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WIL LIT BET HE
AEROPLANE
How an Unparalleled \Xj
> Chain of Murders and \ >
'Robberies by Three Auto= \
mobile Pirates in Paris Has \
Led the Great German \
Scientist, Max Nordau, to Predict
a Visitation of Captain IQidds
THE amazing series of robberies
and murders by automobile
bandits In France has brought
home the alarming possibilities of
applying modern scientific devices
to criminal uses.
It was the perfect understand
ing of automobile mechanism pos
sessed by these bandits, their ability
to repair the and run them
at the highest speed, their knowl
edge of whero to steal new high
powered machines, and their reck
lessness and imaginative daring that
enabled them to carry on their
crimes successfully for three years.
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Wi I'— -i Wftf' fc ’* ' '• in P
f 2s§liF“4yjr* a \ \*
KILLED ■ M
N\ECM An \C IEN J \\
/v, "s.w'T ' ~ wounded \ \ **.»’ 7* \ b ,
3®2M-7 -. ’ >\ V'-Au t
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to slay over twenty persons and to
carry away $200,000 in money before
one of their band was arrested.
This staggering career of success
ful crime has led Dr. Max Nordau
to make the interesting, if alarming,
suggestion that we may soon expect
to find criminals using aeroplanes.
These newer and more wonderful
scientific engines may enable daring
criminals to operate far more suc
cessfully than the automobiles have
done.
"We find that modern criminals
possess a high degree of scientific
I knowledge and a reckless daring
that quails at no risk of death."
writes Dr. Nordau. “How can we
-"expect policemen who are neither
scientific nor daring to deal with
them? We must revise our methods
of coping with crime to keep track
with the progress of science and ed
ucation.
“I anticipate that we shall soon
hear that the aeroplane has been
adopted by some Captain Kidd of
the With it may be utilized
any one of many new scientific in
ventions. With two or three aero
planes, a band of criminals could
swoop down upon some treasure
filled building, take the occupants
by surprise, hold the doorways
against all assistance, load the treas
ure on their aeroplanes, fly away,
perhaps in the darkness of the night,
and speed to some unknown hiding
place."
Dr. Nordau's suggestion that aero
plane bandits might take a great
building by surprise calls up an in
teresting vision of what might hap-
- 1 ‘ ° ' r ;
■ _ __ ,_ * feWwg&Awx t >KjEgteJd
pen to one of the skyscrapers of
New York. Suppose, for instance,
that the aeroplane bandits descend
ed upon the roof of some Wall
street sky-scraper, which contains
countless millions in cash, notes,
gold, securities and other forms of
wealth. According to Dr. Nordau
the bandits could select the most
portable part of this plunder, load
it on their machine, and fly away
to some secret hiding place—say
in the Catskill Mountains.
It is true that at present an aero
plane would have difficulty in land
ing on the top of most New York
skyscrapers, but
scientific ingenu
ity will, it is ex
pected, soon make
a great improve
ment in th : s di
rection.
Then, according
to Dr. Max Nor
dau, the police I
will be forced to
cope with the pi
rates of the air
by becoming aero
planists of supe
rior daring them
selves.
To return to
the actual ex
ploits of the
French automo
bile ) a n dits:
The last great
coup of these
criminals was the
looting of the
branch bank at
Chantilly, near
Paris, of the Soci
ete Genera le,
a very great
French banking
institution.
At 8 o'clock In the morn'ne sij
men, armed with rifles and pistols,
held up an automobile at Montgeron.
the historic forest of Senart. killed
the chauffeur, named Mathille, and
seized the machine. They were seen
to return at top speed to Paris.
By 10:30 o’clock they were at
Chantilly, a wealthy town lying
twenty-three miles northeast of
Paris. They stopped abruptly in
front of the bank. Five of the men
got out and entered the bank. They
shot the cashier and his assistant,
who were behind a desk, and seized
SBO,OOO in gold and notes. They then
shot a porter who attempted to come
to the rescue of his fellow employes.
One of the bandits stood at the
o/ the Jlir
door with a ’epeating carbine, ready
to shoot any one who should enter
from without. The sixth bandit
waited with his hands on the wheel
of the machine.
By the time the five bandits re
turned to the machine a considerable
crowd had gathered, attracted by the
shots. The bandits poured a volley
of bullets into them, wounding
many, and disappeared in a cloud of
dust. They were reported at As
nieres .another suburb, at 11:30, and
vanished again
After this outrage, the last of
many, the French Ministry of the
Interior created a special force of
auto policemen furnished with fast
machines. Before this, the French
police had actually attempted to pur
sue the auto bandits on horseback.
