Memoirs of Vidocq, Volume III/Chapter 34
Once attaining the post of chief of the police of safety, I no longer cared for the snares with which they so often sought to encompass me. The time of trial was past; but still I was compelled to keep on my guard against the base jealousies of some of my subalterns, who envied my appointment, and did their utmost to endeavour to supplant me. Coco-Lacour was a leader amongst the malcontents, who endeavoured to caress and injure me at the same time. At the moment when this rogue was at fifty paces from me and would have overturned all the chairs in a church to come and salute me with a honeyed "God bless you," when, by chance he heard me sneeze, I was well assured that he was a snake in the grass. No one despises more than myself those petty attentions of a man who is servile, even when civility is scarcely requisite. But as I had a conscience which told me that I had done my duty, I cared very little as to whether these demonstrations were false or true. Scarcely a day passed without my spies informing me that Lacour was the soul of certain meetings, (conciliabules,) where all matters relating to me were discussed. They said that he projected my downfall; that there was a party formed against me, the aim of whose conspiracy was to destroy the tyrant Vidocq. At first, the conspirators contented themselves with clamours; and as they hid my destruction perpetually in perspective, that they might mutually please each other, they universally predicted it, and each of them partook beforehand of the inheritance of Alexander. I am ignorant whether the inheritance devolved on "the most worthy," but I know very well that my successor did not hesitate to have recourse to every stratagem, more or less skilful, to succeed in getting it adjudged to him previously to my abdication.
From clamours and scandal-meetings Lacour and his partisans passed to more decided measures; and on the approach of the sitting, during which Peyois, Leblanc, Berthelet, and Lefebvre, who were accused of robbery, by the aid of a crow-bar, or monseigneur le dauphin, they spread a report that I was on the eve of a catastrophe, and that, in all probability, I should not get off with clean hands.
This prophecy, delivered at all the vintners in the environs of the palace of justice, was soon brought to me, but I did not disquiet myself any more than at so many others which were not realized; only, I thought I perceived that Lacour redoubled his attentions and suppleness towards me; he saluted me more respectfully and with more ceremony than usual; his eyes, aided by the spiral movement of his head, when he sought to give himself the graces of a man of good breeding, sedulously avoided all contact with mine. At the same time, I remarked with three other of my agents, Chrestien, Utinet, and Decostard, an increase of zeal for the service, and a complaisance which astonished me. I was instructed that these gentlemen had frequent conferences with Lacour; as for myself, without thinking the least in the world of watching their steps for my personal interest, I had surprised them chattering and talking of me. One evening, particularly, passing into the court of la Sainte-Chapelle, (for they had plotted even in the sanctuary,) I had heard one of them rejoicing that I should not parry the thrust about to be made at me. What did this mean? I had not the least idea. When Peyois and his accomplices had been tried, the judicial examination developed a most atrocious machination, tending to prove that I was the instigator of the crime which had led them to the galleys.
Peyois said, "that having addressed me, to ask me if I knew a recruiter who wanted a substitute, I had proposed that he should rob on my account, and that I had even given him three francs to buy the crow-bar, with which he had been taken when forcibly entering the house of Sieur Labatty." Berthelet and Lefebvre confirmed Peyois's statement; and a vintner named Leblanc who, implicated as well as they, appeared to have been the real provider of funds for procuring the instrument, encouraged them to persevere in a system of defence, which, if allowed, would have the effect of clearing him. The advocates who pleaded in this cause, did not fail to draw all possible argument from this imputation against me, and as they spoke from conviction, if they did not determine the jury to come to a decision favourable to their clients, at least they contrived to insinuate into the minds of the judges and the public most terrible prejudices against me. I therefore felt it incumbent on me to exculpate myself, and, sure of my innocence, I begged M. the préfet of police to grant me an inquiry, that the truth might be made evident.
Peyois, Berthelet, and Lefebvre were condemned, and I imagined that not having henceforward any motive for persisting in falsehood, they would confess that they had calumniated me; I presumed, besides, that in case their conduct should have been the result of suggestion, they would not make much difficulty in naming the advisers of the imposture which they had so impudently supported in the presence of justice. The préfet allowed the inquiry I solicited, and at the moment when he confided the care of directing it to M. Fleuriais, commissary of police for that quarter of the city, a previous document, on which I had not counted, preceded my justification; it was a letter of Berthelet to the vintner Leblanc, who had been declared not guilty; I transcribe it here, because it shows to what are reduced the accusations which were perpetually made against me, the whole time I was attached to the police, and since I have belonged to it. It follows, and I have preserved even the exact orthography.
