisoned, but so vague and uncertain that no conviction was justified. The proofs against the person accused were altogether insufficient. On the other hand, there were many conjectures favourable to her. Moreover, there was the very gravest circumstantial evidence against another person. The verdict should decidedly have been “Not proven.” But public opinion, hastily formed, condemned Madame Lafarge in advance, and the machinery of the French criminal law helped to create a new judicial error, through obstinate reliance on a preconceived opinion.
Marie Lafarge was sentenced to hard labour for life, after exposure in the public pillory. The latter was remitted, but shewent into the Montpelier prison and remained there many years. During her seclusion she received some six thousand letters from outside, the bulk of them sympathetic and kindly. Many in prose or verse, and in several languages, were signed by persons of the highest respectability. A large number offered marriage, some the opportunities for escape and the promise of happiness in another country. She replied to almost all with her own hand. Her pen was her chief solace during her long imprisonment, and several volumes of her work were eventually published, including her memoirs and prison thoughts. At last, having suffered seriously in health, she appealed to Napoleon III., the head of the Second Empire, and obtained a full pardon in 1852.
IN THE PUBLIC PILLORY. (From the Engraving by Victor Adam.)IN THE PUBLIC PILLORY.(From the Engraving by Victor Adam.)
The sad story of Madame Lafarge would be incomplete without some account of another mysterious charge brought against her shortly after her arrest for murder. When her mother-in-lawaccused her of poisoning her husband, one of her old schoolmates declared that she had stolen her jewels. This second allegation raised the public interest to fever pitch. All France, from court to cottage, all classes, high and low, were concerned in this greatcause célèbre, in which the supposed criminal, both thief and murderess, belonged to the best society, and was a young, engaging woman. The question of her guilt or innocence was keenly discussed. Each new fact or statement was taken as clear proof of one or the other, and each side found warm advocates in the public Press.
MAÎTRE LACHAUD.MAÎTRE LACHAUD.
The charge of theft, although the lesser, took precedence of that of murder, and Madame Lafarge was tried by the Correctional Tribunal of Tulle before she appeared at the assizes to answer for her life. She was prosecuted by the Vicomte de Leautaud on behalf of his wife. The accusation was clear and precise. Madame de Leautaud’s diamonds had disappeared for more than a year; the Vicomte believed that Madame Lafarge, when Marie Capelle, had stolen them when on a visit to his house, the Château de Busagny, and he prayed the court to authorise a search to be made at Glandier, Madame Lafarge’s residence until her recent arrest.
When arraigned and interrogated, Marie at once admitted that the diamonds were in her possession. She readily indicated the place where they would be found at Glandier, and made no difficulty as to their restitution. But she long refused positively to explain how she had come by them, declaring it to be a secret she was bound in honour to keep inviolate. At last, under the urgent entreaties of her friends, she confided the secret to her two counsel, Maître Bac and Maître Lachaud (at that time on the threshold of his great and enduring renown), and sent them to Madame Leautaudbeseeching her to allow a full revelation of the facts. The letters she then wrote her school friend have been preserved. The first was brief, and merely introduced Maître Bac as a noble and conscientious person, who had her full confidence, and on whom Madame de Leautaud might rely in discussing an affair that concerned them both so closely. The second was a pathetic appeal to tell the whole truth about the diamonds, and it is not easy to say on reading it whether it was inspired by extraordinary astuteness or by genuine emotion. It ran:
Marie,—May God never visit upon you the evil you have done me. Alas, I know you to be really good, but weak. You have told yourself that as I am likely to be convicted of an atrocious crime I may as well take the blame of one which is only infamous. I kept our secret. I left my honour in your hands, and you have not chosen to absolve me.The time has arrived for doing me justice. Marie, for your conscience’ sake, for the sake of your past, save me!... Remember the facts; you cannot deny them. From the moment I knew you I was deep in your confidence, and I heard the story of that intrigue, begun at school and continued at Busagny by letters that passed through my hands.You soon discovered that this handsome Spaniard had neither fortune nor family. You forbade him to love, although you had first sought his love, and then you entered into another love affair with M. de Leautaud....The man you flouted cried for vengeance.... The situation became intolerable, but money alone could end it. I came to Busagny, and it was arranged between us that you should entrust your diamonds to me, so that I might raise money on them, with which you could pay the price he demanded.