A gendarme on horseback- 1 ' for-in
stance, pursued the vanishing auto
in the forest of Senart. With the
aid of the machines the police suc
,-Aor-,.- ip ane-ring qr suspected
share in rne outrages
is .ibeing i vestigated.
The police are trying to make out j
that a burly ruffian, Carouy, was
among those arrested, but it is much 1
to be doubted that he had the brains
to plan these oaring crimes.
1 ha present -,e~ies of outrages be
gan on December 10 of last year.
On that day a. swift automobile
stopped at 2 o'clock in the afternoon
in the Rue Ordener, one of the most
central thoroughfares of Paris. The
men in it shot down a bank messen-
At 8 o’clock in
the morning of
March 26 the
bandits steal
an automobile
tn the Forest
of Senart.
■ ..
idm 4 <
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Murder of Bank Messenger '' . i
Caby in the Rue Ordener, ' W'p', - p
the
First
Crime
in the
Latest
Series
of
Automobile
Outrages.
All
These
Were
Committed
by the
Same
Man.
copyright. 1812, by American-Examiner. Great Britain Rights Reserve®
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“lanuopate il \\ / / /
that we shall \ v 11 x \\ / I ,/ s
soon hear 'Jr \\ / X /
that the aero- \\\\\
plane has \v\' vTx. Ssflr* / /M "' /
been adopted x ' x sl
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tain Kidd of 11 /AL/.\//■
the air. With /—dfiKAj/-#
it may he t ' 41^ 4 .
tifiri« d a p V ° ne of manv new scien-
bfic inventions. With two or three v'//
sw r oop a, ’down band ° f crimin3,s col,ld U
filled building. hold"fhe°doo ,rcasure . ® '"' <
perhaps in the darkness of nl^ki a,nS l a " ass ' s t ance - i°ad the treasure on their aeroplanes, fly away,
per who was w a ik in <. *"'’ and s P eed to some unknown hiding place.”—Dr. Max Nordau.
street, took lOOOnr » R alon S ,hn
from him andfno" f ri rancs in rash
bullets into a Y o,ley of
ered about, killing d Wh ch gath ’
wounding several One !llan and
jumped into their „ Then the ?
appeared at a , ine an( i dis
miles an nour. “ of “early fifty
The cnse was
submitted to M
Alphonse Bertil
’°n. the scientific
rector o f the
dPpart .
mp ' ,f of Paris, who
completely rpron .
fructed the <|o
’n.fs of the ban
d'fs from the
traces they had
R v measuring
the slight impres
kion made by the
’"o auto wheels
>n the street," he
; aJ d. "I find that
the wheels were
exactly four feet
alx inches apart,
“nd the impres
sion made by the
car when it was
stopped showed
that it was ten
feet long. These
details would cor
respond exactly to
the measurements
of a Panhard
ninety horse pow
er machine of
1910." ’
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cpcpy
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msiwi
**— -J I- y. wouwoto y
Vis
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(> u t V
ehin2"l7.u? On Rhnwf ’ ( l that a ma
hhjne of this description had been
s.oien from M. Norman, of Boulogne,
two weeks before the crime.
~ 1 ' “ e rtillon then pointed out ‘hat
.he car had been carefully renum
bered and the machine stored in a
garage, for otherwise the complaint
or its owner' would have led to its
discovery.
011 she day following the affair in
j e Ordener M. Norman's auto
w<xS found abandoned in a lonely
a reet at Dieppe, one hundred and
nny miles from Paris.
ihe startling discovery was then
made that the leader of the auto
bandits was the same person as the
head of the gang who plundered the
Orient Express in September of last
year. This fast train was stopped
in the heart of France at night and
robbed of thousands of dollars in
bags of gold that were being carried
to India. The identity of this ban
dit was proved by the finger prints
he had left while renumbering the
stolen auto and others he had made
at the time of robbing the express.
After carrying off their plunder
from the train this band stopped
at Chatelet-en-Brie, and executed
one of their number, an Italian
named Platano, a traitor to their
plans, by cutting his throat The
man who performed this execution
w’iped his hands of blood on the
dead man s shirt. The executioner
and the leader of the auto bandits
in the Rue Ordener were one and
the same person. After the execu
tion they stopped an auto and mur
dered the chauffeur at Chatelet-en-
Brie.