"A Monsieur,
"Monsieur le Blanc, maître marchand de vin, demeurant barrière du Combat, boulvard de la Chopinette, au signe de la Crois, à proche Paris.
"Monsieur, je vous Ecris cette lettre Cest pour m'enformer de l'état de votre santée Et an même teimps pour vous prevenir que nous sommes pourvus an grace de notre jugement. Vous ne doutez pas de ma malheureuse position. C'est pourquoi que je vous previens que si vous m'abandonné je ferais de nouvelle Revelation de la peince que vous avez fourny et qui a deplus êté trouvée chez vous, dont vous n'ignores pas ce que nous avons caché a la justice a cette Egard, et dont un chef de la police a êté cités dans cette affaire qui était innocent Et qu'on a cherché a rendre victime, vous n'ignores pas les promesse que vous m'aves faite dans votre chambre pour vous soutenir dans le tribunal, vous n'ignores pas que j'ai vendu le suc et de la chandelle a votre femme C'est pourquoi si vous m'abandonne je ne vous regarderes pas pour un nomme dapres toutes vos belles promesses.
"Rappeles vous que la justice ne pert pas ces droit et qui je pourés vous faire appelles en
"Vous navés Rien à craindre cette a passer secrettement.
"Berthelet."
And lower down, "j'aprouve l'ecriture ci desus."
(translation.)
"To Monsieur,
"Monsieur le Blanc, master vintner, living at the barriere du Combat, boulevard de la Chopinette, at the sign of the Cross, near Paris.
"Sir,
"I write you this letter to inform myself of the state of your health, and, at the same time, to let you know that we are about to seek a reversal of our sentence. You cannot doubt my wretched situation. I therefore warn you that if you forsake me, I will make a fresh discovery of the crow-bar which you furnished, and which has been found at your house, which you well know we have not told to justice, and with which a chief of police has been charged in this affair, who is entirely innocent, and who has been singled out as a victim; you are not ignorant of the promises that you made in your room, on condition that we supported you before the tribunal; you are not ignorant that I sold the sugar and candles to your wife, and, therefore, if you abandon me, I shall think no more of you and your fine promises.
"Remember that justice will not lose her rights, and that I can have you summoned to .
"You have nothing to fear, this passes out secretly.
"Berthelet."
"I approve the above."
According to custom, this letter, which was to pass so secretly, was given up to the jailor, who, having read it, forwarded it to the prefecture of police. Leblanc, consequently, being unable to reply or come to Berthelet, he lost his patience, and to put in execution the menaces he had held out, he wrote to me from the Conciergerie another letter thus conceived:—
"Ce 29 Septembre, 1823.
"Monsieur,
"Dapres les debats de la cour d'assise et le resumée du president qui porte a charge Dapres la Declaration du Nommé Peyois qui par une Fosse declaration faite par lui au tribunal d'un Ecul de 3 fr. que vous lui aviez donnés pour acheté linstrument qui a Casses la porte a Monsieur Labbaty.
"Moi Berthelet En presence des autoritées veux faire Reconnoitre la veritée Et votre innocence je declare 1o. savoir ou la peince a êté achetée. 2o. de la maison doù elle est sorty. 3o. et le nom de celui qui la fourny avec veritée.
"Berthelet."
And lower down, "J'approuve lecriture ci Dessus."
Still lower, the seal of the house of justice and the notice from the hand of the chief of the employés of the Conciergerie.
"L'écriture ci-dessus et la signature est celle de Berthelet. "Egly."
(translation.)
"29th September, 1823.
"Sir,
"After the examination of the Court of Assize and the sentence of the president after the declaration of Peyois, who, by a false declaration made by him at the tribunal, of a three franc piece that you had given him, to buy the instrument which broke open M. Labatty's door.
"I, Berthelet, in presence of the authorities, wish to confess the truth and your innocence. I declare, first, when the crow-bar was bought; secondly, the house whence it came; thirdly, the name of him who furnished it, with truth.