Marie,—May God never visit upon you the evil you have done me. Alas, I know you to be really good, but weak. You have told yourself that as I am likely to be convicted of an atrocious crime I may as well take the blame of one which is only infamous. I kept our secret. I left my honour in your hands, and you have not chosen to absolve me.
The time has arrived for doing me justice. Marie, for your conscience’ sake, for the sake of your past, save me!... Remember the facts; you cannot deny them. From the moment I knew you I was deep in your confidence, and I heard the story of that intrigue, begun at school and continued at Busagny by letters that passed through my hands.
You soon discovered that this handsome Spaniard had neither fortune nor family. You forbade him to love, although you had first sought his love, and then you entered into another love affair with M. de Leautaud.
...The man you flouted cried for vengeance.... The situation became intolerable, but money alone could end it. I came to Busagny, and it was arranged between us that you should entrust your diamonds to me, so that I might raise money on them, with which you could pay the price he demanded.
The letter proceeds in similar terms, and need not be reproduced at length. Marie Lafarge continues to implore her old friend to save her, reminding her that only thus can she save herself. Otherwise all the facts must come out.
Remember [and here we seem to get one glimpse of the cloven foot] I have all the proofs in my hands. Your letters to him and his to you, your letters to me.... Your letter, in which you tell me that he is singing in the chorus at the opera, and is of the stamp of man to extort blackmail.... There is one thing for you to do now. Acknowledge in writing under your own hand, dated June, that you consigned the diamonds to my care with authority to sell them if I thought it advisable. This will end the affair.
Remember [and here we seem to get one glimpse of the cloven foot] I have all the proofs in my hands. Your letters to him and his to you, your letters to me.... Your letter, in which you tell me that he is singing in the chorus at the opera, and is of the stamp of man to extort blackmail.... There is one thing for you to do now. Acknowledge in writing under your own hand, dated June, that you consigned the diamonds to my care with authority to sell them if I thought it advisable. This will end the affair.
As Madame de Leautaud still positively denied the truth of these statements, Marie, in self-defence, made them to the judge. She told the whole story of how the diamonds had been given her to sell, that she might remit the amount to a young man in poor circumstances and of humble condition, whose revelations might proveinconvenient. Madame de Leautaud had assisted Marie to take the jewels out of their settings, so as to facilitate their sale. If they had not as yet been sold, it was because she had found it very difficult to dispose of them, both before and after her marriage. She still had them; and they were, in fact, found at Glandier, in the place she indicated. There was never any question as to the identity of the stones, which were recognised in court by the jeweller who had supplied them, and who spoke to their value, some £300, independently of certain pearls which were missing.
The prosecution certainly made out a strong case against Marie Lafarge. The jewels, it was stated, were first missed after a discussion between the two ladies on the difference between paste and real stones. At first Madame de Leautaud made little of her loss. She was careless of her things, and thought her husband or her mother had hidden her jewels somewhere to give her a fright. But they both denied having played her any such trick, and as the jewels were undoubtedly gone, the police were informed, and many of the servants suspected. Suspicion against Madame Lafarge had always rankled in Madame de Leautaud’s mind, and it was soon strengthened by her strange antics with regard to the jewels. On one occasion she defended a servant who had been suspected, promising to find him a place if he were dismissed, as she knew he was innocent. One of her servants told the de Leautauds that her mistress said laughingly she had stolen the jewels and swallowed them. Again, Madame Lafarge had submitted to be mesmerised by Madame de Montbreton, Madame de Leautaud’s sister, and had fallen into an evidently simulated magnetic trance; when, being questioned about the missing jewels, she said they had been removed by a Jew, who had sold them. Other circumstances were adduced as strongly indicating Marie’s guilt. It was observed in Paris, before her marriage, that she had a quantity of fine stones, loose, and she explained that they had been given her at Busagny. Once after her marriage M. Lafarge had asked her for a diamond to cut a pane of glass, and, to his surprise, she produced a number, saying she had owned them from childhood, but that they had only been handed over to her lately by an old servant.
