What’s Your Poison: Magic, Murder and Mayhem on the Streets of Paris
One of the most high-profile scandals in France, the
Affairs of the Poisons uncovered a secret/not-so-secret network of poisoners working in Paris who were selling their services to mostly the upper classes and even the nobility. The ensuing investigation uncovered many high-profile poisoners, some of them working as fortune tellers, and a client list that stretched all the way to the royal palace of Versailles itself. In the process, the scandal brought to light several women who can be described as serial killers. Eventually, the number of high-ranking members of the French aristocracy involved in the ring - including a plot to kill the king himself - forced Louis XIV to close down the investigation and place it under a royal seal, with many of the accused being imprisoned for life without trial.
There were as many as two hundred defendants (though over twice that many were originally suspected and fifty percent more arrested) with the eventual condemnations of just over sixty, the larger part of which were executed, with a smaller amount exiled and a few sentenced to servitude on the galleys (French ships; slaves basically I guess). As ever down through history, those with connections and high breeding (and presumably the money to bribe courts) were dealt with the most leniently, while the ordinary people suffered mostly death. Don’t feel bad for them though: they were all multi-murderers, or accomplices to murder. They deserved what they got. It’s just a pity that the wheels of justice tend to get bumped off their track by gold or the influence of powerful people.
Here we present some of the major players in the scandal. In all cases, these are certainly serial killers. As we are dealing with one particular incident here, I’ve cut out certain criteria, such as “weapon” (they all used poison), “Years active” (as these all plied their trade during the years of the scandal), "Hunting Grounds" as they all operated in Paris and “type” (as they’re all comfort killers, killing for financial gain).
Killer: Marie Bosse
Epithet: La Bosse
Nationality: French
Signature (if any):
Victims: Unknown (but surely a lot)
Survivors: Unknown (but surely none)
Caught by: French police
Fate: Burned at the stake
In vino veritas, it’s said - in wine, truth - but it could also be said
in vino culpa (or possibly
in vino fuckupa), or even to paraphrase the later saying used in World War II by the Allies, loose lips sink poisoners. Basically Marie Bosse, a successful and in-demand fortune teller got drunk at a party and began mouthing off about how she could soon retire on the proceeds of all the people to whom she had sold poisons. Unfortunately for her, in attendance at the party was a lawyer, and, shocked at this revelation (and obviously not taking it as the ravings of a drunk woman) he reported it to the police. They set up a sting operation in which the wife of one of the officers posed as a client in need of a way to get rid of her husband, and when she came back with what La Bosse had sold her, the police tested it in a way that won’t really be too pleasing to we animal lovers.
They fed it to a dog and monitored its reactions. Luckily the dog did not die (I don’t know if it was a police dog or just some stray) but it did puke a lot, and so they reasoned that what was in the package the wife of the officer had received from La Bosse was arsenic. Arrested, it’s said, in bed with her own children (all full grown) - this may have been embellishment to make the story even more interesting and repulsive, and thus attractive, or not - she began to sing, saying that she was not the one who sold the poisons, but could tell them who was. One of them was the woman known as La Voisin, Catherine Monvoisin. Squealing on a fellow poisoner did not however save her from the fire.
It dawns on me now that far from being a means of extracting information, torture in France seemed to have been part of the punishment, part of the sentence, as it was always or often carried out after the sentence of death had been passed, so there would be no need for it other than as additional torment. La Bosse had to wait her turn to be tortured while her friend, Marie Vigoreaux, went through her own court-ordered punishment, which actually resulted in her death. Whether it was a more merciful one than burning at the stake I don’t know, as the cause of death is only mentioned as being a head wound, and that could have been anything. Still, she was tortured for three days, so maybe not such an escape. La Bosse did survive her torture, at least long enough to go up in flames in the market square.
Killer: Francoise de Dreux
Epithet:
Nationality: French
Signature (if any):
Victims: 4
Survivors: 2
Caught by: French police
Fate: Exile but not really (see below)
If there was one thing you could be sure of in seventeenth century France, it was that your connections could save you from the fire or the noose if you were of noble enough birth. Francoise de Dreux, originally acquitted of four murders and the attempted murders of two more, including her husband, was basically let off with a slap on the wrist when her guilt was proven after her poison supplier was arrested and spilled the beans. Having fled the country, she was sentenced to exile, though only from Paris, and in the end it seems she was able to return there anyway, providing she lived under the supervision of her husband.
