X:oas!H m. si,!..I' snomI u,o8


Copyright, © x963, by The Vanguard Press, Inc.

Published simukaneously in Canada by the

Copp Clark Publishing Company, Ltd., Toronto

No portion of this book may be reproduced
in any form without the written permission of the'
publisher, except by a reviewer who may xvish to
quote short passages or reproduce one or two illustrations
in connection with a review for a newspaper or magazine.'
Manufactured in the United States of America by H. Wolff
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Library of Congress Catalogue Card Number: 63- 38oo


In Memory o


WILLIAM SHARP


Other Books by Robin McKown


Fiction:


JANINE


THE ORDEAL OF ANNE DEVLIN


	PUBLICITY
	GIRL


FOREIGN SERVICE GIRL
AUTHOR'S AGENT


Non-Fiction:


MARIE CURIE

SHE LIVED FOR SCIENCE, Irene Joliot-Curie

GIANT OF THE ATOM, Ernest Rutherford

THE FABULOUS ISOTOPES
WASHINGTON'S AMERICA
THOMAS PAINE
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
ROOSEVELT'S AMERICA

P A I N T E R 0 F T H E W I L D W E S T, Frederic Remington

PIONEERS IN MENTAL HEALTH


ACKNOWLEDGMENTS


The minutes of actual court proceedings are followed
in all the trials herein, with the exception of that of Soc-rates,
where no official recording clerk was present. In
this case we have depended on the account given by
Plato in his Dialogues, as translated by Benjamin Jowett,
which, if not literally exact, has the figurative and
spiritual truth of all great literature.

The excerpts from Joan of Arc's testimony are from
the translations of Sven Stolpe and W. S. Scott, and the
recantation of Galileo is quoted from the Giorgio de
Santillana translation.

I should like to express my appreciation to Helen
Landreth, for permission to use the version of Robert
Emmet's last speech that appears in her biography of
Emmet, and to Matthew Josephson for his permission to
quote his translation from the French of Emile Zola's
]'Accuse.


[X]
	FOREWORD


ants were tried. These twenty-one did not consider them-selves
criminals but important personages in a powerful
state that had suffered the reverses of war. Many of their
fellow citizens, and others, had been persuaded to agree
with them. Without the Nuremberg trial, there might
have lurked some latent suspicion that the political creed
known as Nazism had some justification in being. The
trial, with its mighty weight of evidence, produced in-contestable
proof of dastardly crimes against people and
against nations.

These seven trials are set in Greece, France, Italy, Ire-land,
America, and Germany. They range in time from
four centuries before the birth of Christ to post World
War II. They show legal procedures in different epochs
and different countries.

If there is one truth to be learned from them, it is
that laws are as just as the society that makes them and
the men who enforce them.


CONTENTS


SOCRATES [3]


JOAN OF ARC [42]


GALILEO [73]
iETER ZENGER [I9]

ROBERT EMMET [56]


THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [209]
THE NUREMBERG TRIAL [252]


IX]
	FOREWORD


ants were tried. 'These twenty-one did not consider them-selves
criminals but important personages in a powerful
state that had suffered the reverses of war. Many of their
fellow citizens, tnd others, had been persuaded to agree
with them. Without the Nuremberg trial, there might
have lurked some latent suspicion that the political creed
known as Nazism had some justification in being. The
trial, with its mighty weight of evidence, produced in-contestable
proof of dastardly crimes against people and
against nations.

These seven trials are set in Greece, France, Italy, Ire-land,
America, and Germany. They range in rime from
four centuries before the birth of Christ to post World
War II. They show legal procedures in different epochs
and different countries.

If there is otae truth to be learned from them, it is
that laws are as just as the society that makes them and
the men who enforce them.


CONTENTS


SOCRATES [31


JOA OF ARC [4.>]


GALILEO [73]


PETER ZENGER [119]


ROBERT EMMET [X56]


TIlE DREYFUS AFFAIR [209]
THE NUREMBERG TRIAL [25'>]


DON i ILLS

LIBRARY


SOCRATES


"You are charged, Socrates, son of Sophroniscus, with
not worshiping the gods whom the State worships. You
are further charged with corrupting the young. The
death penalty has been demanded by your accusers."

These words were spoken by the archon at the triaI
of the philosopher Socrates held in ancient Athens in the
year 399 s.c. The archon was responsible for. seeing that
the trial was conducted according to the laws of
Athens. He was not a judge. The jurors would be the
judges. There were five hundred of them, chosen by
lot. They alone would decide whether the defendant was
guilty of the crimes with which he was charged.

It was early in the morning. Socrates would have that
day, and that day only, to offer his defense. Before night-fall
the jury would give its verdict.

Who would miss such a drama? It promised more
excitement than the Olympian games, than the great


[6]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


plays of Aeschylus and Euripides. Practically all Athens
was there, everyone except women and slaves, who
were not admitted to public trials. The spectators sat
along stone benches or stood leaning against the marble
columns of the open court, some sympathetic, some hos-tile,
some merely curious.

On a small stool at one side of the raised platform was
the defendant. He was a bearded old man wi. th a pug
nose, bulging brow, and round, bright, quizzical eyes.
He wore a patched and ragged tunic, and he was bare-foot.
His expression was tranquil. Slowly he rose and
walked to the center of the platform in a curious wad-dling
gait that endeared him to his friends and gave his
enemies another reason to mock him. As he faced his au-dience,
he leaned forward slightly, balancing on the balls
of his feet.

At the far end of the platform stood the three men
who had brought the indictment against him. They
looked worried, and with good reason. If less than one-fifth
of the jury voted to dismiss the charges, they
would receive either a lashing or a fine of a thousand
drachmas, the penalty for making false charges.

Close by the platform were gathered a small group of
Socrates' friends and disciples. (Among them was a
youth named Plato, who would serve as court reporter,
writing down what was said as best he could remember,
certainly with some literary embellishments not per-mitted
in a later age.) Their faces were anxious and
troubled. They loved Socrates and feared for him. He
cast them a reassuring glance--as though he wanted to
tell them how unimportant it was whether he lived or
died; as though he must make them understand that the


SOCRATES [7]


way he had lived, the way he accepted death, were all
that mattered.

"O men of Athens," he began, addressing himself not
only to the jury but to everyone present. "O men of
Athens, I cannot tell how you have been affected by my
accusers, but I know they almost made me forget who
I was--so persuasively did they speak .... "

He had begun by giving a compliment to his oppo-nents,
which was typical of him. It was typical of him as
well to destroy at once the effect of that compliment.
He continued with a guileless air: "... And yet they
have hardly uttered a word of truth .... "

The spectators must have gasped with delight. They
had come to be entertained and they were not going to be
disappointed. The old man who, for more years than
most of them had lived, had been heaping scorn on the
smug and hypocritical, was not beaten yet. A hush fell
over the assembly.

