The History and Romance of Crime 12

The History and Romance of Crime 12

Before leaving Fossard it may be interesting to note that he had been a

long time at large in Paris, and was the author of innumerable thefts.

His capture was a difficult matter, for he was a reckless character,

who had frequently been sent to the _bagnes_ and as frequently escaped

therefrom. The police report said of him: “Unequalled for intrepidity

and always armed to the teeth, he must be attacked with caution.” He

declared that he would blow out the brains of any police agent who

attempted to apprehend him. Vidocq obtained great credit for making the

arrest. Fossard lived in great retirement at the shop of a vintner, who

was secretly warned by Vidocq that Fossard intended to rob him, and,

if necessary, to cut his throat in doing so. The vintner, alarmed, was

willing enough to admit the police, and Fossard was overpowered by

the gensdarmes and taken in his bed. Fossard’s history was curious. He

had embarked early upon a career of crime. He came of decent people,

and had received a good education, but his nature was vicious and he

speedily lapsed into evil courses. One peculiar characteristic was

useful to him in his nefarious business. He had a natural taste for

the fabrication of keys, and was known as one of the most skilful

locksmiths of his time. He died at Brest, two or three years after his

conviction of the robbery of the medals.

 

Vidocq, with all his shrewdness and insight into criminal human nature,

was himself capable of being deceived. Later on, when he had secured

a firm foothold in the police and was actually director of the newly

created detective department, a man unknown to him came to offer his

services as an _indicateur_. When asked what he could do he answered,

“Anything.” “Well,” said Vidocq, “take these two five-franc pieces,

and bring me the best two fowls you can find in the market.” The man

returned with the fowls and the money also. “How did you do it?” asked

Vidocq. “I went to the market,” said the messenger, “carrying the

basket on my shoulders, which I had filled with stones with straw on

the top. I also bought some vegetables, which were placed on top of

the straw. When I bought the fowls, I begged the woman, as I stood

before her, to place them on the basket; in doing this her hands

were occupied and mine free, the pockets of her apron were close in

front of me and I soon recovered my two five-franc pieces and thirty

francs besides.” “That was clever,” cried Vidocq, “do you often work

like that? Come again to-morrow. I daresay I shall find you a job.”

The would-be agent went off delighted, taking with him Vidocq’s gold

watch and the contents of his pockets. The thief had made the most of

his time, and, while explaining his action in robbing the woman who

had sold him the fowls, had repeated the trick upon Vidocq as he stood

before him.

 

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 informed against 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 like a 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 the _Police

provocative_. Agents were employed 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 for his

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.

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER V

 

THE COMBAT WITH CRIME

 

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 carefully

concealed. 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. The _coqueurs_, 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.