These contradictory explanations told greatly against Madame Lafarge. She made other statements also that were at variance. When first taxed with the theft she pretended that the diamondshad been sent her by an uncle in Toulouse, whose name and address she was, however, unable to give. Next she brought up the story contained in her appealing letter to Madame de Leautaud. It was the story of the young man, Félix Clavé, son of a schoolmaster, with whom the girls had made acquaintance. Having frequently met him when attending mass, they rashly wrote him an anonymous letter, giving him a rendezvous in the garden of the Tuileries. Marie Lafarge declared that the encouragement came from Madame de Leautaud, which the latter denied, and retorted that it was Marie Lafarge who had been the object of the young man’s devotion.
Then Clavé disappeared to Algeria, so Marie declared, as he had written to her from Algiers. Madame de Leautaud said this was impossible, as she had seen him on the stage of the opera. A few months later, Marie alleged, when her friend was with her at Busagny, Madame de Leautaud brought out the diamonds and implored Marie to sell them for her, as she must “absolutely” have money to buy Clavé’s silence. What followed, according to Marie Lafarge, has already been told, except that Madame de Leautaud went through a number of devices to make it appear that the diamonds had been stolen from her, and that then M. de Leautaud was informed of the supposed theft. The gendarmes actually came to search the château and to investigate the robbery next day, although at that time the diamonds were safe in her possession, entrusted to her by Madame de Leautaud.
According to the prosecution, these statements were quite untrue. There had been a theft, and it was soon discovered. The chief of the Paris detective police, M. Allard, had been summoned to Busagny to investigate, and he was satisfied that the robbery had been committed by someone in the château; and, as the servants all bore unimpeachable characters, M. Allard had asked about the other inmates, and the guests. Then M. de Leautaud mentioned Marie Capelle (Lafarge), and hinted that there were several sinister rumours current concerning her, but would not make any distinct charge then. M. Allard now remembered that there had been another mysterious robbery at the house of Madame Garat, Marie Lafarge’s aunt, in Paris, a couple of years before, when a 500 franc note had been stolen, and he had been called in to investigate, but without any result. What if Marie Capelle (Lafarge) had had something to do with this theft?
“HER OWN MAID ELECTED TO GO WITH HER TO PRISON” (p. 150).“HER OWN MAID ELECTED TO GO WITH HER TO PRISON” (p.150).
It must be admitted that these charges, if substantiated, made the case look black against Marie Lafarge. But one, at least, fell entirely to the ground when she was on her defence. It was clearly shown that she could not have stolen the banknote at her aunt’s, Madame Garat’s, for she was in Paris at the time. As regards the diamonds, her story, if she had stuck to one account only—that of the blackmail—would have been plausible, nay probable, enough. It was positively contradicted on oath by the lady most nearly concerned, Madame de Leautaud, and it was not believed by the court; and Marie Lafarge was finally convicted of having stolen the diamonds, and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment. She appealed against this finding, and appeared no less than four timesto seek redress, always without success. Meanwhile the graver charge of murder had been gone into and decided against her; so that the shorter sentence for theft was merged into the life sentence.
There were many who believed in Marie’s entire innocence to the very last. Her own maid elected to go with her to prison, and remained by her side for a year. A young girl, cousin of the deceased M. Lafarge, was equally devoted, and also accompanied her to Montpelier gaol. Her advocate, the eminent Maître Lachaud, steadfastly denied her guilt, and years later, when the unfortunate woman died, he regularly sent flowers for her grave.
MADELEINE SMITH. (From a Portrait taken in Court during her Trial.)MADELEINE SMITH. (From a Portrait taken in Court during her Trial.)
