The Sun.
London, England, 1850-12-05 00:00:00

EXTRAORDINARY POISONING

CASE.

The trial of the AI 1)6 Gothland, cure of Saint

Germain, near Angoule:ne, and Mme. du Sablon,
wife of a physician, of the same place, for having
Foißon.d the widow Deguisa], servant of the former,
commenced on Thursday before the Court of 'Assizes
of the department. The case excited the most intense
interest, and the court was crowded to excess, a vast
crowd assembling in the streets to see the prisoners
pass from the prison, which is at some distance from
the court. The family of the female prisonerlad
solicited that she should be allowed to go in a car-
riage, but this was refused. Madame du Sablon
walked first, elegantly dressed in black, and wearing
a long veil; she leaned on her husband's arm, and
was accompanied by her sister rind brother-in-law.
The cure walked alone, but was followed by groups
of his parishioners. Both were in custody of police-
men and gendarmes. They were placed side by side
in the dock, And the male prisoner stated his name
to be Laurent Gothland, his age 29, and his pro-
fession that of a priest; the female, that her
name was Marie Laure du Sablon, and her age 30.
Madame du Sablon's features were thinned by a long
sickness and anxiety, but were delicately beau-
tiful ; the cure is a short thickset man, with rather a
sensual cast of face; he was dressed in plain black
clothes. On a table were vases containing the bowels
of the deceased, and the arsenic which had been ex-
tracted from them.

The indictment was read. It stated that in the
evening of the 2] st of December last Widow Deguisal
died at the house of the cure of St. Germain, after an
illness of six days. At six o'clock the next morning
the cure went to the mayor to demand an authoriza-
tion to bury her at once, as he said the body was in a
state of putrefaction. The authorization was granted,
and the cure caused the body to be interred on the
same day. On his return from the ceremony he
wrote to deceased's son to say that she bad died of
congestion of the brain. Surprised at the sudden
death and hasty burial of his mother, the son, Edmond
Deguisal, suspected that there had been some. foul
work, and on the 28th he communicated his suspi-
cions to the Procureur of the Republic at Angouleme.
That functionary went the next day,to St. Germain, and
bad the body taken up. On examination by medical
men and chemists, arsenic was discovered, and it ap-
peared probable that it had been administered at
different times. It thus became evident that de-
ceased had either committed suicide or been poisoned.
But she had no reason to feel disgust of life, as she
was in no danger of losing her place (the cure having
just increased her wages, and written to her son to
say that he was much pleased with her), and besides
the place was of no consequence to her, as both her
son and daughter were tenderly attached to her, and
were in a position to supply all her wants. It was,
moreover, shown that she had never on any occasion
procured poison. Thus, then, said the indictment,
she could not have committed suicide, and conse-
quently she had been murdered. But by whom ?
Evidently only by the cure Gothland and Mme. du
Sablon, for they alone had approached her in the
sickness of which she had died, and they alone had
interest in her death. This interest arose from the
fact that the honour of both was in her hands, she li
having discovered that an adulterous connexion
existed between them. Gothland, it appeared, had at I
first been curate at Semur, but had been interdicted
by the Bishop of Autun, on account of immoral con-
duct. On the prayer of the superior of the seminary,
the bishop consented to appoint him to the cure of
Charolles ; but he there caused such scandal by his
relations with a Madame Allier that he was expelled.
After a while he presented himself to .the Bishop of
Angouleme, and having deceived that prelate as to
his past conduct, was appointed by him cure of the
parish of St. Germain. At St. Germain Mme. du
Sablon was his nearest neighbour, and they soon
became very intimate. This lady was of rather light
conduct, and it appeared that some time before she
had sent some licentious verses to a young man
of nineteen. A criminal connexion having been
established between them, it appeared that almost
every day they indulged their passions at the par-
sonage, and besides they constantly exchanged letters.
The widow Deguisal suspected what was going on,
but to convince herself she enlarged a hole which
happened to be in the ceiling of the cure's bed-
room, and placed herself in the garret above.
Peeping through the whole, she distinctly saw the
parties on the bed. Greatly shocked, she notified to
her son her intention of leaving the cure's service, bnt
he told her to take no notice. After a while she had
a quarrel with the cure, and he threatened to beat
her. " Take care, Monsieur le cure !" said she, " I
know something !" " What do you know ?" cried
he, " tell me—tell me !" " Well, then, I know that
you carry on a criminal connexion with Mme. du
Sablon ! Through that hole I saw you! " On this
the cure became calm; he offered her money, which
she refused ; and he then wrote to her son to say how
pleased he was with her, and that he had increased
her wages. Whilst he was thus engaged with Mme.
du Sablon, he kept up his correspondence with Mme.
Allier at Charolles, and he protested to her that he
loved her better than he did Mine. du Sablon, and
that he had to resist the advances of the latter. lie
once, on pretence of visiting his family, went to Chit-
rolles, and for 15 days was secreted by Mine. Allier
in her house. During his absence, Mine. du Sa-
blon was jealous, and opened letters which
arrived for him. On the 16th December, the widow
Deguisal was suddenly seized with violent vomitings
after dinner, and these continued on the following
days. Mme. du Sablon sent her broths and medicines
from her own house • the cure prepared her sugared
wine, and sat up with her. She took nothing except
what passed through their hands ; and during five
days they kept administering poisonous substances.
The way in which the poison was procured was this :

