Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 53, No. 327, January, 1843

III.—THE ROBBERY AND MURDER

At the same time that the horseman left Lieursaint for Paris, the Lyons mail arrived there from Paris, and changed horses. It was about half-past eight, and the night had been obscure for some time. The courier, having charged horses and taken a fresh postilion, set forth to traverse the long forest of Senart. The mail, at this epoch, was very different from what it is at present. It was a simple post-chaise, with a raised box behind, in which were placed the despatches. Only one place, by the side of the courier, was reserved for travellers, and that was obtained with difficulty. On the night in question this seat was occupied by a man of about thirty, who had that morning taken it for Lyons, under the name of Laborde, a silk-merchant; his real name was Durochat; his object may be guessed.

At nine o'clock, the carriage having descended a declivity with great speed, now slackened its course to mount a steep hill which faced it; at this moment four horsemen bounded into the road—two of them seizing the horses' heads, the two other attacked the postilion, who fell lifeless at their feet, his skull split open by a sabre-cut. At the same instant—before he had time to utter a word—the wretched courier was stabbed to the heart by the false Laborde, who sat beside him. They ransacked the mail of a sum of seventy-five thousand francs (L.3000) in money, assignats, and bank-notes. They then took the postilion's horse from the chaise, and Durochat mounting it, they galloped to Paris, which they entered between four and five in the morning by the Barrier de Rambouillet.

IV.—THE ARREST

This double murder, committed with such audacity on the most frequented route of France, could not but produce an immense sensation, even at that epoch so fertile in brigandage of every sort, where the exploits of la Chouannerie, and the ferocious expeditions of the Chauffeurs,8 daily filled them with alarm. The police were at once in pursuit. The post-horse ridden by Durochat, and abandoned by him on the Boulevard, was found wandering about the Palais Royale. It was known that four horses covered with foam had been conducted at about five in the morning to the stables of a certain Muiron, Rue des Fossé's, Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois, by two men who had hired them the day before: these men were Bernard and Couriol; the former of whom was immediately arrested, the second had, with the other accomplices, taken flight.

The research was pursued with great activity at Paris, as well as at the scene of the crime, and along the route which the assassins had twice travelled. The information obtained showed that there were five culprits. The description of the four horsemen who rode from Paris, stopping at Mongeron and Lieursaint, was furnished with as much precision as concordance by the various witnesses who had seen and spoken to them on the road, and in the inns and cafés. The description of the traveller, who, under the name of Laborde, had taken the seat beside the courier, was furnished with equal exactitude by the clerks, from whom he had retained the place, and by those who saw him mount. Couriol, recognized as having with Bernard conducted back the horses to Muiron, after the crime, had left Paris for Château-Thierry, where he was lodged in the house of Citoyen Bruer, where also Guesno had gone on some business. The police followed Couriol, and arrested him. They found upon him a sum in money and assignats, nearly equivalent to a fifth share of what the courier had been robbed. Guesno and Bruer were also arrested, and had their papers seized; but they so completely established their alibi, that they were at once dismissed on their arrival at Paris. At the epoch of which we write, the examination of judicial affairs followed a very different course from the one now traced by the French code. It was to the Citoyen Daubenton, justice of the peace of the division of Pont Neuf, and officer of the police judiciare, that the Central Bureau confided the examination of this affair. This magistrate having ordered the dismissal of Guesno, told him that he might present himself at his cabinet on the morrow, for the papers which had been seized at Château-Thierry; at the same time he ordered an officer, Hendon, to start at once for Mangeron and Lieursaint, and to bring back the witnesses, whose names he gave him, so that they might all be collected the next day at the Bureau for examination.

Guesno, desirous of having his papers as soon as possible, went out early, and directed his steps towards the Central Bureau, which he had just reached when he encountered his compatriot Lesurques; having explained to him the motive that called him to the Bureau, he proposed to him that they should go together. Lesurques accepted, and the Citizen Daubenton not having yet arrived, they sat down in the antechamber, in order to see him as he passed, and thus expedite the matter.