An identical case (not a serial killer though) involving a lower-born woman, Madame Philbert, resulted in her being hanged for the crime, as well as losing her right hand. In a clear case of class distinction and noble privilege, the lenient sentence - if it could even be called that - handed down to Madame de Dreux cast the French courts in a bad light, and showed how the richer and more connected you were, the easier the courts were on you. Or as Londo once put it in
Babylon 5: “Just how much justice can you afford?” Indeed.
Killer: Marguerite Joly
Epithet:
Nationality: French
Signature (if any):
Victims: Unknown
Survivors: Unknown (probably none; she was very good at her trade)
Caught by: French police
Fate: Burned at the stake
This was the poisoner who, when caught, dropped Francoise de Dreux right in it, the woman having previously been found not guilty of the murders she had committed. Joly claimed, under torture, to have been involved in black masses and the ritual sacrifice of babies. Having no noble blood however, or powerful friends (or at least, any who would endanger themselves by speaking up for her) she was executed by being burned at the stake, while de Dreux escaped without barely a fine. One rule for them…
Killer: Marie Vigoreaux
Epithet:
Nationality: French
Signature (if any):
Victims: Possibly 3
Survivors: Unknown
Caught by: French police
Fate: Died during torture
As already noted above, Madame Vigoreaux was a close -
very close! - associate of Marie Bosse, to the extent that it was claimed she had had sexual congress with Bosse’s entire family. She was arrested as a result of Bosse’s boast at Vigoreaux’s party and taken into custody, where she began naming names. She was sentenced to death but died while being tortured.
Killer: Magdelaine Chapelain
Epithet:
Nationality: French
Signature (if any):
Victims: Unknown
Survivors: Unknown
Caught by: French police
Fate: Sentenced to life imprisonment by a
lettre de cachet
Although there is no record of how many people she killed, like many of the accused in the
Affair of the Poisons, Chapelain was convicted of assisting Madame de Montespan in the assassination of another of the king’s mistresses, and of participating in and arranging black masses and other occult rites. Imprisoned without trial, it’s believed she died around 1724.
Killer: Francoise Filastre
Epithet:
Nationality: French
Signature (if any):
Victims: Unknown
Survivors: 2 known (King Louis XIV and his then-mistress)
Caught by: French police
Fate: Burned at the stake
Another involved in the plot to kill the king and his mistress, the Duchesse de Fontagnes, and later, when that failed, just the mistress, in which she also failed. She revealed that she had been engaged by our friend Madame de Montespan, and was sentenced to death, but first there was as seems to have been usual in 17th century France, time for a little torture. It seems incredible to me that this woman could die with the deaths of people on her soul, having attended black masses and witnessed the sacrifice of babies, and yet the one thing she could said she could not die with on her conscience was a lie. I mean, can you see it now? Saint Peter: “And this is, hmm, I see. Madame Filastre, you have been a bad girl, haven’t you? Let’s see: murder, poisoning, attempted murder, worshipping Satan… oh well all that is okay I suppose. God forgives every - WHAT? A LIE? Oh no no no! This will NOT stand! Get to Hell immediately!” Christ.
Killer: Marguerite Delaporte
Epithet:
Nationality: French
Signature (if any):
Victims: Unknown
Survivors: Unknown
Caught by: French police
Fate: Imprisoned perpetually under a
lettre de cachet
Her role in the Affair was quite prominent, in that she introduced La Voisin to her lover, the alchemist Denis Poculot, whose release after being kidnapped was the theme of the poisoned petition supposed to be handed to King Louis, but which he was too busy to read and therefore the plot failed. So she was of course directly connected with Mme. de Montespan as well as one of the biggest of the poison ring, Catherine Monvoisin, and it was in fact her daughter, Marguerite, who shopped her to the police as an accomplice of both her mother and the king’s mistress. Because of her high position in society, again, she was not executed but imprisoned permanently under a
lettre de cachet so that the king could put the whole affair to bed as quietly as possible.