Northern Weekly Gazette. — 1912-10-26 (Stockton-on-Tees, Cleveland, England)

TRUTH PREVAILS.  Reference is made on Page 12 to the condemnation of .Joseph Lesurques, whose fatal resemblance to another man was the c-ause of several witnesses giving evidence which resulted in his execution as one of the murderess of a Lyons courier. Les-urques protested his inneoence just prior to being executed in 1797. Many of the jurv----impressed by the fact that one of the real criminals deelareil LesUrques was innoce.nt— afterwards expressed their sorrow at haying given credit to the witnesses from Mongeron and Lieursaint; and Citizen Daubenton, the Juge de Pais, who had arrested Lesurques, and conducted the first proceedings, resolved to inveszigate the truth, which could only be satisfactorily done through the arrest and trial of the four persons denounoed by Conriol as his accomplices. Two years ekipsed without the conscientious magistrate being able, in spite of all his inquiries, to discover the slightest trace of the fugitives. At length' in examining the numerous warrants and registers of prisoners daily brought to his bureau, he discovered that Durochat, the individual whom Couriol had denounced as the one who had taken his place by the side of the courier, under the name of Laborde, had just been arrested for a rothery he had lately effected, and lodged in St. Pelagic. At the time of Lesurques's trial, it had come out in evidence that several persons, amongst others an inspector of the post-mails, had preserved a perfect recollection of the pretended Laborde; having seen him when waiting for the mail.  Citizen Daubenton, by great exertions secured the presence of the inspector in the court on the day of Wurochat's trial. He .was condemned to fourteen years' labour in chains ; and as the rens-d'armes were conducting him to prison, the inspector recognised the prisoner as the same person who had travelled in the mail towards Lyons under the name of Laborde, on the day on which the courier was assassinated. Duroch.a,t made but feeble denials, and was reconducted to the Conciergerie, where Citizen Danbenton had him immediately detained, under a charge arising out of the proceedings against Couriol. The next morning the magistrate, assisted by Citizen Masson, an officer of the criminal tribunal, took moans for transferring 1 the prisoner to the prisons of Melun. where he arrived the same evening. After being examined early the next morning, it was found necessary to transfer him to Versailles, where he was to be tried. The magistrate and the officer set out, followed by two gens-d'armes, to convey the Prisoner to Versailles. While on the journey, and in a moment of compunctions he confessed the whole affair. The true criminals, he stated, were Couriol, Rossi, alias Berokly, Vidal, him-6,01f, and Dubosq. "I have heard," he added, that there was a fellow named Lesurques condemned for this business; but, to tell the truth, I never knew the fellow either at the planning of. the business, or at its execution, or at the division of the spoil." To this oenfeission Durochat afterwards adhered. The magistrate, present at his examination observed to him, that Lesurques had been sworn to as one of the party of four, and also that he had silver spurs on his boots, which he had been seen to repair with thread, and that this spur had been found on the place where the mail had been attacked. Du. rochat replied, "It was Dubosq who had the silver spurs. The morning we divided the Plumler, I remember bearing that he had broken 0" of the chains of his spurs; that ho had mended it where he dined, and lost it in tne scuffle. I saw in his hand the other spur which Ile said he ivLs going to throw into the mixen.•'