About ten o'clock the judge, who had entered his cabinet by a back door, was interrupted in his examination of the documents, previous to interrogating the witnesses, by the officer Hendon, who demanded leave to make an important communication. "Amongst the witnesses," said he, "now waiting in the antechamber, are two women—one, la femme Santon, servant to Evrard the innkeeper at Mongeron—the other, la fille Grossetète, servant to Madame Châtelain the limonadière at Lieursaint, who assert in the most positive manner, that two of the assassins are there, waiting like them to be admitted. These women declare that they cannot deceive themselves, for one of them served the four travellers at Mongeron, and the other spoke to them at Lieursaint, and stayed an hour in the billiard-room while they were playing."

The judge could not admit the probability of two of the assassins thus voluntarily placing themselves within the grasp of the law, yet he ordered the women to be shown into his presence. On interrogation, they persisted in their statements, declaring that it was impossible they could deceive themselves. Guesno was then introduced to the judge's presence, the women being continued to examine him strictly before finally pronouncing as to his identity.

"What brings you to the Central Bureau?" demanded the judge.

"I come to receive my papers," replied Guesno, "as you promised me yesterday that I should have them on application."

"Are you alone?"

"I have a compatriot with me, one Joseph Lesurques, whom I met on the way here."

The judge then ordered the second individual designated by the women to be introduced. It was Lesurques. He spoke to Lesurques and to Guesno for a few minutes, and then begged them to return into the antechamber, where their papers would be sent to them. An order was given, however, to the officer, Hendon, not to lose sight of them.

On their leaving the room, M. Daubenton again demanded of the women, if they persisted in their declarations as to the identity of these men with the criminals they were in search of. They replied, without hesitation, that they were certain of it; that they could not be deceived. The magistrate was then forced to receive their depositions in writing, and to order the arrest of Guesno and Lesurques.

From the moment of their arrest, the examination proceeded with great rapidity. Guesno and Lesurques were confronted with the witnesses brought from Mongeron and Lieursaint, and were recognised by all of them!

La femme Santon deposed, that Lesurques was the one who, after the dinner at Mongeron, wanted to pay in assignats, but that the big dark man (Couriol) paid in money. She was positive as to Lesurques being the man.

Champeaux and his wife, who kept the inn at Lieursaint, were equally positive as to Lesurques being the one whose spur wanted mending, and who came back to fetch the sabre which he had forgotten. Lafolie, groom at Mongeron, and la femme Alfroy, also recognised him; and Laurent Charbaut, labourer, who dined in the same room with the four horsemen, recognised Lesurques as the one who had silver spurs fastened by little chains to his top-boots. This combination of testimony, respecting one whom they had seen but a few days before, was sufficient to leave little doubt in the mind of any one. The trial was therefore fixed on.

The day of his arrest, Lesurques wrote the following letter to one of his friends, which was intercepted, and joined to the documentary evidence to be examined on the trial:—

"My dear Friend,—I have met with nothing but unpleasantries since my arrival at Paris, but I did not—I could not anticipate the misfortune which has befallen me to-day. You know me—and you know whether I am capable of sullying myself with a crime—yet the most atrocious crime is imputed to me. The mere thought of it makes me tremble. I find myself implicated in the murder of the Lyons' courier. Three women and two men, whom I know not—whose residence I know not—(for you well know that I have not left Paris)—have had the impudence to swear that they recognise me, and that I was the first of the four who presented himself at their houses on horseback. You know, also, that I have not crossed a horse's back since my arrival in Paris. You may understand the importance of such an accusation, which tends at nothing less than my judicial assassination. Oblige me by lending me the assistance of your memory, and endeavour to recollect where I was and what persons I saw at Paris, on the day when they impudently assert they saw me out of Paris, (I believe it was the 7th or 8th,) in order that I may confound these infamous calumniators, and make them suffer the penalty of the law."