—Dr. du Sablon had a collection of medicines in his
house, in his professional capacity ; among them was
a phial containing 60 grammes of arsenic ; of these,
14 had been employed in killing rats ; when the phial
was examined.by the magistrates only 25 grammes re-
mained; consequently 21 grammes were missing, and
they could, it was asserted, only have been taken by
the female prisoner, as she alone had the key of the
chest in which her husband kept the poison. The
indictment dwelt on the fact that the accused had the
strongest possible interest in getting rid of the de-
ceased, inasmuch as a word from her would have
caused the former to be ignominiously expelled from
the Church, and the latter to be dishonoured as a wife
and mother.
The interrogatories of the accused then commenced.
Gothland, in reply to the questions put to him,
maintained that he had not been dismissed from S6miur
and Charolles on account of conduct, but because
he had from different causes excited the of the
cure to whom he was assistant. He attempted to
explain away his intimate relations with Mme.
Allier, by stating that they were of a mere friendly
kind, such as she maintained with fifteen or twenty
other priest 3; he also observed that her age was forty.-
eight when he first knew her, and fifty. three now;
but his letters to her, of which several were read,
were decidedly of an amatory character. He gave a
general denial to the charge of having been too inti,
mate with Mme. du Sablon, and declared that he had
refused little presents which she had wished to make
him. He said that he had resolved to dismiss his
servant on account of her violent conduct. He
denied that he alone had attended her, after she
became indisposed, and said she first became ill
after eating the same dinner as he had done. Dr.
du Sablon, on seeing her ill, recommended her to
take tea, and had sent her some drops of laudanum. He
admitted having given her some sugared wine. He
said that just before she died "he heard her pronounce
the holy names of Jesus and of Mary, and that was a
great consolation to him, and that he immediately
administered the sacraments." He added that Ma-
dame du Sablon and her husband had come to the
bedside of the deceased.

Madame du Sablon, in answer to the judge's ques-
tions, said she had been married eleven years, and
had a son. She had sent some songs to a young man.
She had known the cure Bisette, the predecessor of
Gothland. She had visited him sometimes, but never
alone. Had never been in parties with him. On
the arrival of Gothland, her husband forbade her ever
to enter his house; but that did not cause her to re-
flect on the causes for which Bisette had left the parish,
neither did she know for what cause he had left. Al-
though her husband had forbidden her to visit Gothland,
she had taken him for her confessor. She had gone
to the parsonage when the cure's servant was ill, but
on other occasions had always been accompanied by
her husband. It was not true that she bad opened
any letter of Gothland ; as to the little presents
which had been referred to, she had sent them with
the knowledge of her husband. She did not know
that her husband had arsenic in his possession. He
did not leave his keys with her, though he sometimes
left her medicines to distribute to his patients. She
had, however, seen a phial containing arsenic. It
was her servant, not she herself, who waited on and
prepared things for the deceased. She had never-
theless prepared a soup for her, but she denied that
she had given orders that a basin used by deceased
should be broken.
Some days after the death of the servant were you
not taken ill, on hearing the death alluded to at a
dinner party ?—I was indisposed, but I did not lose
my consciousness.
When the authorities made a descent into the cure's
house, were you not seized with terror, and did you
not send to seek your husband ?--Any other person
would have done so.
But although your husband said, " After all, if the
Abbe Gothland be arrested, that does not concern us,"
did you not continue to feel fear ?—The accused re-
turned no reply.
Some proces-verbaux and documents establishing
the poisoning, and the circumstances which acconapa-
Tied it, were read. Extracts from the preliminary in-
terrogatories of Gothland were also read ; they con-
(4radicted several of his assertions now made ; they also
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