New Britain herald., 1929-11-29
Shot French Officer in the Thigh During a Duel After Telling Him That He Could Easily Kill Him.

New York, Nov. % UP)-A large and muscular gendarme push ed his way through a noisy crowd one February night in 1862 and seized Georges Clemenceau by the coat collar
 The Paris police had had a busy night and the police van was well illled. When the youthful Clcmen- "eau was showed into the wagon he found himself sitting on the lap Of butcher boy who had just murdered another youth.
 Arrested for Revolt
 It was in the reign of Napoleon III. and Clemenceau had been ar rested for leading a republican dem onstration. His journey on the lap of the butcher boy was he remark ed later, "a distraction, a pleasure, q joy"
 At the jail there were more dis fractions, His first vivid impression of the jail included the sight of a thief bathing in q tub of water water which rcsembled "cafc au lait.' The authorities were very strict about sanitation, the young radical discovered. And they insisted that all inmates bathe-in the same water. Clemenceau's rebellion against the order was useless. but he finally won a compromise. T got in up up to my knecs,' he wrote later.
 The fiery hatred of monarchy which Clemenceau inherited in part from his father had started 10 run it's course. He was out of jail in q month and returned to school 10 complete his work for a doctors degree, but it was not long before he was cn route 10 America. He lived in New York in the last years of the Civil War-aCting as cores pondent for le Temps in Paris-but his modest rooming house in Green wich Village has long since been torn down. He could not find it 30 years later when he returned 10 America.
 He learned American slang while in New York but. after being forced 10 teach French and horsemanship in a girls school at Stamford, Conn.,. because his father cut off his allow ancc ClemeuCeau returned to France to go through the siege of Paris in 1870. Tho romance with Mary Hummer, who was his pupil in Connecticut. led to a hurried re turn trip to America and their mar riagc and return 10 France They were divorced a quarter of q century later.
 Begins His Career
 After the victory of BismarCk'S r armies over France, after establish ment of the third republic, the .Clemenccau of history began emerg- ing. For a moment, because of mistaken impression which spread at tho time of the transition, Cleu- rnccau was suspected as q political traitor by all factions. He escaped arrest. but native of Brazil who rcsemblod him slightly was seized on the street by national guards and taken before judge who attempted to question him. The judge spoke Spanish brokenly and the victim could not understand him.
 What you B. lzlian but you don't know Spanish cried the judge Then turning to the guards, he said: "He must be Clemenceau. T. of
 Again his political ferocity led to a duel with pistols with an army officer, Major Poussargues.
 "I could kill you" Clemenceau remarked before the duel. but sec ing youoare French officer I'll con- tent myself with wounding you.'
 Shot Man in Thigh
 He shot the major in the thigh,
 Always fighting and always cynical towards his political op- ponents he became known as the Cabinet wrcCkor." Once asked how many cabinets he had wrecked he struck at the core of the complex French political system in his re- ply: "I have only thrown out one mllllSlfN, TOT IL IS dl"dSS IIlc Sdilt one reformed
 Throughout inc period Of his rise he was an ardent irNrnalist. When his radical "Lllouunr Libre" C'Thc Free Man") was suppressed he came out the next day with another pa rer called 'I'Homme Enchaine' C'The Bondman.D
 Clemenceau once told q political writer that he wanted to write a book called of I Were God"
 Found Strange Man
 When he was in the busy period of relinquishing his medical prac- 1ice for politics he often found strange crowds in his little office. One day a consumptive patient en- tered Clcmenceau motioned him to a corner and parked. "lindrcsS." A second consumptive patient entered and was motioned to another cor ner with the command: "Undress." Clemenceau looked up to see a third man in the door, a husky sy-cheeked man. who had heard the orders given the other two. The third man went to another corner