In a postscript he enumerates the persons he saw on that day: Citoyen Tixier, General Cambrai, 'Demoiselle Eugénie, Citoyen Hilaire Ledru, his wife's hairdresser, the workmen in his apartments, and the porter of the house.

V.—THE TRIAL, AND THE BLINDNESS OF ZEAL

MM. Lesurques, Guesno, Couriol, Bernard, Richard, and Bruer, were summoned before the tribunal of justice; the three first as authors or accomplices of the murder and robbery—Bernard as having furnished the horses—Richard as having concealed at his house Couriol—and his mistress, Madelaine Breban, as having received and concealed part of the stolen goods—and Bruer as having given Couriol refuge at Château-Thierry.

The witnesses persisted in their declarations as to the identity of Guesno and Lesurques. But Guesno established beyond all doubt the fact of his alibi; and Bruer easily refuted every charge that concerned himself. Lesurques had cited fifteen witnesses—all respectable men—and presented himself at the bar with a calmness and confidence which produced a favourable impression. Against the positive testimony of the six witnesses who asserted him to have been at Mongeron and Lieursaint on the 8th Floréal, he had brought a mass of testimony to prove an alibi.

Citoyen Legrand, a rich jeweller and goldsmith, compatriot of Lesurques, was first examined. He deposed, that on the 8th Floréal—the day on which the crime had been committed—Lesurques had passed a portion of the morning with him.

Aldenof, a jeweller, Hilaire Ledru, and Chausfer, deposed, that on that day they dined with Lesurques in the Rue Montorgueil; that, after dinner, they went to a café, took some liqueur, and went home with him.

Beudart, a painter, deposed that he was invited to the dinner, with Lesurques and his friends, but that, as one of the national guard, he was that day on service, and so was prevented attending; but that, he had gone to Lesurques that very evening in his uniform, and had seen him go to bed. In support of his deposition he produced his billet de garde, dated the 8th.

Finally, the workmen employed in the apartment that Lesurques was having fitted up, deposed that they saw him at various times during the 8th and 9th Floréal.

No further doubt of his innocence now remained; the alibi was so distinctly proved, and on such unquestionable testimony, that the jury showed in their manner that they were ready to acquit him, when a fatal circumstance suddenly changed the whole face of the matter.

The jeweller Legrand, who had manifested such zeal in the establishment of his friend's innocence, had, with an anxiety to avail himself of every trifle, declared, that to prove the sincerity of his declaration, he would cite a fact which prevented his being mistaken. On the 8th Floréal, he had made before dinner an exchange of jewellery with the witness, Aldenof. He proposed that his ledger should be sent for, as its entry there would serve to fix all recollections.

As a matter of form, the ledger was sent for. At the first glance, however, it was evident that the date of the transaction, mentioned by Legrand, had been altered! The exchange had taken place on the 9th, and an alteration, badly dissimulated by an erasure, had substituted the figure 8 for the original figure 9.

Murmurs of surprise and indignation followed this discovery, and the President, pressing Legrand with questions, and unable to obtain from him any satisfactory answer, ordered his arrest. Legrand then, trembling and terrified, retracted his former deposition, and declared that he was not certain he had seen Lesurques on the 8th Floréal, but that he had altered his book in order to give more probability to the declaration he had determined to make in his friend's favour—of whose innocence he was so assured, that it was only the conviction that he was accused erroneously, which made him perjure himself to save that innocent head.

From this moment, the jury received the depositions in favour of Lesurques with extreme prejudice—those already heard seemed little better than connivance, and those yet to be heard were listened to with such suspicion as to have no effect. The conviction of his guilt was fixed in every mind. Lesurques, despairing to get over such fatal appearances, ceased his energetic denials, and awaited his sentence in gloomy silence. The jury retired.