The eldest daughter of a Glasgow architect, Madeleine Smith was a girl of great beauty, bright, attractive, and much courted. But from all her suitors she singled out a certain Jersey man, Pierre Émile l’Angelier, anemployéin the firm of Huggins, in Glasgow—a small, insignificant creature, altogether unworthy of her in looks or position. The acquaintance ripened, and Madeleine seems to have become devotedly attached to her lover, whom she often addressed as her “own darling husband.” They kept up a clandestine correspondence, and had many stolen interviews at a friend’s house. In the spring of 1856 Madeleine’s parents discovered the intimacy, and peremptorily insisted that it should end forthwith. But the lovers continued to meet secretly, and Madeleine threw off all restraint, and was ready to elope with her lover. The time was indeed fixed, but she suddenly changed her mind.
Then a rich Glasgow merchant, Mr. Minnock, saw Madeleine, and was greatly enamoured of her. Early in January, 1857, he offered her marriage, and she became engaged to him. It wasnecessary, now, to break with l’Angelier, and, mindful of the old adage to be off with the old love before she took on with the new, she wrote to him, begging him to return her letters and her portrait. L’Angelier positively refused to give them or her up. He had told many friends of his connection with Madeleine Smith, and some of them had now advised him to let her go. “No; I will never surrender the letters, nor, so long as I live, shall she marry another man.” On the 9th of February he wrote her a letter, which must have been full of upbraiding, and probably of threats, but it has not been preserved. Madeleine must have been greatly terrified by it, too, for her reply was a frantic appeal for mercy, for a chivalrous silence as to their past relations which he was evidently incapable of preserving. She was in despair, entirely in the hands of this mean ruffian, who was determined not to spare her; she saw all hope of a good marriage fading away, and nothing but ignominious exposure before her.
As the result of the trial, when by-and-by she was arraigned for the murder of l’Angelier, was a verdict of “Not Proven,” it is hardly right to say that she now resolved to rid herself of the man who possessed her guilty secret. But that was the case for the prosecution, the basis of the charge brought against her. She had made up her mind, as it seemed, to extreme measures. She appeared to be reconciled with l’Angelier, and had several interviews with him. What passed at these meetings of the 11th and 12th of February was never positively known, but on the 19th he was seized with a mysterious and terrible illness, being found lying on the floor of his bedroom writhing in pain, and likely to die. He did, in fact, recover, but those who knew him said he was never the same man again. He seems to have had some suspicion of Madeleine, for he told a friend that a cup of chocolate had made him sick, but said he was so much fascinated by her that he would forgive her even if she poisoned him, and that he would never willingly give her up.
Rumours of the engagement and approaching marriage now reached his ears, and called forth fresh protests and remonstrances. Madeleine replied, denying the rumours, and declaring that she loved him alone. About this time the Smith family went on a visit to Bridge of Allan, where Mr. Minnock followed them, and, at his urgent request, the day of marriage was fixed. Then they all returned to Glasgow, and missed l’Angelier, who also hadfollowed Madeleine to Bridge of Allan. He remained at Stirling, but, on receiving a letter from her, he went on to Glasgow, being in good health at the time. This was the 22nd of February, a Sunday, on which night, about eight p.m., he reached his lodgings, had tea, and went out. As he left, he asked for a latchkey, saying he “might be late.” He expressed his intention of going back to Stirling the following day.
That same night, or rather in the small hours of the morning, the landlady was roused by a violent ringing of the bell; and, going down to the front door, found l’Angelier there, half doubled up with pain. He described himself as exceedingly ill. A doctor was sent for, who put him to bed and prescribed remedies, but did not anticipate immediate danger. The patient, however, persisted in repeating that he was “worse than the doctor thought”; but he hoped if the curtains were drawn round his bed, and he were left in peace for five minutes, he would be better. These were his last words. When the doctor presently reappeared; l’Angelier was dead. He had passed away without giving a sign; without uttering one word to explain how he had spent his time during the evening.
A search was made in his pockets, but nothing of importance was found; but a letter addressed to him signed “M’eine,” couched in passionate language, imploring him “to return.” “Are you ill, my beloved? Adieu! with tender embraces.” The handwriting of this letter was not identified, but a friend of l’Angelier’s, M. de Mean, hearing of his sudden death, went at once to warn Madeleine Smith’s father that l’Angelier had letters in his possession which should not be allowed to fall into strange hands. It was too late: the friends of the deceased had sealed up his effects and they refused to surrender the letters.