In Athens the name of Socrates was familiar to all.
There was hardly a citizen who did not know who he
was, what he did, and the legends that had grown
around him. The modern reader, to understand the
meaning and reason of his trial, has need of this same in-timate
acquaintance with the man and the times in which
he lived. The difficulty is that he left no written works,
either memoirs or philosophy. Much of what we know
comes from Plato, though Plato in his writings often
used the character of Socrates to express his own ideas.
The historian Xenophon, also a disciple of Socrates, left
an idealized portrait of him in his Memoralilia. Other
contemporary accounts are inconsistent and often con-tradictory.
There are periods of his life about which


[xo]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


men "the works of God." "Let this then be one of our
rules and principles concerning the gods," he wrote, "to
which our poets and reciters will be expected to con-form--that
God is not the author of all things, but of
good only."

For the most part, Greek religion was a matter of
ceremony and ritual, having little connection with moral
behavior or spiritual improvement. Any man might act
or believe as he chose, provided he did not commit the
unforgivable sin of "blaspheming the gods."

Athens in this period was a stimulating place for those
with intellectual curiosity. Athenians loved to talk, and
they talked about anything and everything wherever
two or more of them came together. Since heavy labor
was done by slaves, free citizens had plenty of leisure
in which to develop philosophical ideas. No man was
required to produce experimental proof of a scientific
theory. If he was eloquent enough to make his theory
sound plausible, he was sure of a following. Athens did
not give birth to all the varied schools of thought that
arose in this astounding age, but they were all discussed
there.

Although Socrates mastered his father's trade, he
found the pursuit of knowledge far more enticing than
the cutting of stone or the making of lifeless statues.
"When I was young," Plato quotes him in the Phaedo,
"I had a prodigious desire to know that department of
philosophy which is called the investigation of nature; to
know the causes of things and why a thing is and is
created or destroyed . . . and I rejoiced to think that I
had found in Anaxagoras a teacher of the causes of ex-istence
.... "

Anaxagoras, Socrates' first teacher, was concerned


SOCRATES [III


with "the investigation of sun, moon, and heavens." He
taught that the universe was originally a chaos of various
kinds of seeds pervaded by a Mind. The Mind set these
seeds to gyrating in a whirlpool, or vortex, guiding them
to develop organic forms and to divide into the four
elements: fire, air, water, and earth. Nobody disputed
this imaginative concept indeed, there was no way of
disproving it but strong objections were raised when
Anaxagoras, making a remarkable guess, stated that the
sun was "a mass of stone on fire . . . larger than the
Peloponnesian Peninsula."

The sun, so the Greeks believed, was the god Helios.
It was blasphemy to call it "a mass of stone on fire." The
Athenian Assembly accused Anaxagoras of heresy and
condemned him to death. By fleeing Athens, he escaped
execution of the sentence.

After the abrupt departure of Anaxagoras, Socrates
studied with Archelaus, who was responsible for an early
version of the theory of evolution: "As regards living
creatures, when the earth grew warm, at first in its
lower portion, wherever the warm and cold mingled,
man appeared and many other living creatures, all hav-ing
the same mode of life, nurtured as they were from
slime .... "

In later years Archelaus changed from a physicist to a
student of ethics. He may have influenced Socrates to a
similar transfer of interests.

Another who had a role in the early education of Soc-rates
was Protagoras, who called him the ablest man of
his years that he ever met. Protagoras was a Sophist,
which originally meant a teacher of wisdom. He taught
that there vere no absolute truths, but only such truths
as hold for given men under given conditions. Of the


[ 2] Seven Famous Trials in History


gods, he rashly said, "I know not whether they exist or
not, or what they are like. Many things prevent our
knowing: the subiect is obscure and brief is the span of
our mortal life." To the Athenian Assembly this was
blasphemy; they banished Protagoras and burned his
books.

Socrates may have known Gorgias, another Sophist,
who carried the skepticism of Protagoras further, seek-ing
to prove, first, that nothing exists; second, that if
anything does exist it would be unknowable; third, that
if anything were knowable, the knowledge of it could
not be communicated from one person to another. The
Sophists gradually became known for this type of subtly
deceptive reasoning.

The Sophists of Socrates' time wandered from town
to town, giving lectures in rhetoric and logic and other
subjects. Their fees were often high. Gorgias and Pro-tagoras
charged pupils as much as io,ooo drachmas
for their education. One reason Socrates deserted the
Sophist school of thought was that he believed knowl-edge
should be given freely, not sold.

Another contemporary philosopher was Parmenides,
who contended that all things are one and never change.
"One thing are Thinking and Being... Beginning
and end, birth and death . . · are of forms only." The
one reality "never begins and never ends." Plato, in the
Parmenides, shows young Socrates, puzzled, trying to
understand what Parmenides means by his "the one"
and "the many."

Parmenides had a disciple, Zeno of Elea, who became
celebrated for his paradoxes. One of these stated that
"swift-footed Achilles" can never pass the slow-moving
tortoise--since as often as Achilles reaches the tortoise,


socsr:s [x3]


the tortoise has moved beyond that point! Socrates was
nineteen when Zeno came to Athens to confuse citi-zens
with such conundrums.

How much was the mind of Socrates formed by the
theoretical scientists Anaxagoras and Archelaus, by the
Sophists Protagoras and Gorgias, and by Parmenides
and Zeno of Elea? No one can say exactly. It is fairly
certain that he explored all existing philosophies before
his own ideas crystallized.

Somewhere in his late twenties or early thirties, he
stopped being a student and began to gather his own
group of disciples. In the beginning they were artisans
and craftsmen, young men as poor as he. At least one,
according to Diogenes, was a cobbler, who took notes
on his leather stock. Socrates may at first have discussed
astronomy and other matters of science with these young
men, but he soon abandoned all else to examine the qual-ities
of the human mind. "He discoursed," wrote Xeno-phon,
"always of human affairs."

What is justice and what is injustice? What is absolute
good, or truth, or beauty? What is piety and impiety?
What is courage, and is it not true that courageous men
face death because they are afraid of yet greater evils?
And, that being the case, what a strange thing that a
man should be courageous through fear!

The Socratic method was not to give speeches but to
ask questions. It was his habit to rise early and set out for
the marketplace or the Lyceum or the gymnasium or
the xvorkshops--wherever men gathered together. Inno-cently,
he would start the conversation with a question,
of which these lines from Plato's Phaedo are typical:

"Is it not true that anything that becomes greater
must become greater after being less?"


[I4]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


"True."

"And that which becomes less must have been once

greater and then have become less?"

"Yes."

"And the weaker is generated from the stronger, and

the swifter from the slower?"

"Very true."

"And the worse is from the better, and the more just

is from the more unjust?"

"Of course."

Socrates believed that only through such questioning
could one find truth. Knowledge to him was the highest
virtue, whereas evil grew from ignorance. Without
proper knowledge right action was impossible. The
highest good was happiness; the highest means to happi-ness
was knowledge or intelligence.

His young disciples were convinced that Socrates was
the wisest man in the world, and one of them, a youth
named Chaerephon, decided he would prove that he
was. Chaerephon made a pilgrimage to the Temple of
Delphi, high on the barren slopes of Mount Parnassus,
to consult the priestesses of the oracle. The gleaming
marble temple had been built in honor of the god Apollo.
Anyone with a perplexing question could address the
oracle, and it was said that Apollo himself, speaking
through the priestesses, would give the correct answer.