At 10:30 the
bandits who
stole the auto
in the forest
kill the cashier,
assistant cashier
and porter of
the bank at
Ch'.ntilly. seize
the cash, fusil
lade the would
be rescuers and
vanish-
The Interesting fact was also ob
served by the police that the auto
bandits were teetotallers. Probably
that was why they were so proficient
in their work. Common criminals
have always been drinkers of alco
hol. Alcoholic drinkers are forced
to stop frequently to take more
drink, alcoholic if they can find it,
but drink of some sort. They have
to stop frequently to attend to their
physical needs, and are incapable o'
continuous, unswerving exertion.
Now, in all the searches the police
made they found no traces of men
with a fresh supply of money in the
common drinking resorts of crimi
nals, no breaking open of saloons
such as always follows a successful
coup by common burglars, no aban
doned bottles along the road. These
men were teetotallers and able to
refresh themselves by frequent stops
at roadside fountains and horse
troughs.
The bandits had a habit of con
stantly stealing fresh automobiles
and abandoning the old ones. They
bad a profound knowledge of ail
kinds of machines.
The machine abandoned near
Dieppe showed by its speedometer
that it had been running for the trip
at the rate of 40% miles per hour,
the third speed of this machine.
Now, this rate of speed proved that
the car had left Paris just three
hours and three-quarters before it
was abandoned. This was exactly
half an hour after the robbery, just
time to get out of Paris.
The police here did a clever pieca
of detective work. They estimated
that the criminals had stolen a fresh
machine about half an hour after
the robbery and sent, perhaps, one
accomplice to Dieppe to get rid of
the old machine.
They made inquiries, and soon
found that a 70-horsepower Levas
seur car had been stolen at the time
specified from the garage of M.
Buisson at Saint Mande, a quiet,
aristocratic suburb of Paris, border
ing on the Park of Vincennes
The police found the tracks of
this machine running in the direc
tion of Alais. They wired to Alais,
and tho police there waited in am
bush.
But the bandits were too clever,
guessed the police plans, turned
around, came back by a different
road and passed the octroi gate of
Paris at 6 o’clock, always going full
speed. At R:OS they overturned t
vegetable dealer's cart in the Rue
de Rivoli and their machine was in
jured, a fact shown by a streak of
gasoline along the roa’d.
At 6:30 they stopped.in the Place
du Havre to mend a leak in the gas-
oline tank. A policeman named G 81 *
nier, not suspecting they were
great bandits, put his foot on the
step to warn them against breakin?
the speed law. They left him dead
with three bullets in him.
As they flew away, many terrified
pedestrians were able to distinguish
three men in the car. with a tremen
dously thickset giant at the wheel,
his face concealed by automobile
goggles.
Did justice hold the bandits at
last? Not yet.
Once more they vanished in a
cloud of dust, and orders were wired
to the police and gendarmerie (the
national military police force) in
every direction to watch for a flee
ing or an abandoned auto.
Soon a report came of an auto
abandoned in a back street of St
Ouen, a suburb of Paris.
It was the auto of M. Buisson, It
St Mande. It had been set on tlrs
and all its combustible parts de
stroyed, hut this time the speedome
ter showed a distance of 215 mllea
covered in one trip On the back of
the carriage were the marks of two •
revolver bullett.
This showed that the bandits had
travelled far out of Paris, had been
concerned in another crime (for no
bulle*s had struck the machine be
fore), and had been compelled to
return to Paris for some reason.
At this point word came from
Fontolse, another suburb, five miles
from St. Ouen, that at 5 o'clock that
morning, before daybreak, some men
had been surprised in the office of
M. Tintant, a leading lawyer of the
town, engaged in breaking open hig
safe. M. Tintant had discovered
them and fired at them from his
window as they were getting mtn
an auto. A journeyman baker named
Coquerel, who was up at. that early
hour on account of his trade at
tempted to hold them and was shot
dead.
At this point the bandits disap
peared completely. It was not until
after they attacked and bombarded
the Societe Generale at Chantilly.,
an episode described earlier in this
article, that any of them were ar
rested.
Among the other crimes attributed
to them besides those already m •.<
tioned are:
Bank messenger named Gouy Pal!
Dt robbed of $30,000 in Paris Jan
uary 31. 1912.
Freight station robbed, two meu
murdered, at Les Aubrais, near Or
leans. January 31.
Battle with burglars, in which one
policeman was killed and one buiv
glar committed suicide. Angervilia,
January 3L