Later M. de Mean plainly told Madeleine Smith, whom he saw in her mother’s presence, that grave suspicion began to overshadow her. It was known that l’Angelier had come up from Bridge of Allan at her request, and he implored her to say whether or not he had been in her company that night. Her answer was a decided negative, and she stated positively that she had seen nothing of him for three weeks. She went farther and asserted that she had neither seen nor wanted to see him on the Sunday evening; she had given him an appointment for Saturday, but he had not
“THE LANDLADY WAS ROUSED BY A VIOLENT RINGING OF THE BELL.” (p. 152).“THE LANDLADY WAS ROUSED BY A VIOLENT RINGING OF THE BELL.” (p.152.)
appeared, although she had waited for him some time. This appointment had been made that she might recover her letters. All through this painful interview with de Mean, Madeleine appeared in the greatest distress. Next morning she took to flight.
Madeleine was pursued, but by her family, not by the police, and was overtaken on board a steamer bound for Rowallan. Soon after her return to Glasgow the contents of her letters to l’Angelier were made public, and apost-mortemhad been made. The body had been exhumed, and the suspicious appearance of the mucous membrane of the stomach, together with the history of the case, pointed to death by poison. The various organs, carefully sealed, were handed over to experts for analysis, and it may be well to state here the result of the medical examination.
Dr. Penny stated in evidence that the quantity of arsenic found in the deceased amounted to eighty-eight grains, or about half a, teaspoonful, some of it in hard, gritty, colourless, crystalline particles. It was probable that this was no more than half the whole amount the deceased had swallowed, for under the peculiar action of arsenic a quantity, quite half a teaspoonful, must have been ejected.
The chief difficulties in the case were whether anyone could have taken so much as a whole teaspoonful of arsenic unknowingly, and how this amount could have been administered. The question was keenly debated, and it was generally admitted that the poison could have been given in chocolate, cocoa, gruel, or some thick liquid, or mixed with solid food in the shape of a cake. This was not inconsistent with the conjectures formed that l’Angelier had met Madeleine Smith on the Sunday night.
The case against her became more formidable when it was ascertained that she had been in the habit of buying arsenic, but with the alleged intention of taking it herself, for her complexion. She was now arrested and sent for trial at Edinburgh, on a charge of poisoning l’Angelier. Her purchases of arsenic were proved by the chemist’s books under date of the 21st of February, and again on the 6th and 18th of March, this last date being four days before the murder.
It was also proved that she wanted to buy prussic acid a few weeks before her arrest. There was nothing to show that she had obtained or possessed any arsenic at the time of l’Angelier’s first illness, on the 19th of February. But it was proved in evidencethat, on the night of his death, Sunday, the 22nd of March, l’Angelier had been seen in the neighbourhood of Blythswood Square, where the Smiths lived; again, that he had himself bought no arsenic in Glasgow.
Madeleine’s plucky demeanour in court gained her much sympathy; she never once gave way; only when her impassioned letters were being read aloud did she really lose her composure. She stepped into the dock as though she were entering a ballroom and although she was under grave suspicion of having committed a dastardly crime, the conduct of l’Angelier had set the public strongly against him, so that a vague feeling of “served him right” was present in the large crowd assembled to witness the trial. The case for the prosecution was strong, but it failed to prove the actual administration of poison, or, indeed, that the accused had met the deceased on the Sunday night.
The judge, in summing up, pointed out the grave doubts that surrounded the case, and the verdict of the jury was “Not proven,” by a majority of votes.
This result was received with much applause in court, and generally throughout Glasgow, although a dispassionate review of all the facts in this somewhat mysterious case must surely point clearly to a failure of justice. However, Madeleine triumphed, and won great favour with the crowd. The money for her defence was subscribed in Glasgow twice over, and even before she left the court she received several offers of marriage.