"Is anyone wiser than Socrates of Athens?" Chaere-phon
asked the oracle.

Sometimes the replies of the oracle were confusing
and difficult to interpret, but not in this case. "No one
is wiser," the oracle informed Chaerephon.

Chaerephon hurried back to Athens to report what he
had learned. Inevitably the story was repeated to Soc

socxr:s [S]


rates. Though Socrates would not dispute the oracle, he
took the verdict humbly. His only claim to wisdom, he
said, was that he admitted he knew nothing. Whereas
others pretended they knew everything.

It was possibly the decision of the oracle that brought
Socrates his first enemies. Certain pompous citizens, who
believed themselves much cleverer and better informed
than the son of the stonecutter Sophroniscus, were highly
indignant that Socrates' protestation of ignorance should
be considered wisdom..They began to watch him care-fully,
hoping to get something against him, some "dan-gerous''
statement uttered by him that could be used to
discredit him. Eventually they found what they wanted.

Socrates loved Athens and would not have felt at
home anywhere else, but he lamented the bitterness of
political factions. What the city needed, he once said,
was government by "knowledge and ability." It was
not difficult to construe this remark as an attack on de-mocracy.
Thus the rumor was started that Socrates
favored an oligarchy, a form of government in which
power is in the hands of the few.

Although Socrates faithfully observed the city's re-ligious
ceremonies, he was reported as saying: "Of the
gods we know nothing." Why, he was as bad as Pro-tagoras!
Those whom he had offended began to whis-per
that Socrates lacked respect for the gods.

His enemies also claimed that he tore down but never
built, that in many cases his clarification of an idea made
it more obscure than it had been before. Someone ac-cused
him of being unwilling to state an opinion him-self.
To which he answered calmly that the reproach
was just. He was a midwife, as his mother had been.
Only he helped give birth to ideas instead of babies.


[6]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


Sometime in his young manhood--the date is not
known--he married Xanthippe, a woman of his own
class. Xanthippe has become a symbol of a nagging
wife. She scolded him incessantly--for not providing
for his family, for not dressing himself properly, for
spending all his time in interminable philosophical argu-ments.
Socrates loyally defended her to his friends, say-ing
she was perfectly right. Many years later he had an-other
wife named Myrto, a woman of a noble family.
History does not say whether she was more patient
with him than Xanthippe had been.

The years between 445 and 431 B.c. (the twenty-fourth
to the thirty-eighth years of Socrates' life) were
a splendid period for Athens. This was "the Golden
Age of Pericles," which the poet Shelley called "the
most memorable in the history of the world." The city-state
of Athens was at peace after a long and intermit-tent
war with the Persians. An uneasy truce had been
signed with their ancient enemies, the Spartans, citizens
of a city-state like Athens on the Peloponnesian penin-sula.
Pericles, at once general, statesman, and partron
of culture and the arts, was in power.

Pericles revered Athens with a single-minded devo-tion
and set out to make it the most beautiful city of the
ancient world. A wealthy aristocrat himself, he "invited"
other rich citizens to fit out ships and to subsidize games,
musical contests, and plays. He also exacted tribute from
less powerful Greek city-states that, with Athens,
formed the Delian Confederacy, using the money col-lected
to beautify his city.

During this time the Parthenon, a temple to Athena,
was erected on the fortified hill known as the Acropolis.
The Parthenon was a rectangular building with Doric


SOCRATES [I7]


columns, of a beauty and simplicity of design that has
never been surpassed. The sculptor Phidias and his pupils
carved the incredibly lovely ivory and gold statue of
Athena and the hundreds of lifelike figures that adorned
the building.

Other temples were built on the Acropolis, and it is
said that Socrates worked on some of them, perhaps
with his father. He is personally credited with a statue
of Hermes and the three Graces for one temple. If this
is so, it was before he became a full-time philosopher.

As his reputation spread, many rich and well-born
young men joined the ranks of his disciples. Most,prom~
inent of them was a brilliant, spoiled, willful, and ex-ceedingly
handsome youth named Alcibiades. He and
Socrates differed widely in appearance, background, and
character. For Socrates, the ugliest of men, fame and
wealth were meaningless. He wore the same ragged
tunic throughout the years and went barefoot oftener
than he wore sandals or shoes. "How many things there
are that I do not want!" he once exclaimed, on seeing
the clutter of merchandise on sale in the market. "You
seem to think that happiness consists in luxury and ex-travagance,''
he reproached one of his pupils, "but I
think that to want nothing is to resemble the gods, and
that to want as little as possible is to make the nearest
approach to the gods."

As for young Alcibiades, he craved all the worldly
pleasures life had to offer. His wild escapades and his
drunken revels with the lowest of companions were the
scandal of Athens. Yet in spite of his frivolity he adored
Socrates more than he did any other human being. "He
is the only person who ever made me ashamed," he once
admitted.


[i8]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


The peace of Athens had lasted fourteen years when,
in 432 ,.c., Potidaea, a tiny peninsula in northern Greece,
declared its independence of Athenian power. Socrates
was called back into military service and stationed there
with the army Pericles sent to suppress the uprising.
There was a cruel frost that winter. Most of the sol-diers
bundled themselves up in warm garments and
swathed their feet in felt and fleece. Socrates wore his
ordinary tunic and went barefoot, even on ice. He had
kept healthy by wrestling and other sports and, accord-ing
to his comrades, knew neither fatigue nor hunger.

Alcibiades was an officer in the same division in which
Socrates served as a private. In one skirmish Alcibiades
was severely wounded. Socrates risked his life to carry
him to safety. Their general wanted to give Socrates a
prize for valor, but he insisted it be given to Alcibiades.

The year after the Potidaea campaign began, the
Spartans declared war on Athens. Sparta was a formida-ble
opponent. The military training of Athenian youths
was soft compared to that of young Spartans. Spartan
boys were taken from their families at the age of seven
and brought up by the state. They were taught to en-dure
pain without flinching; once a year the bravest
boys were beaten until their blood stained the stones on
which they stood. Winter and summer they slept in the
open on beds of rushes, and until they were thirty they
lived with their companions of the barracks. They were
unschooled in art and culture and the free exchange of
ideas, but they were excellent soldiers.

The Spartans, joined by certain city-states that re-sented
paying tribute to Pericles, laid siege to Attica,
the province in which Athens was situated. Pericles,
foreseeing the siege would be long, called the farmers of


socRATEs


Attica within the walls of Athens. A plague broke out
in the crowded city; in the three years it lsted it killed
a fourth o pounds the soldiers and unnumbered civilians. In
their misery the Athenians denounced Pericles s the
cause of both the war.and the plague and he was de-posed
from office. Though he was soon forgiven and

called to power, it was too late. He was ill of the plague
himself and died in 429 B.C. With him ended Athens'
"Golden Age."