"Berthelet."
"I approve the above."
Berthelet, being interrogated by M. Fleuriais, declared that the crow-bar had cost forty-five sous; that it was bought at the faubourg du temple, at a broker's, and that Leblanc, knowing the use to which it was to be applied, had advanced the money to pay for it. "The bargain concluded," continued Berthelet, "Leblanc, who was a little behind, said to me; "If any person should ask you what you are going to do with the crow-bar, you must say that you are a stone-cutter, and that you want the bar to work your turning-wheel. If they ask for your papers, come to me, and I will say that you are my apprentice." I went on with the crow-bar in my hand, and he told me to give it to him, that he might carry it under his great coat, lest I should meet any of the agents. Leblanc then conducted me to his house, and on arriving, his first care was to go down into his cellar to hide the crow-bar. I went up stairs and found Lefebvre there, to whom I said that I had bought the tool. The same evening, after having sat drinking till ten o'clock, Lefebvre, Peyois, and myself went round the temple to a small street, the name of which I forget; Peyois, whilst I and Lefebvre were on the watch, made thirty-three holes by means of a centre-bit, in the shutter of a milliner's shop. The knife he used to enlarge the holes having broken, and our attempt thus failing, we retired, and went then to the market at the corner of St. Eustache, when Peyois, using the crow-bar, tried to force the door of a silk-mercer. Some one within having asked what we wanted, we fled; it was then half-past two o'clock in the morning. We went all then to the hôtel d'Angleterre, when Perjois left with the woman of the house, whom he knew, an umbrella which he had with him.
"Before he entered, Peyois had left the crow-bar, which was wrapped up, with a coffee-seller in the street. We left the hôtel d'Angleterre about five o'clock, and Peyois again took the bar from the woman in whose charge he had left it. I must say that woman knew nothing of what it was. Peyois went then to Leblanc's, and carried the bar with him. Lefebvre and I did not part company, but returned to Leblanc's at five o'clock in the evening, and remained there till tea. Leblanc gave me a phosphorus light-box in case we should need one, and also a piece of candle. I amused myself with tracing on this light-box, which was of lead, with my knife, the letter L, which is Leblanc's initial. Peyois, Lefebvre, and I went out together. Peyois, having taken the bar with him, passed the barrier with it, and then left it with us. He stopped on the road, to call at a house with Victoire Bigan, and Lefebvre and I went to commit (at Labatty's) the robbery for which we were subsequently apprehended. The crow-bar and a part of the booty stolen were conveyed to Leblanc's by Lefebvre.
"Leblanc, who was tried with us, had engaged us not to accuse him, and not to contradict Peyois, who was to say that it was M. Vidocq who had given him three francs to buy the crow-bar; and he has promised to give me a sum of money if I would consent to assert the same thing. I did consent, fearing that if I told the truth my situation would be still worse."
(Declaration of 3d October, 1823.)
Lefebvre, who afterwards confessed, without having any communication with Berthelet, confirmed his confession, as far as concerned Leblanc. "If I did not say," he added, "that it was he who furnished Berthelet with the money for the purchase of the crow-bar, it is because Peyois had engaged me to say that it was he, Peyois, who had bought it. Peyois being compromised in this robbery, was unwilling to charge Leblanc, who was friendly to him and would serve him again." A Monsieur Egly, chief of the employés at the Conciergerie, and Lecomte and Vermont, confined in that prison, having been heard by M. Fleuriais, related many conversations, in which Berthelet, Lefebvre, and Peyois had arranged, in their presence, how they would inculpate me. In their evidence all the convicts agreed that I had endeavoured to dissuade them from doing wrong. Vermont related, besides, that one day he having blamed them because they had compromised me without any motive, they replied: "Stuff! we will do the trick; we would have compromised the eternal Father to save ourselves; but it has not turned out so well as might be."
Peyois, who was the youngest of the party, was less free in his replies: his friendship for Leblanc induced him to conceal a part of the affair, but he confessed that I knew nothing of the purchase of the crow-bar.
