The Sun.
London, England, 1855-09-07 00:00:00

ROBBERY AND MURDER.

The Court of Assizes of the Nord has just been occu-
pied two days in trying two men named Legrand and
Bouchard, for murder and robbery. An elderly couple
named Moucheront, retired brewers, lived at Marbaix,
and were ki.own to have large sums of money in their
house. On the 28th February last their servant, a fe-
male named \Very, on going to the house at an early
hour in the morning, was horrified to find them both
lying dead in a pool of blood. Their skulls were com-
pletely crushed in, apparently by blows from hammers ;
they were dreadfully wounded in different parts of their
per-ons with sharp instruments ; and their throats were
cut from ear to ear. They had evidently been murdered
on the previous evening, when seated by their fireside ;
and as there were two chairs placed besides theirs, and
as a jug and three glasses, containing beer, were en the
table, it was supposed that the murderers were two men
who had called upon them, and to whom they bad of-
fered a glass of beer. Several drawers in different parts
of the house had been broken open, and large sums of
money, amounting to more than 50,000 f., which they
were known to have contained, were stolen, as were also
a gold wat,th and a quantity of plate. Suspicion fell on
two brothers named Bouchard, men of bad character be-
longing to the village, and an anonymous letter was sent
to the authorities stating that those men, accompanied
by one Legrand, their brother•in-law, who was also a
bad character, had been seen in the evening of the
27th going towards the house of the Aloucheronts.
The three men were in consequence arrested. A. few
days after the wife of Thelesphore Bouchard, one of the
accused men, revealed that in the night of the 27th Feb.,
her husband and her brother Adolphe, after having been
absent the greater part of the preceding day, had returned
home at a late hour, and had entered the house, not by
the door, but by the stable window ; that they had im-
mediatel' washed their clothes, had examined them care-
fully the next morning, had destroyed a pair of shoes
though quite new, and had made her wash a cravat.
She also stated that they had informed her and their
sister Clara that they had returned home late, and had
washed their clothes, because they had had a fight with
some gamekeepers, and they specially requested them
net to talk of the affair, as they said that if found outl
It
they would be sure to get a year's imprisonment•
turned out that they had, two days after this, sent hr
e_i
sister Clara to Paris, hut the authorities had her their
sister
home. When interrogated, she stated that she
had
several
times overheard her brothers and Legrand talk of
ncom-
mitting murder for the sake of robbery, and had heard
them indioate Moucheront and his wife
their victims. A few days after these
to a fellow
facts had been
as likely to be
ascertained, Thelesphore Bouchard confessedwashe,
his bro-
prisoner named Barleon, that it
and Barleon was about
and remove 'her, and and Legrand who had corutomitbteed
rtehleeamseudr,derbse,
begged him to go to his hiouesee,
where it was secreted,
rout's gold watch from
from Moucheront, which he
Barleon told the director of
and also to take away a ablapeg af
hadul
buried
r ied money,n a ditcha s o stolen
a t
a
place called Faux Monnne_ a
said,
and Bouchard having
the
h e watchat
the
repeated this,
immediately
was about to leave the gaol, to haste
named the prison
Crapes, what
begged another prisoner,
ts‘t,he man has
and money beforek
own to this man that he iiad buried
same time made n Faux
authoritiesAia " e t'
couldaad removearrive
-
t o his house and totahFe
another sum of money in a. ditch at Catillon, and tome '
in a ditch at Marbaix , and he promisedlin a large
more
part of the booty provided he would remove it and keep
silent. Crapez immediately communicated the man's con-
fession to the gaol authorities. On hearing that he had
done so, T. Bouchard was plunged in despair and deter-
mined to commit suicide. He sent for the director of the
prison, and told him that it was he and Legrand who
had committed the murders, and he describes] minutely
how they had done them ; but be proteste that his
.th.e crimes. Shortly
brother Adolphe bad had no sharekit‘i
after the man hanged himself.
2141°1Phe however, ad-
mitted, on being interrogated, that be w'
plice in the murder- and robbery, and thatas haenhaadecant"
perpetratedwatch near the
there. houseT hweh
ji‘lisrty
declared
ei se
abrreodt hbiorthatnhde
prisonersL graid
ouilty, but with extenuating circumst in favour of
A. Bouo'at d. The Court sentencedances Legrand to death,
and Bouchard to hard labour for life. In the course of
the proceedings, it was stated that Crapez, on making