There is no record of how Socrates spent the years of
the plague, but in 424 s.c. when the war had been under-way
six years, he was fighting at Delium. Alcibiades,
who had become a general and a brilliant military strate-gist,
was again in the same campaign. Plato, in his Sym-posium,
quotes a vivid account by Alcibiades of Soc-rates
the soldier during the retreat after the battle of
Delium:

"He and Laches [a companion] were retreating, for
the troops were in flight, and I met them and told them
not to be discouraged, and promised to remain with
them . . . you might see him [Socrates] . . . just as
he is in the streets of Athens, stalking like a pelican, and
rolling his eyes, calmly contemplating enemies as well
as friends, and making very intelligible to anybody, even
from a distance, that whoever attacked him would be
likely to meet with a stout resistance; and in this way he
and his companion escaped--for this is the sort of man
who is never touched in war; those only are pursued
who are running away headlong. I particularly observed
how superior he was to Laches in presence of

mind.
	,,

	The')er after the battle of Delium, Socrates was

	home again, attending the opening of a new play by the


[20]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


popular comic dramatist, Aristophanes. It was called
The Clouds, and Socrates was lampooned in it.

The setting of The Clouds was the "Thinking Shop,"
a school where one could learn to prove anything, even
if it was false. Aristophanes obviously had the Sophists
in mind, though Socrates had long since deserted sophis-try.

In the play, an old man named Strepsiades bangs on
the gate of the Thinking Shop, crying, "Take me to
Socrates." He wants to learn how to prove that he
need not pay his debts. A student appears and tells him:


"The master is busy.

He is asking Chaerepbon

How many times its length a/tea can lump."


(This must have delighted members of the audience
who had been trapped by Socrates' endless questions.)

Inside the Thinking Shop, Strepsiades finds the stage
Socrates seated in a basket suspended in mid-air. His
pupils are beneath him, staring downward. The guide
explains that they are studying what is below the
ground, wtfile their backs are studying astronomy.

Strepsiades approaches Socrates, pleading:


"Teach me one of your lessons in baste--

The way by 'which one never pays . . .

You shall have the proper l'ee:

Ye gods bear viess that 1 speak the truth."


"By what gods do you swear?" demands the stage
Socrates. "The gods are not a current coin with us." (It
is true, then, some of the audience may have whispered,
that Socrates does not worship the gods whom the State


worships.) Socrates then announces that the clouds are
the real gods. They make the rain. "For have you ever
seen rain without clouds?" The clouds are responsible for
thunder, too. "When they are full of water and are
driven along, they fall heavily upon one another, and
burst with a clap." It is not Zeus who drives them, as
everyone thinks, but Vortex. (Vortex was the "Mind"
that Anaxagoras invented in the least scientific part of
his theory; there is no evidence that Socrates ever be-lieved
in it.)

Strepsiades next persuades his good-for-nothing son,
Phidippides, to attend the Thinking Shop. (Since Phidip-pides
speaks with a lisp, the audience quickly guesses that
he is supposed to be Socrates' pupil Alcibiades, who
also lisps.) In the shop, Phidippides meets Just Argu-ment,
who pompously advises him to imitate the just
and the virtuous, and Unjust Argument, who wants to
know what good men have ever gained by justice or
virtue. Are there not among the leaders ten dishonest
men to one honest man? Do not the gods themselves
lie, steal, murder, commit other sins?

Phidippides is easily swayed by Unjust Argument, and
immediately begins to beat his father. Strepsiades begs
him for mercy in the name of Zeus, but Phidippides, con-tinuing
his beating, informs him that Zeus no longer ex-ists,
having been replaced by Vortex. (It is thus that
youth is corrupted, the spectators may have murmured,
and k is certainly Socrates who does the corrupting.)

In the last scene the enraged father runs out into the
streets, calling upon all good citizens to destroy this new
philosophy. Thereupon the people bum down the
Thinking Shop, leaving the stage Socrates to perish in
the flames.


[22]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


It is said that no one laughed more heartily at the first
performance of Aristophanes' The Clouds than Socrates
himself, and that when the play was over he stood up,
so that all present could compare him with his stage dou-ble.
Xanthippe, who reportedly was at his side, was prob-ably
not amused at all; no woman likes to see her hus-band
made a laughingstock. It is even possible that she
realized this caricature might one day cause Socrates
serious harm.

The next year Socrates resumed military service, this
time fighting at Amphipolis. At forty-seven he still dis-played
remarkable endurance and fortitude. So far as is
known, this was his last campaign. When it was over, he
could return to Athens to resume his role of making
people think for themselves, of instilling in them to the
best of his ability the love of good, of knowledge, and
of all the higher virtues that are man's heritage.

He was at the height of his fame now. The most im-portant
persons in Athens sought his company. In
,.c., he attended a banquet given by the poet Agathon,
who was celebrating the winning of a prize for a tragic
drama. We know of this banquet from Plato's account
of it in the Symposium. Plato was only thirteen at the
time and was not present, but he reconstructed it from
the reminiscences of one of the guests.

The guests reclining around the banquet table were
the intdlectual elite of Athens, among them Aristoph-anes,
against whom Socrates bore no grudge. After din-ing
they sent away the hired flute girl in order to devote
themselves to conversation. The subject was love. Soc-rates,
when his turn came to speak, described love as
something that was in itself poor and needy but that
raised man from earthly passions to a vision of the ab

soctA:s [z3]


solute beauty of God. Typically, he took no credit for
his ideas, attributing them to a mysterious woman of
great wisdom.

The discussion was interrupted by the arrival of Alci-biades,
drunk and crowned with ribbons and violets.
Ignoring the other guests, he burst into ecstatic praise
of Socrates:

"When we hear any other speaker, even a very good
one, he produces absolutely no effect upon us, or not
much, whereas the mere fragments of . . . your words,
Socrates, even at second hand, and however imperfectly
repeated, amaze and possess the souls of every man,
woman, and child who comes within hearing of them."

In this vein he continued to extol the greatness of Soc-rates
until some uninvited merrymakers dragged him
away with them. One by one the guests departed. When
the crowing of the cock marked the dawn, only three
were left: Agathon, the host; Aristophanes, and Soc-rates.
Socrates talked on, wisely and profoundly, until
his two exhausted companions were asleep. Then he
covered them up gently and departed to the Lyceum
for his bath, from there going to the marketplace to
find new listeners for the rest of the day.

At the time of this banquet, Alcibiades, because of his
military victories, was the idol of Athens. The Athen-ian
Assembly appointed him commander of a fleet with
which Alcibiades planned to attack and conquer Syra-cuse,
in Sicily, thus cutting off Sparta's imports from
this city and giving Athens a new source of grain, man-power,
and tribute. It was an ambitious project but he
was not permitted to carry it out. Just before the fleet
was to sail, the Athenians discovered that during the night
certain statues of the god Hermes had been mutilated. It


[24]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


was rumored that Alcibiades and his drunken friends were
responsible, though Alcibiades denied the charge and
there was no proof. His fleet was already at sea when
another charge was brought against him: that he had
mocked the sacred religious rites known as the Eleusinian
mysteries. A fast ship was sent to bring him back to
Athens for trial. Alcibiades escaped to a nearby island,
but was tried in absentia and condemned to death. In-dignant
at such treatment, he turned traitor, serving first
the Spartans and later the Persians.