"During," said he, "all the time that preceded our trial, and before the court of. assizes, I have affirmed and declared that M. Vidocq gave me the three francs to buy the crow-bar, by the aid of which the robbery has been committed, which caused the apprehension of myself, Berthelet, Leblanc, Lefebvre, and others. I have persisted in saying the same thing, hoping that it might defer or diminish my term of sentence. I had thought of this plan because, some prisoners had told me that it might be of use to me. I will now truly declare that M. Vidocq gave me no money to buy the crow-bar, and I purchased it with my own money: this bar cost me forty-eight sous, and I bought it at a smith's shop in the first street on the right hand, on entering the Rue des Arcis on the side of the bridge of Notre-Dame. I do not know the name of the smith, but I could easily point out the shop, which is the second on the right on going down the street. It was on the eighth or ninth of March last that I made the purchase; the smith and his wife were in the shop; it was the first time I ever bought any thing of them."
Three days afterwards Peyois, having been transferred to Bicêtre, wrote to the chief of the second division of the prefecture of police a letter, in which he confessed that he had constantly imposed on justice, and testified a wish to make sincere disclosures: this time the whole truth did really come to light. Utinet, Chrestien, Decostard, and Coco-Lacour, who had come to the court to depose in favour of the imposture, were at once dragged to light: it became evident that Chrestien had planned the whole intrigue, which was to lead to my expulsion from the police. A declaration which the mayor of Gentilly received, exposed the whole infamy of the machination, from which Lacour, Chrestien, Decostard, and Utinet, had promised themselves the greatest success. This declaration, to which I could add a great many others, comprises a complete justification, and I here subjoin it word for word.
Declaration
"Second Division, First Office, No. 70,466."
"This day, the 13th of October, 1823, at ten o'clock in the morning, we, Guillaume Recodere, mayor of the commune of Gentilly, after the order of M. the councillor of state, préfet of police, we went to the central house of detention of Bicêtre, when we caused to appear before us, in the room of the said prison, André Peyois, detained, under a sentence condemning him to confinement in irons, whom, after having presented a letter addressed to the chief of the second division of the prefecture of police, beginning with these words, 'pardon the liberty,' and finishing with these, 'of which my mother has informed me,' the said letter, dated the tenth current, and signed Peyois, we asked to tell us if he knew it to be that which he had subscribed and signed, and if he avowed the whole contents.
"His reply was, that he perfectly knew this letter to be the same which he addressed to M. Parisot, chief of the second division of the prefecture of police, it was signed by him. The body of the letter was not written by him, as he could not write well enough for that, but that what it contained had been dictated by him to the writer, (named Lemaitre, a fellow-prisoner,) and as a proof of what he stated, he is ready to declare to us orally all the facts and circumstances contained in the same, without requiring to have his memory assisted by any hints from us, by reading its contents: he, consequently, declared, that after the affair which led to his condemnation and sentence to fetters, when he publicly stated that the Sieur Vidocq had given him the sum of three francs to buy the crow bar, by aid of which he committed the robbery which led to his condemnation, he told a thing not only incorrect but actually untrue, for no such offer or suggestion was made to him by that functionary, and that never, at this or any other time, did he receive money from this individual: he stated this falsehood in public court; be did it from the bad advice given to him by Utinet and Chrestien, who persuaded him that by this means only his affair would take a favourable turn, and that he would not be condemned; and so much the more, as if he called on them as witnesses of what he stated they would support his assertion, and they would depose exactly as he did, and that they would even say that they had seen the sum of three francs given; they went even further, they persuaded him that they had much influence with some powerful personage whose authority would secure him from condemnation, or, if a sentence was past, would exercise his influence in reversing his judgment.
"It was also by the advice of these two individuals that he called Lacour and Decostard as witnesses, who deposed the same facts as himself, declaring that Sieur Vidocq had done so, although such statement was positively false.
"After his sentence these same individuals required of him that he should appeal, promising to pay the expenses of a counsel and all the costs of such appeal. As to the latter circumstance, the mother may be examined, who received from Lacour and Decostard the same promises and same advances: they were made to her at a vintner's, in the place du Palais de Justice, named M. Bazile. His mother lives with her husband, Rue du Faubourg Saint Denis, No. 143, at a M. Restauret's.
"Thus he must, for the satisfaction of his conscience, and to pay homage to justice and truth, disavow what he said in open court to the prejudice of Sieur Vidocq, against his morality and his honour, and he humbly asks his pardon.
