The San Francisco call., 1910-03-27
nUMBFRTS BUILT
SWINDLE ON AIR
Gigantic Fraud Brought Hun-
dreds of Thousands of Doll
lars to Couple

mating frauds the inventive and lively
genius of the Parisians is literally non-
pareil. Such seems to be the case with
the gigantic swindle now agitating the
boulevards in which NJ. Duez is said to
have cleaned up several millians, and
such most certainly was the case with
NJ. and Mime. Humbert, who fooled all
the best legal talent in France, to say
nothing of half the members of the
bourse
The great Panama swindle and the no
less gigantic Humbert swindle. to which
NJ. Duez' operations are compared. were
the two greatest frauds in recent French
history. The more picturesque of the
two, perhaps, was the Humbert case,
says the Chicago Record-Herald.
SCHEME WAS SIMPLE
Frederick Humbert and his wife, The
rese, were married in 1878. They were
plain citizens, of the clerking variety,
and lived in obscurity until 1883, when
Nine. Humbert sprang her great idea,
upon which she had been thinking for
years. It was one of the boldest, sim
plest and most fetching schemes IN all
the annals of fraud
Mime. Humbert gave it out that an
American uncle of hers, Henry R. Craw-
ford. had recently died at Nice and left
a will bequeathing to herself and her
sister fortune of $20,000,000. Another
will was produced by Marie Daurignac,
Mime. Humbert's sister, making the leg
acy to the two sisters dependent upon
the marriage of Mile. Daurignac to
Henry Robert Crawford, a nephew of
the deceased millionaire. The sisters
made a pretense of quarreling about
the inheritance and went to law. Nine
Humbert kept a great iron safe, in
which the deeds and other documents
of the fortune Were supposed TO be
safely reposing.
The fact of the matter was that
Crawford. the American uncle, was the
pure creation of Nine. Humberts brain.
There had never been any such person
millions he was supposed to have left
existed only in Mime. Humbert's exu-
berant imagination.
BORROWED THOUSANDS
Then began a game in which, the whole
world soon became interested Rich
lawyers were drawn into the case, SYM
pathetic Judges were crazy to get mixed
up with IT and capitalists came forward
with enormous tenders of ready money
to tide the two sisters over their period
of litigation.
For Is years the case dragged in the
courts and for Is years the Humberts
courts and lawyers were -dallying
with the American millions in the hope
of getting goodly whack out of them
for their fees, Nine Humbert and her
cheerful Spose took in more than $135,-
600 in loans from all sorts of persons
who had designs on the apparently sim
pie minded heirs. The contracts, prom
issory notes, legal documents and other
papers in the case totaIed, it was said.
G1,0 10 1,se
nothing.
Meanwhile Nine Humbert and her
family became important personages in
Paris. They bought magnificent estates
in the city and country. They enter
tanned visiting kings with the sump-
tuousness of lord cardinal NJ. Hum
bert became a leading man on the
bourse and was sought by the principal
statesmen and judges In France. Nine.
Humbert's suppers and soirees became
the talk of the world. 1t was one great
boundless revel of millions into which
the whole world dipped its hands. Peo-
pie were calculating how much of the
fortune the poor Humberts would have
when the lawyers got theirs out of it,
including the money they had advanced
on the prospects. And then came the
crash.
One day, in the interminable' Iawing
and lawyering, one of the attorneys in
the case said he would like to verify
some date or something and asked for
an exhibit of the papers in the great
safe.
COMIC PAPERS IN SAFE
Soon after the attorney made his sug-
gestion Nine. Humbert, NJ. Humbert and
Nine. Humbert's sister ducked. When
the good old safe was opened it was
found to contain copies of the comic
newspapers and nothing else whatever
Paris laughed as usual, but those
who had been bitten were either foam
ing at the mouth or denying their be-
lief in the fraud. But fraud it was, and
the money which the Humberts had
collected on their prospects was gone.
The pair were finally captured and
sent to trial, but their years of emil
nence as wealthy and highly respect
able people had their effect and they
were given only few years in jail.
They are now living quietly at little
estate near Asnieres. They are said
like many other eminent personages. to
be shy and retiring, their social aspira-
tions having been completely satisfied.
The Panama scandal and swindIe was
probably the greatest fraud in French
history. It originated in 1879, when
Ferdinand de Lesseps, the great en-
gineer and builder of the Suez canal.
ana ms son, CnarleS, proposed to dig
a canal through the isthmus of Panama
and organized a company for that pur-
pose.
START WITH $60,000,0OO
A start was made with 100000, 1000,
collected for the most part from the old
wooden stockings of French peasants.
No doubt De Lesseps was honest enough
in the beginning. but after few years
OF failure the pressure became too high
for him and he gradually swelled the
funds of his company by increased bor-
rowings from the people until he had
got together and spent upward of
$500, 100000
The fact that the company was as
rotten as ii could be and that the
money that had been put into IL was
irrevocably burned up was known to
the newspapers OF Paris and to many
of the legislators of France, but the
newspapers were bought up and the
Legislators were bribed and the fraud
throve on, millions annually going into
the hole which seemed to have no bot
tom.
OLDER SUCCUMBS
IN 1892 the affairs of the company
became so notorious that secrecy was
no longer possible. An explosion took
place in that year which threatened
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