Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1878-01-19
rREAsuRE rRovE.


Anold Theft and Its Consequences.
Truth, it has been often asserted,
Ia stranger than fiction. Here is 3
story Of actual facts which sounds
like a romance-a story of stolen
treasure recovered by tho merest ac-
cident after many years.
In the month of Jelly, 1862, shop
bow named Albert Siltremann stole
from a merchant in the Rue de Ar
yenteuil, Paris, by whom he was
employed, the sum of Ia, 900 francs,
to which he had gained access by
false KEYS to his masters escritOire.
Suspicion was naturally directed to
him and he was arrested shortly af-
ter the thaft, in his native Aisatian
village, Gdebwjller, to which he had
fled Immediately after the commits
sion of his crime.
All the money found in his posses
sion was 2,0i9 francs. He acknowl-
edged the robbery, but asserted that
the remainder of the treasure had
been stolen froaIhim byan unknown
man, one evening while he was gO-
ing through the forest on his way
home from the scene of his crime.
On the strength Of shis confession,
which was the only one that he
would make, he was condemned to
twenty years labor.
His master, rendered bankrupt by
the loss Of the money, went mad,
and battered his brains out against
the wall Of his room in q lunatic
asylum. An old clerk, who had
been accused of the theft and arrest
cd, committed suicide in prison.
Two lives already, therefore, had
paid the penalty of the boys dis
honesty.
Filtremann attempted, but unSuc-
cessfully, several escapes, and was
finally condemned to removal from
the galleys to a penal settlement.
In 1872, after having served half his
term, he died, on his way to Cay
enne, of a wound received in an at
tack ON one of the officers of the con-
vict ship.
Here the romance begins. NJ.
Claude, the Chief of Police, had,
from the first, expressed a disbelief
in Filtremann's story of the loss of
the money. The 1876 francs, he
asserted, were hidden somewhere,
and he caused a search to be made
for them. In vain.
The story was almost forgotten,
therefore, when, in the month of
October last, NJ. Callinaud, 81 mer-
chant of Nancy, arrived at Paris.
OVertaken by a thunderstorm, NJ
Callinaud sought shelter in a wine
shop in the Rue Marcel. The place
was a species of cheap restaurant,
such as abound in Paris, divided off
into boxes, like our Old-time oyster
houses. In the next cabinet to that
occupied by NJ. Callinaud, two men,
whom he could not see, were con-
Versing in the Lorraine patOis.
Some words which the merchant
caught apprised him that the sub
ject of discussion was a robbery COM
mitted years before by Partisan
shop-bOy, and that the sum involved
was $4,000 francs. Interested by
the magnitude of the interest in dis
cussion, he listened. 1t proved a
fortunate bit of eavesdropping.
The whole conversation, as he
quickly learned, bore on the burial
of the sum in question at the foot of
an oak tree in a certain location in
the forest of Guebwiller. This fact
he communicated to the police, and
aseaTch was consequently instituted.
This, too, was unsuccessful. and
the quest was again abandoned I'M
til, three weeks ago, by the merest
accident of accidents, the most COM
mOnplace yet romantic coincidence,
the treasure was discovered.
4 workman employed in ditch
digging, close by an old oak in the
forest, felt his spade strike some
thing hard. Further excavation
uncovered an iron-bOund box, upon
opening which casket of oak was
revealed, in which were $4,000
francs in bank notes.
The notes We're mOuldcred, and
frayed to pieces at the touch, but
the finder had sense enough to take
them to the authorities ut Guebwil-
Ter, through whom they were re-
deemed by the Bank Of France.
The French Government, after
paying the royalty for treasure trOve
TO the German authorities in Alsace,
is nOw advertising for an owner for
the money. The plundered mer-
chant, as far as is known, died with
out heirs, and his strangely-discOV-
cred property is therefore likely to
revert to the State.
As regards the discovery, the
probability il that the persons
through whom VI. Callinaud gained
his knowledge of the treasure were
convicts, to whom Filtremann, dur
ing his activity, had cOnfided his
secret of his hidden store and the dis.
position he had made of it.