"To corroborate this confession he requests us to examine Lefebvre, his accomplice, sentenced with himself in the same affair, who is in this prison, and knows by whom and with whose money the crow-bar was bought, which he said had been paid for by the money of Vidocq.
"This was read over to him, and he confirms the truth of it, in which he persists, and has signed it.
| (Signed) | "Peyois." |
"Afterwards, having summoned before us Lefebvre, who was above alluded to as a prisoner in the same prison, we asked him if he knew Peyois, and how he procured the crow-bar, by the aid of which the robbery was effected, which led to their mutual conviction.
"He answered, that two or three days before the robbery was committed he had seen this instrument in the hands of Peyois, who, before the affair, had always told him that he bought it for three francs, but never said that M. Vidocq had given him the money. It was on the trial, and during the arraignment previously, that he learnt that it was M. Vidocq who had supplied the funds which bought it.
"Which is all he knew of the matter, and his declaration being read over to him, he said that it was all true, he persisted in the assertion, and signed it.
| (Signed) | "Lefebvre." |
"From which, and of all which, the present procès verbal has been drawn, to be transmitted to M. the councillor of state, préfet of police, on the day, month, and year, above-mentioned.
| (Signed) | "Recodere." |
It was these four agents (Lacour, Chrestien, Decostard and Utinet) who had sent Peyois to me, when he came under pretence of asking me if I could not tell him of some recruits who wanted a substitute: it was also they who persuaded Berthelet to come to my office, to give me information on a certain robbery about to be perpetrated. They had thus prepared to support the accusation, under the weight of which they hoped to crush me, an assemblage of apparent truths resulting from my intercourse with robbers previously to their apprehension. According to all appearances it was not impossible but that they had, for some time, winked at the exploits of Peyois and his gang, on condition that if they were apprehended in the act, they should adopt a system of defence conformable to their interest. Not a trace of such an understanding could be made out, but it is most probable; and the measures of my agents, both during the proceedings and after the conviction of the culprits, do not allow any doubt on the point. Peyois is arrested, and instantly Utinet and Chrestien go to La Force and have a conversation with him, in which they persuade him that it is only by accusing me that he can give a favourable turn to his affair: that if he would escape a sentence he must call them both as witnesses of what they agreed that he should assert: that they will support his assertion, and will depose exactly the same as he did: that they will even state that they have seen me give him the sum of three francs.
The two agents do not confine themselves to this only; but to make assurance doubly sure of the non-retraction of Peyois, they tell him that they have a powerful protector at their disposal, whose influence will preserve them from every kind of sentence, and who, if by chance a sentence was inevitable, would still have arms long enough to overturn the sentence.
The pleadings opened, Utinet, Chrestien, Lacour, and Decostard hastened to attest the facts which were imputed to me by Peyois. But this young man, to whom they promised impunity, was overwhelmed by the verdict: then apprehending that, now seeing his fate, he would make them repent having deceived him, by exposing their treachery, they hastened to animate his hope, and not only required of him that he should appeal to the court of cassation, but, still more, they offered to give him a counsel at their own expense, and engaged to pay all expenses of the appeal. The mother of Peyois was equally assailed by these intrigues: they made her the same offers of service, the same promises; Lacour, Decostard, and Chrestien took her to M. Bazile's, the vintner's, place du Palais de Justice; and there, in the presence of Leblanc's wife and a bottle of wine, exerted all their eloquence to prove to the mother of Peyois that if she seconded them, and her son was obedient to their orders, it would be easy to save him: "Be quiet," said Chrestien, "and we will do all that is requisite."
Such were the facts elucidated by the inquiry; it became evident to the magistrates that the incident of the crow-bar furnished by Vidocq was an invention of my agents; and, subsequently, on this foundation, a thousand and one tales were made more or less ridiculous; which the Plutarchs of the literary pillar will not fail to give as authentic, if ever Tiger, the printer, or his successor, should take a fancy to add to their collection of wonderful books, "The wonderful, but yet most true history of the deeds, actions, and adventures, memorable, extraordinary, and surprising, of the celebrated Vidocq; with a portrait of that great spy, as he appeared when living, just before his death, which happened without accident, on the day of his decease, in his house at Saint Mandé, at midnight, on the 22d July, in the year of grace, 1875."