At this moment a woman, agitated with the most violent emotions, demanded to speak to the President. She said that she was moved by the voice of conscience, and wished to save the criminal tribunal from a dreadful error. It was Madelaine Breban, the mistress of Couriol. Brought before the President, she declared that she knew positively Lesurques was innocent, and that the witnesses, deceived by an inexplicable resemblance, had confounded him with the real culprit, who was called Dubosq.

Prejudiced as they were against Lesurques, and suspicious of all testimony after the perjury they had already detected, the tribunal scarcely listened to Madelaine Breban; and the jury returned with their verdict, in consequence of which, Couriol, Lesurques, and Bernard were condemned to death; Richard to four-and-twenty years' imprisonment; Guesno and Bruer were acquitted.

No sooner was the sentence passed, than Lesurques rose calmly, and addressing the Judges, said, "I am innocent of the crime of which I am accused. Ah! citoyens, if it is horrible to murder on the high-road, it is not less so to murder by the law!"

Couriol, condemned to death, rose and said, "Yes, I am guilty—I avow it. But Lesurques is innocent, and Bernard did not participate in the murder."

Four times he reiterated this declaration; and, on entering his prison, he wrote to the judge a letter full of sorrow and repentance, in which he said, "I have never known Lesurques; my accomplices are Vidal, Rossi, Durochat, and Dubosq. The resemblance of Lesurques to Dubosq has deceived the witnesses."

To this declaration of Couriol was joined that of Madelaine Breban, who, after the judgment, returned to renew her protestation, accompanied by two individuals, who swore that, before the trial, she had told them Lesurques had never had any relations with the culprits; but that he was a victim of his fatal likeness to Dubosq. These testimonies threw doubt in the minds of the magistrates, who hastened to demand a reprieve from the Directory, which, terrified at the idea of seeing an innocent man perish through a judicial error, had recourse to the Corps Législatif; for every other resource was exhausted. The message of the Directory to the Five Hundred was pressing; its aim was to demand a reprieve, and a decision as to what course to pursue. It ended thus: "Must Lesurques perish on the scaffold because he resembles a villain?"

The Corps Législatif passed to the order of the day, as every condition had been legally fulfilled, that a particular case could not justify an infraction of decreed laws; and that, too, on such indications, to do away with a condemnation legally pronounced by a jury, would be to overset all ideas of justice and equality before the law.

The right of pardon had been abolished; and Lesurques had neither resources nor hope. He bore his fate with firmness and resignation, and wrote, on the day of his execution, this note to his wife:—

"Ma bonne Amie,—There is no eluding ones destiny, I was fated to be judicially murdered. I shall at least bear it with proper courage. I send you my locks of hair; when our children are grown up, you will divide it among them; it is the only heritage I can leave them."

He addressed also a letter to Dubosq through the newspapers. "You, in whose place I am about to perish, content yourself with the sacrifice of my life. Should you ever be brought to justice, remember my three children covered with opprobrium—remember my wife reduced to despair and do not longer prolong their misfortunes."

VI.—THE EXECUTION

The 10th March 1797, Lesurques was led to the scaffold. He wished to be dressed completely in white, as a symbol of his innocence. He wore pantaloons and frock-coat of white cotton, and his shirt-collar turned down over his shoulders. It was the day before Good Friday, and he expressed regret that he had not to die on the morrow. In passing from the prison de la Conciergerie to the Place de la Grève, where the execution took place, Couriol, placed beside Lesurques in the cart, cried out to the people in a loud voice, "Citoyens, I am guilty! I am guilty! but Lesurques is innocent."

On arriving at the platform of the guillotine, already stained with the blood of Bernard, Lesurques exclaimed, "I pardon my judges; I pardon the witnesses through whose error I die; and I pardon Legrand, who has not a little contributed to my judicial assassination. I die protesting my innocence." In another instant he was no more.