Since writing the foregoing I have had an interesting communication from a lady, who has told me the impressions of one who was present in court during the whole of Madeleine Smith’s trial. This gentleman was an advocate, trained and practised in the law, and according to his opinion, unhesitatingly expressed, there could be no shadow of doubt but that Madeleine was l’Angelier’s wife, by the law of Scotland. As he has put it, in Scotland two people who ought to be married can generally be joined together, and there was little doubt that the sanction of matrimony was needed for this connection. Both Madeleine and l’Angelier were in the habit of addressing each other as husband and wife. This explains l’Angelier’s insistence on the point that “so long as he lived Madeleine should never marry another man.”
The verdict of “Not proven” was brought in by the jury on thegrounds that it was not established that the two had actually met on the Sunday night preceding l’Angelier’s last illness. Nevertheless, it is certain that a pocket-book of l’Angelier’s was offered as evidence to the judge, Lord Fullerton, who examined it, but ruled it out because it was not a consecutive diary and the entries had been made in pencil. This book was placed, after the proceedings, in the hands of the legal gentleman above mentioned, and he saw in it an unmistakable entry made by l’Angelier to the effect that he had been in Madeleine’s company on the Saturday night.
“SHE STEPPED INTO THE DOCK AS THOUGH SHE WERE ENTERING A BALL-ROOM” (p. 155).“SHE STEPPED INTO THE DOCK AS THOUGH SHE WERE ENTERING A BALL-ROOM” (p.155.)
Full corroboration is given by my informant of the engaging and attractive appearance of Madeleine Smith. She was so excessively pretty and bewitching that, to use his own words, no one but ahard-hearted old married man could have resisted her fascinations. He had no doubt whatever in his own mind of her guilt.
General W. E. Ketchum, of the United States army, was a man somewhat past the prime of life, but still sound and strong. Mrs. Wharton was the widow of an army man, and was upwards of fifty years of age. The two were intimate friends, and the General, who had amassed a modest competence, had lent various sums to Mrs. Wharton, amounting to some $2,600 (£520). She was not well off, as it was thought, and, just before the events about to be recorded, she was unable to pay an intended visit to Europe from insufficient funds and inability to obtain her letter of credit.
On the 23rd of June, 1871, General Ketchum came from Washington to her house in Baltimore, to see the last of her, believing her about to start on her long journey, and to collect his debt of $2,600. He was in excellent health when he left home, but very soon after arriving at Baltimore he was taken very ill. He rallied for a time, but again relapsed, and on the 28th of June he died. Suspicions were aroused by his sudden decease, and certainly the symptoms of his illness, as reported, were singular and obscure. Whilst he lay there sick unto death, another gentleman residing in the same house was also suddenly prostrated with a strange and unaccountable sickness, and narrowly escaped with his life.
After General Ketchum’s death his waistcoat was not to be found, nor the note for $2,600. Mrs. Wharton declared that she had repaid him what she owed him and that he had then given her back the note of hand, which was destroyed there and then. She furthermore claimed from his estate a sum of $4,000 in United States Bonds, which, as she asserted, she had entrusted to the General’s safe keeping; yet there was not the slightest mention of any such transaction in his papers—a strange omission, seeing that he was a man of unquestionable integrity, and most scrupulously exact in all matters of account.
Chemical analysis of the stomach of the deceased disclosed the presence of antimonial poison—one of the constituents of tartar emetic. The same poison had been found in a tumbler of milk punch prepared by Mrs. Wharton for General Ketchum, and in atumbler of beer offered by Mrs. Wharton to the other invalid in her house, Mr. van Ness. Mrs. Wharton had been known to buy tartar emetic during the very week when these singular illnesses occurred among the guests under her roof.