He was forgiven and invited home three years later
and in an effort to redeem himself led the Athenians in a
series of naval victories, but again he found himself in
trouble. He had taken off for Athens, to enjoy the fruits
of his successes, leaving his fleet in charge of an incompe-tent
commander who promptly lost it to the Spartans.
Alcibiades, blamed for the loss and censured by the
Athenian Assembly, fled to take refuge in Bithynia (in
present-day Turkey).

Even after this, he attempted to help his countrymen,
coming down out of the hills at the risk of his life to
warn an Athenian commander that his fleet was in dan-ger.
The commander disregarded his warning and the
next day all but eight of the 208 Athenian ships of the
fleet were sunk by the Spartans.

Alcibiades continued to get into scrapes, even with
those who gave him refuge. He was assassinated by the
Spartans at the age of forty-six.

Alcibiades was the most spectacular of Socrates' pu-pils.
His good qualities were eclipsed by the fact that he
had turned traitor, however sporadically, and those who
did not like Socrates held him up as the prime example
of the philosopher's "corruption of youth."


soc,:rs [S]


The war with the Spartans had proved costly and the
coffers of Athens were empty. In desperation the citi~
zens voted to mek down the gold and silver from their
statues to raise money for a new and powerful fleet.
Slaves were offered their freedom and aliens were prom-ised
citizenship if they would join the crews. This
armada demolished the Spartan fleet in 4o6 B.c., losing
only twenty-five ships in battle. But there was no vic-tory
celebration.

The crews of the twenty-five lost ships had perished in
a storm without proper burial, which, according to the
belief of the time, meant that the souls of the dead would
wander forever around the universe, blaming Athens for
their fate. Hastily, the Athenian Assembly held a trial to
judge the eight generals in charge of the expedition.
Socrates attended as a senator, the only public office he
ever held. When a motion was made to execute the gen-erals,
on the grounds that this would appease the souls of
those who had drowned, Socrates protested the action
as illegal. He stood alone. The others threatened to im-peach
or arrest him for not agreeing with them.

"I would rather run the risk, having law and justice
with me," said Socrates, "than take part in your injus-tice
from fear of imprisonment and death."

The motion was passed, even without Socrates' vote,
and the eight generals were promptly put to death. Soc-rates
was not punished. The fickle Assembly soon de-cided
they had made a mistake--and imposed the death
penalty on the orators who had "bewitched" them into
killing their generals.

One by one the cities on the Aegean coast had fallen
to the Spartans Lysander, the ruler of the Spartans, or-dered
a siege o' Athens. The Athenians held out bravely,


[26]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


but in three months their food was gone and their
streets were full of the dead and dying. In 404 u.c.,
after a war of twenty-seven years, Athens surrendered.

The surrender terms were considered lenient, for
although Lysander ordered the walls around Athens
leveled and demanded the support of Athens in future
wars, he did not destroy the city nor make slaves of its
citizens. A Council of Thirty was set up to establish an
oligarchy in this city that had been so proudly demo-cradc.
This Council of Thirty quickly became unpopu-lar
with rich and poor alike. It seized the property of
wealthy merchants, plundered the temples, exiled some
five thousand prominent democrats, and condemned
fifteen hundred others to death. It put an end to free-dom
of assembly, of teaching, and of speech.

Socrates was not at first affected by these rulings, ap-parently
because Critias, one of the leaders of the Coun-cil
of Thirty, had once briefly been among his disciples.
Cdtias had heard Socrates criticize certain weaknesses
of Athenian democracy and mistakenly believed he
could count on him to support the oligarchy. But when
the council ordered five ckizens, including Socrates, to
arrest the democrat Leon of Salamis, Socrates, unlike
the other four, went quietly home to bed, ignoring the
order. In reprisal, Cridas forbade him ever again to
teach or speak in public places.

This punishment, which must have been as cruel as a
flogging to one as garrulous as Socrates, did not last
long. The Council of Thirty had been in power hardly
a year when ir was overthrown by the democrats. Cridas
was killed, along with his general, Charmides, also a
former pupil of Socrates. Democracy was restored
to Athens in 403 n.c. The new government set out to


SOCRATES [27]


bring prosperity back to their dty and to fight the
wrongs of the oligarchy. But Socrates, because of his
doubtful relationship to Critias, was not fully restored to
favor. Toward this old man who had never taken an
active part in politics, the restored democracy of Athens,
so generous to most of its enemies, would commit a
monstrous act.

It so happened that one of the democratic leaders,
Antyus, held a bitter grudge against Socrates. While
Antyus had been in exile, his son had stayed in Athens,
supposedly to study under the philosopher but actually
to spend his days in drinking and reckless living. Antyus,
a reasonable man in other respects, convinced himself
that Socrates alone was responsible for his son's turning
into a drunkard and became obsessed with the desire to
have him punished.

He enlisted the support of a mediocre poet named
Meletus and an orator named Lycon. Meletus was a man
of litde intelligence and great conceit who had on occa-sion
been exposed to Socrates' wit and who thirsted
for revenge. Lycon was a rbgtr, the predecessor of the
lawyer. Antyus, Meletus, and Lycon were the three
men who brought Socrates to trial for his life on that
long-ago day in 399 B.c. The full script of their indict-ment
against him does not exist. Though Lycon, as
rhOtbr, was supposedly better qualified to present the
case than the other two, it would seem that Meletus did
most of the talking, since Socrates, in his defense (as re-ported
by young Plato), addressed most of his remarks
to the poet.

"O men of Athens," he began--after the archon had
summarized the indictment accusing him of not wor-shiping
the gods the State worshiped and of "corrupting


[2 8] Seven Famous Trials in History


the young"--"O men of Athens, I cannot tell how you
have been affected by my accusers, but I know they al-most
made me forget who I was--so persuasively did
they speak . . ."

The old man with the white beard, pug nose, and
high, bulging, furrowed brow, stood on the platform of
the vast open court, leaning forward slightly and bal-ancing
on the balls of his feet. Before him he could see,
seated on stone benches, the five hundred jurors, stern
and serious with the responsibility of deciding whether
a man should live or die, and beyond them the crowd
of spectators, some hostile, some sympathetic, and some
merely curious.

Close by, just beneath him, were gathered his most
intimate friends--Chaerephon, who had asked the Del-phic
oracle if there was anyone wiser than he; the el-derly
and wealthy Crito; Adeimantus, and his younger
brother Plato, who would serve as court reporter. To
them Socrates cast a reassuring glance. We can imagine
that the sky above the marble pillars was deep blue and
cloudless and that the air was dry and warm and the sun
bright.

". . . and yet they have scarcely spoken the truth at
all," Socrates continued, "but from me you shall hear
the whole truth: not, however, delivered after their
manner in a set oration duly ornamented with words and
phrases. No, by heaven! But I shall use the words and
arguments which occur to me at the moment; for I am
confident in the justice of my cause . . . I am more
than seventy years of age, and appearing now for the
first time in a court of law. I am quite a stranger to the
language of the place, and therefore I would have you
regard me as if I were really a stranger, whom you


socg/ r :s [=9]


would excuse if he spoke in his native tongue, and after
the fashion of his country . . ."