Couriol continued his declarations of Lesurques's innocence to the foot of the scaffold; and, after a final appeal, he, too, delivered himself to the executioner. The drop fell on a guilty neck, having before been stained with the blood of two innocent men.

The crowd retired with a general conviction that Lesurques had perished guiltless; and several of the judges were seriously troubled by the doubts which this day had raised in their minds. Many of the jury began to repent having relied so on the affirmations of the witnesses from Mongeron and Lieursaint, precise as they had been. M. Daubenton, the magistrate who had first ordered the arrest, went home a thoughtful man, and determined to lose no opportunity of getting at the truth, which the arrest of the three accomplices mentioned by Couriol could alone bring to light.

VII.—THE PROOFS

Two years passed on without affording any clue to the conscientious magistrate. One day, however, he heard that a certain Durochat was arrested for a recent robbery, and was confined in the Sainte Pelagie; and remembering that Durochat was the name of the one designated by Couriol as having taken the place beside the courier, under the false name of Laborde. At the epoch of the trial of Lesurques, it came out that several persons, amongst them an inspector of the administration des postes, had seen the false Laborde at the moment that he was awaiting the mail, and had preserved a distinct recollection of his person.

M. Daubenton, on ascertaining the day of Durochat's approaching trial for robbery, went to the administration des postes, and obtained through the Chef the permission to send for the inspector who had seen the false Laborde, and who was no longer in Paris.

The juges du tribunal had also been warned of the suspicions which rested on Durochat. The day of trial arrived, and he was condemned to fourteen years' imprisonment, and was about being led from the court when the inspector arrived, and declared that Durochat was the man whom he had seen on the 8th Floréal mount beside the courier under the false name of Laborde. Durochat only opposed feeble denials to this declaration, and was consequently taken to the Conciergerie.

On the morrow, Durochat was transferred to Versailles, where he was to be judged. Daubenton and a huissier departed with the prisoner and four gendarmes. As they reached the village of Grosbois he demanded some breakfast, for he had eaten nothing since the preceding day. They stopped at the first auberge, and there Durochat manifested a desire to speak to the magistrate in private.

Daubenton ordered the gendarmes to leave them together, and even the huissier, though he made him understand by a sign the danger of being alone with so desperate a villain, was begged to retire. A breakfast was ordered for the two. It was brought—but, by order of the huissier, only one knife was placed on the table. Daubenton took it up, and began carelessly to break an egg with it.

Durochat looked at him fixedly for a moment, and said,

"Monsieur le juge, you are afraid?"

"Afraid!" replied he calmly, "and of whom?"

"Of me," said Durochat.

"Folly!" continued the other, breaking his egg.

"You are. You arm yourself with a knife," said he sarcastically.

"Bah!" replied Daubenton, presenting him the knife, "cut me a piece of bread, and tell me what you have to communicate to me respecting the murder of the courier of Lyons."

There is something in the collected courage of a brave man more impressive than any menace; and courage is a thing which acts upon all natures, however vile. Strongly moved by the calm audacity of the magistrate the ruffian, who had seized the knife with menacing vivacity, now set it down upon the table, and with a faltering voice said, "Vous êtes un brave, citoyen!" then after a pause, "I am a lost man—it's all up with me; but you shall know all."

He then detailed the circumstances of the crime, as we have related them above, and confirmed all Couriol's declarations, naming Couriol, Rossi, Vidal, and Dubosq, as his accomplices. Before the tribunal he repeated this account, adding, "that he had heard an individual named Lesurques had been condemned for the crime, but that he had neither seen him at the time of the deed, nor subsequently. He did not know him."

He added, that it was Dubosq whose spur had been broken, and was mended where they had dined; for he had heard them talk about it, and that he had lost it in the scuffle. He had seen the other spur in his hand, and heard him say that he intended throwing it in the river. He further gave a description of Dubosq's person, and added, that on that day he wore a flaxen peruke.