In these suspicious facts people easily found materials for believing in a crime, and a story was soon spread to the effect that Mrs. Wharton had succeeded in poisoning General Ketchum, and had tried to poison Mr. van Ness. Meanwhile she resumed her preparations for her voyage to Europe; but on the very day of departure, the 10th of July, 1871, a warrant for her arrest was issued, and she was taken into custody. In the trial which followed, a great many of the known facts were ruled out as inadmissible. It was argued, and accepted in law, that an accusation of murdering one man could not be supported by evidence of an attempt to kill another, although almost at the same time and by the same means. The charge of poisoning General Ketchum was tried as if there had been no van Ness, as if no other person had been taken ill in Mrs. Wharton’s house. But by reason of the predisposition of the public mind, the case was transferred from Baltimore to Annapolis, and there tried.
The first witness was a Mrs. Chubb, who had accompanied General Ketchum to Baltimore, and who testified that he had fallen ill directly he arrived. He was seized with vomiting, giddiness, and general nausea, which lasted for three days. A doctor was then called in, who prescribed medicine, but Mrs. Wharton broke the bottle, whether by accident or intentionally it was impossible to say. Distinct evidence was first afforded of the possession of tartar emetic by Mrs. Wharton. Mrs. Chubb, who went out to get a fresh bottle of medicine for the General, was asked to buy the antimony also, which Mrs. Wharton said she wanted for herself.
The invalid’s condition improved a little the next day, and arrangements were made to remove him to his own home. However, he relapsed and became worse than ever. The doctor prescribed medicine, which was to be given him at intervals, but before the time for taking the second dose, Mrs. Wharton appeared with it, or something like it, yet different, and more of it than was prescribed. This she strenuously urged the General to swallow, and succeeded in inducing him to do so. Within fifteen minutes he was racked with terrible pain. He tore with his fingers at his throat, chest,and stomach until he broke the skin, then followed fierce convulsions, at the end of which he died.
Fresh evidence was forthcoming, but not accepted, against Mrs. Wharton. At her suggestion Mrs. van Ness, who had been nursing her brother, had concocted some milk punch. This was made in two portions. One was given to Mr. van Ness, and produced symptoms very similar to those exhibited by the unfortunate General Ketchum; the other had been left in a refrigerator by the General’s bedside, and when what was left had been examined by Mrs. van Ness, she declared it had been tampered with; there was a strange muddy deposit at the bottom of the tumbler, and when tasted it was metallic, leaving a curious grating sensation in the mouth. The original constituents had been no more than whisky, milk, and sugar. This testimony was ruled out of order, as belonging to an entirely different case.
The doctor who had attended the General gave evidence as to the symptoms he observed and the remedies applied. At first sight he thought him to be suffering from Asiatic cholera; but later developments were more those of apoplexy, and then again he feared paralysis. He at length had his suspicions aroused, and hinted at poison. The remains of the suspected tumbler were shown him, and his doubts became convictions. With regard to the poisonous action of tartar emetic, the doctor testified that he had noticed all its symptoms in the deceased, although there was a strong similarity between them and those of cholera. Other medical opinion was to the effect that death might have been due to cerebro-spinal meningitis, and some stress was laid upon the absence of antimonial poison in many of the internal organs, although it was contended it had been found in small quantities in the stomach. The same lethal drug had been also detected by analysis in the sediment at the bottom of the tumbler of milk punch.
The verdict of the jury was “Not guilty,” but it did not satisfy public opinion, and it was generally felt that Wharton’s counsel had by no means established her innocence; none of the incriminating facts had been entirely disproved, nor had the exact truth in regard to the money transactions been elicited. No doubt the accused escaped chiefly owing to the fact that chemical experts, called by her counsel, were not satisfied, beyond the possibility of all reasonable doubt, that antimony had been found in the vital organsof General Ketchum. At the time of this trial another indictment was also pending against Mrs. Wharton, charging her with an attempt to kill Mr. van Ness by administering poison. But some months later the counsel for the State entered anolle prosequi, for what reasons was never generally or distinctly known.
Truth is stranger than fiction, as we have heard often enough, but in this extraordinary case we shall never know how much is fiction, how much truth. If justice failed, it was misled by a series of the strangest circumstances, some of which have remained a mystery to the present hour. The following details are taken from an account written by a magistrate resident near the scene of the occurrence, and by name Sir Thomas Overbury, the direct descendant of the unfortunate Overbury poisoned in the Tower.