It was true. ¥Vith all the talking Socrates had done, he
had never been an orator nor had he pretended to be
one. This was the first time he had been called upon to
make a long and almost uninterrupted address. He had
to make that clear. He proceeded:

"I will begin at the beginning, and ask what is the
accusation which has given rise to the slander of me, and
in fact has encouraged Meletus to prefer this charge
against me. [Veil, what do the slanderers say? They
shall be my prosecutors, and I will sum up their words
in an adavit:

"'Socrates is an evildoer, and a curious person, who
searches into things under the earth and in heaven, and
he makes the worse appear the better cause; and he
teaches the aforesaid doctrines to others.'

"Such is the nature of the accusation: it is just what
you have yourself seen in the comedy of Aristophanes
[he was referring to The Clouds], who has introduced
a man whom he calls Socrates, going about and saying
that he walks in air, and talking a deal of nonsense con-cerning
matters of which I do nor pretend to know
either much or little--not that I mean to speak disparag-ingly
of anyone who is a student of natural philoso-phy
.... ,,

Was he not rambling? When would he get to the
specific charges of the indictment? But Socrates took
his time. He must first rehearse ail the slanders that had
arisen about him over the years, and explain the reason
for them. Then, suddenly, he lashed out:

"Meletus says that I am a doer of evil, and corrupt the
but I say, O men of Athens, that Meletus is a


[30]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


doer of evil, in that he pretends to be in earnest when he
is only in jest, and is so eager to bring men to trial from
a pretended zeal and interest about matters in which he
really never had the smallest interest. And the truth of
this I will endeavor to prove to you. Come hither, Mele-ms.
Let me ask a question of you. You think a great
deal about the improvement of youth?"

The poet must have stepped forward reluctantly.
In his heart he knew he was no match for Socrates.

Nonetheless he spoke out defiandy:

"Yes, I do."

"Tell the judges, then, who is their improver; for you
must know, as you have taken the pains to discover
their corrupter, and are citing and accusing me before
them. Speak, then, and tell the judges who their im-prover
is."

Meletus was silent, fearing a trick.

"Speak, my friend," Socrates insisted. "Tell us who is
the improver of youth."

"The laws," Meletus blurted out.

"But that, my good sir, is not my meaning. I want to
know who the person is, who, in the first place, knows
the laws."

"The judges, Socrates," he said finally, "who are pres-ent
in court."

"What? Do you mean to say, Meletus, that they are

able to instruct and improve youth?"

"Certainly they are."

"All of them, or some only and not others?" Socrates
asked next.

"All of them."

"By the goddess Hera, that is good news!" Socrates
said sweetly. "There are plenty of improvers, then. And


SOCRATES [3II


what do you say of the audience? Do they improve
them?"

"Yes, they do."

"And the senators?"

"Yes, the senators improve them." Meletus must have
realized he was being forced into an awkward position,
but he could not back down.

"But perhaps the members of the assembly corrupt

them? Or do they improve them?"

"They improve them."

"Then every Athenian improves and elevates youth;
all with the exception of myself; and I alone am their

corrupter? Is that what you affirm?"

"That is what I stoutly affirm."

He had said exactly what Socrates wanted him to say.
"Happy indeed would be the condition of youth if
they had one corrupter only, and all the rest of the
world were their improvers." He turned to the poet, his
voice rising, "But you, Meletus, have sufficiently shown
that you never had a thought about the young; your
carelessness is seen in your not caring about the very
things which you bring against me. And now, Meletus,
I will ask you another question. By Zeus, I will.

"Which is better, to live among bad citizens, or among
good ones? The question is one which may be easily
answered. Do not the good do their neighbors good,
and the bad do them evil?"

"Certainly." What else could Meletus say?

"And is there anyone who would rather be injured
than benefited by those who live with him? Does anyone
like to be injured?"

"Certainly not." This, too, was obvious.

"And when you accuse me of corrupting and deteri

[32]


Seven Famous Trials in History


orating the youth, do you allege that I corrupt them in-tentionally
or unintentionally?"

"Intentionally, I say." Again Meletus had fallen into
a trap.

"But you have just admitted that the good do their
neighbors good, and the evil do them evil." Socrates
continued triumphantly. "Now, is that a truth which
your superior wisdom has recognized thus early in life,
and am I, at my age, in such darkness and ignorance as
not to know that if a man with whom I have to live is
corrupted by me, I am very likely to be harmed by him;
and yet I corrupt him, and intentionally, too--so you
say, although neither I nor any other human being is
ever likely to be convinced by you. But either I do not
corrupt them, or I corrupt them unintentionally; and on
either view of the case, you lie .... "

So far Socrates had won the argument. His friends
could have no doubt about it. He was ready for the
next round.

"But I still should like to know, Meletus, in which
ways I am affirmed to corrupt the young. I suppose you
mean . . . that I teach them not to acknowledge the
gods which the State acknowledges, but some other new
divinities or spiritual agencies in their stead. These are

the lessons by which I corrupt the youth, as you say?"
"Yes, that I say emphatically," Meletus admitted.
"Then, by the gods of whom we are speaking, tell
me and the court, in somewhat plainer terms, what you
mean! For I do not as yet understand whether you
affirm that I teach other men to acknowledge some gods,
and therefore that I do believe in gods, and am not an
entire atheist . . . or do you mean that I am an atheist
simply, and a teacher of atheism?"


SOCR.TES [33]


"I mean the latter--that you are a complete atheist,"
Meletus shouted.

"What an extraordinary statement! Do you mean that
I do not believe in the gods of the sun or moon, like
other men?"

Meletus turned to the jury. "I assure you that he does
not. He says the sun is stone and the moon earth."

Ah, Socrates explained, Meletus had made a grave mis-take
here. He had confused him with Anaxagoras, who
had indeed advanced such a doctrine. The jury would
have to concede this point. All knew by now that Soc-rates
was no longer concerned with the substance of the
sun and moon, but with the good and evil in man.

Now, as to the charge of the indictment that Socrates
worshiped gods other than those the State worshiped:
Here Meletus had made a "factious contradiction," Soc-rates
told the jury.

He faced Meletus. "Did ever man believe in the ex-istence
of human things and not of human beings? Did
ever any man believe in horsemanship and not in horses?
Or in flute playing and not in flute players? No, my

friend 	Now,
please answer the next question. Can
a
man believe in spiritual and divine agencies and not in
spirits
or demigods?"
"He
cannot," Meletus conceded.
"What
are spirits or demigods? Are they not either
gods
or the sons of gods?"
"Certainly
they are."
Once
more the poet had been routed by the logic of
Socrates.
It was absurd to claim that the philosopher be!ieved

in spirits and demigods--in the sons of gods, that

Sand not in the gods
themselves.
"You might as well affirm the existence of
mules,"


[34]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


Socrates pointed out, "and deny that of horses and asses.
Such nonsense, Meletus .... You have put this into
the indictment because you had nothing real of which to
accuse me."

He had said enough to answer the indictment. There
was much more he wanted to tell his fellow citizens on
this one day he was granted to defend himself.

"Someone will say: And are you not ashamed, Soc-rates,
of a course of life which is likely to bring you to
an untimely end? To him I may fairly answer: There
you are mistaken. A man who is good for anything
ought not to calculate the chance of living or dying; he
ought only to consider whether in doing anything he is
doing right or wrongmacting the part of a good man or
of a bad .... "

He spoke of heroes of the past who had time and dine
again preferred death to dishonor or disgrace. Should a
philosopher behave differently? "Strange, indeed, would
be my conduct, 0 men of Athens, if I, who, when I was
ordered by the generals whom you chose to command
me at Potidaea and Amphipolis and Delium, remained
where they placed me, like any other man, facing death
--if now, when, as I conceive and imagine, God orders
me to fulfill the philosopher's mission of searching into
myself and other men, I were to desert my post through
fear of death, or any other fears .... "

Were he to be granted his life on the condkion of
silence, he would refuse: "...while I have life and
strength I shall never cease from the practice and teach-ing
of philosophy, exhorting anyone whom I meet and
saying to him after my manner: You, my friend, a
citizen of the great and mighty and wise city of Athens,
are you not ashamed of heaping up the greatest amount


socv.x:s [35]


of money and honor and reputation, and caring so little

about wisdom and truth and the greatest improvement

of the soul, which you never regard or heed at all ....

I tell you that virtue is not given by money 	"

Some
of his judges--the wealthier ones--must have
winced.
Ragged as a beggar he was, and yet he dared
sneer at
them because they loved money. And by his
own admission
he was not going to change bis ways.
"And now,
Athenians," he continued, "I am not going
to argue
for my own sake, as you may think, but for
yours, that
you may not sin against God by condemning
me, who am
his gift to you. For if you kill me you will
not easily find a
successor to me, who, if I may use such
a ludicrous figure of
speech, am a sort of gadfly, given
to the State of
God; and the State is a great and noble
steed who is tardy in
his motions owing to his very size,
and requires to be stirred
into life. I am that gadfly
which God has attached to
the State, and all day long
and in all places am
always fastening upon you, arousing
and persuading and reproaching you.
You will not easily
find another like me, and
therefore I would advise you to
spare me."
Socrates comparing himself
to a
gadfly! In spite of
the solemnity of the occasion,
his friends must have
chuckled. But the jurors who
had been "stung" by that
gadfly could only have considered
the comparison as unbridled
insolence.
The sun was
low on
the horizon and still Socrates
talked on: about his life's
work, his teaching, about what
he believed and why. He
must have been tired, but there
was one more thought he
had to express to those assembled
to listen to him:

"There seems to be something
wrong in asking a fa-

[ 36] Seven Famous Trials in History


vor of a judge, and thus procuring an acquittal, instead
of informing and convincing him. For his duty is, not to
make a present of justice, but to give judgment; and he
has sworn that he will judge according to the laws, and
not according to his own good pleasure; and we ought
not to encourage you, nor should you allow yourselves
to be encouraged, in this habit of perjury--there can be
no piety in that. Do not, then, require me to do what I
consider dishonorable and impious and wrong, especially
now, when I am being tried for impiety on the indict-ment
of Meletus. For if, O men of Athens, by force of
persuasion and entreaty I could overpower your oaths,
then I should be teaching you to believe that there are
no gods, and in defending myself should simply cox-vict
myself of the charge of not believing in them. But
that is not so--far otherwise. For I do believe that there
are gods, and in a sense higher than that in which any of
my accusers believe in them. And to you and to God !
commit my cause to be determined by you as is best for
you and me."

He had said it all. It was over and he returned to his
place to await the vote. He had spoken as he never had
before and his friends were weeping. But the iurors saw
him neither as a philosopher nor as a poor old man
worthy of mercy and pity. For the majority of them,
Socrates was someone they would be well rid of be-cause
he was not like them, because he made them un-comfortable,
or because, as they no doubt reasoned
loftily, he was really a danger to the democratic State
of Athens.

When their ballots were counted, it was found that
280 had voted against him and only 220 for him. Soc-rates
had lost, Melctus and Antyus and Lycon would


socazEs [37]


not have to face a lashing, nor would they be fined.
There remained the sentencing.

The three accusers had asked for death, but the pris-oner
was allowed to suggest an alternative. Socrates
obliged them by saying that though he was a poor man
he might offer one mina (about ten dollars) in exchange
for his life. In the startled lull that followed this absurd
proposal, four of his friends, Plato, Crito, Critobulus, and
Apollodorus, approached the platform and whispered
something to him. "My friends here bid me say thirty
mime," Socrates said. "Let thirty minae be the penalty;
for which sum they will be ample security to you."

The jury refused the offer. They hoped, and there is
reason to believe that his accusers hoped, too, that Soc-rates
would plead for exile from Athens. But for Soc-rates
exile would have been a disgrace he did not deserve.
He spoke instead of his pity for those who had con-demned
him and who would henceforth have to live
with his murder on their consciences.

We are told that Socrates spent a month chained in his
prison cell waiting for the execution of the death sen-tence.
A ship had been sent to Delos on a sacred mission,
and until its return capital punishment was forbidden.
In that month his friends worked out a plan for his es-cape.
One morning Crito visited him in his cell to try to
convince Socrates to let them carry out their plan. Soc-rates
refused. The State had given him an unjust sen-tence,
but it had been made lawfully. To break the law
would be to bring injury to the State. That he was un-willing
to do. Reluctantly, Crito left.

The day the ship returned from Delos--the day his
friends knew would be Socrates' last--they gathered in
his prison cell. They found his wife there, with her


[38]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


youngest son in her arms. (Plato says it was Xanthippe.
Modern scholars have pointed out that it must have been
his second wife, Myrto.)

"O Socrates," she cried, "this is the last time that
either you will converse with your friends or they with

yOU."

Socrates turned to the aged Crito: "Let someone take
her home."

She was led away, weeping.

The jailer had taken off Socrates' chains, and he sat
on his couch rubbing his legs. "How singular is the
thing called pleasure," he said, "and how curiously re-lated
to pain, which might be thought to be the opposite
of it; for they are never present to a man at the same in-stant,
and yet he who pursues either is generally com-pelled
to take the other; their bodies are two, but they
are joined by a single head."

He talked to his friends of many things after that: of
the reason why he had been composing poetry in prison,
although he had never done so before; of why no
philosopher should fear death but still should never try
to take his own life; and of how the physical senses mis-lead
the soul in its search for truth.

Crito interrupted at one point to say that the jailer had
warned him not to let Socrates talk too much, for talk-ing
would excite him and interfere with the action of the
poison he was to take.

"Let him mind his business and be prepared to give
the poison twice or even thrice if necessary; that is all,"
said Socrates. He continued to discourse with his friends
on life and death and the harmony of the spirit, on the
immortality of the soul, on why the greatness in people


socR,a::s [39]


drive out the smallness, and other such matters that
had concerned him in the past.

As sunset approached, he left his friends to bathe and
prepare himself for his final departure. Then his wife
was admitted again with all three of his sons and the
other women of his family. He spoke with them briefly,
giving them advice for their' future, but soon dismissed
them and returned to his friends.

The jailer brought in the cup of hemlock, saying,
"You have only to walk about until your legs are heavy,
and then to lie down and the poison will act."

As Socrates raised the cup to his lips, his friends were
unable to control their emotions and their tears flowed
openly. "What is this strange outcry?" he reproached
them. "I sent away the women so they might not misbe-have
in this way, for I have been told that a man should
die in peace. Be quiet then, and have patience."

As the jailer had instructed, he paced the cell, and
when his legs began to fail him, he lay down on his
couch. After a while the jailer pressed his foot and then
his leg, and asked him if he could feel anything.

"No," said Socrates. "When the poison reaches the
heart, that will be the end."

He looked up at his oldest friend. "Crito, I owe a cock
to Asclepius; will you remember to pay the debt?"

"The debt shall be paid," Crito assured him. "Is there
anything else?"

There was no answer. The soul of Socrates had quit
its earthly body and was now free to explore the realm
beyond man's knowledge.


JOAN OF ARC


The preparatory trial opened at eight o'clock, the morn-ing
of February 2 , i43 x. It was held in the royal chapel
of the castle of Rouen, which is in Normandy, France,
at this time occupied by English soldiers.

Tall wax candles lit the chapel's dim interior and cast
shadows on the features of the judges and the assessors
(who acted as jury), some sixty in all. They were high
Church officials from the Rouen Cathedral, abbots, heads
of big Norman monasteries, theological faculty members
from the University of Paris, doctors of law and of
medicine.

In charge of the trial was the haughty Pierre Cauchon,
former Bishop of Beauvais, a traitor to France who had
sold his services to the English. At his side was Jean
LeMaltre, deputy inquisitor, present as representative of
the Inquisition, that body of men appointed by the Holy
Church to seek out and punish heretics. He was there


!: .
	SOAS Or UC [4]


	unwillingly, had agreed to come only to make sure that

the trial was conducted in accordance with Church law.
Also present was the chief prosecutor, Jean d'Estivet,
a bitter, cynical man wkh an evil disposition.

The prisoner was brought before them--a young girl
wkh shoulder-length hair worn in the style of a court
page, said to be attractive although no accurate descrip-don
of her exists. To the common people of France she
was known as the Maid of Orleans.

She was accused of heresy, of sorcery, of practicing
the "diabolic arts."

There were red marks on her wrists where prison
fetters had bitten into her flesh. Her ragged and shabby
clothes were of the sort worn by a youth--a short
girdled runic and long hose. Her eyes were unafraid and
she held herself proudly before the imposing gentlemen
in their stately robes who had come to iudge her.

How shocking, they whispered to one another, how
.unspeakably shocking that a woman would dare appear
m the garb of a man! An Augustinian hermit covered
his eyes with his hands to hide the shameful sight.

No formal charges had been made against her. These
would be formulated on the basis of her replies to the
questions asked during the preparatory trial, and she
would then be permitted to try to refute them. In con-trast
to Anglo-Saxon legal practice, she would be found

	guilty unless she could prove her innocence.

Bishop Cauchon opened the proceedings.

"Put your hand on the Bible, Joan," he said. "Swear
to tell the truth to all the questions you are asked."

"I cannot take such an oath." Her voice rang out clear
and firm. "There are questions to which I have no right
to reply. Not even if you cut off my head. The revela

[44]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


tions that have come to me from God--I have no right
to speak of them to any human being."

The Bishop frowned. It was a bad beginning, a humil-iating
thing to be defied at the very outset by this igno-rant
country girl. He had a personal grievance against
her. It was her fault that the English had been driven
from Beauvais, where he had been bishop. To escape the
wrath of the people, Cauchon had been forced to flee. He
hoped that his successful handling of this trial would
lead to his appointment as archbishop of Rouen--a
dream that would never be realized.

England and France had been fighting intermittently
since i337, with the English scoring many victories on
French soil. In 142o, when Joan was ten, Charles VI of
France, a madman, signed the Treaty of Troyes, by
which he bequeathed the French crown to Henry V of
England, thus disowning his own son, the Dauphin
Charles. Henry V died two years before Charles VI.
The ruthless Duke of Bedford became acting regent for
one-year-old Henry VI. The Duke of Burgundy and
his followers, who were French, claimed that this baby
was King of both France and England. Other French-men
staunchly maintained that the French crown be-longed
only to the Dauphin.

The Dauphin, ineffective weakling though he seemed,
had sufficient courage to repudiate the Treaty of Troyes,
and from Chinon in southwest France organized an
army from Gascony and Armagnac, pawning his jewels
and, it was said, even the clothes on his back, to pay his
soldiers. It seemed a futile gesture. The Dauphin was
unskilled in the arts of war; his generals and ministers,
who should have advised him, did nothing but quarrel
among themselves.


.oA ov ARC [45]


The English occupied the greater part of France north
of the Loire River. Early in x429, two years before
Joan's trial, they sent an army to besiege Orleans, on a
bend in the Loire. If Orleans fellwand it then seemed
inevitable that it would--all France would soon be an
English colony.

It was at this moment of crisis that the peasant girl
Joan arrived at Chinon, demanding boldly that she be
taken to the Dauphin. She had traveled some four hun-dred
miles across war-torn France with an escort of
men supplied by Robert de Baudricourt of Vaucouleurs,
the Dauphin's representative in the Vosges. She was sent
by God, she said. St. Catherine, St. Margaret, and the
Archangel Michael had spoken ro her in His name. They
had told her she was to raise the siege of Orleans and
have the Dauphin crowned the true King of France.

The Dauphin, who had reasonable doubts that a sev-enteen-year-old
girl could accomplish these miracles,
avoided seeing her as long as he could. When she was
finally admitted to the palace, he had a knight take his
place on the throne and disguised himself as one of his
courtiers. She had recognized him at once. Sensible and
matter-of-fact and confident, she convinced him of her
sin. ce. rity. For an ecclesiastical opinion as to her divine
msson, he sent her to the Archbishop of Reims, at
Poitiers, who, following a lengthy examination, gave
Joan his blessing and told her to do as she must. After
that the Dauphin made her head of the French armies,
providing her with a black horse and a suit of white
armor.

Joan proved to be the equal of the most experienced
generals. The soldiers, tough and undisciplined, vowed
to follow her to the death, and, just as surprising, gave


[46] Seven Famous Trials in History


up swearing and carousing for her sake. One after
another, the English fortresses around Orleans fell, and
on May 8, 429, the besieged city was saved.

With the Maid of Orleans at their head, the French
armies won more battles in the next weeks, liberating
town after town. There had never been a military leader
like her. She took no credit for victory. She wept bit-terly
at the sight of the English dead. Once she leaped
from her horse to comfort a dying prisoner, holding his
head in her arms until the priest arrived. Everywhere
people claimed her as their savior, crowded around her,
trying to touch her horse, gazing at her "as if they were
beholding God." On July 9, she captured Troyes, the
site of the infamous Treaty of Troyes. On July

French armies entered Reims where, in a beautiful cerc-mony,
the Dauphin was crowned Charles VI of France
--just as the Maid had prophesied.

Following the coronation there were reverses. In an
unsuccessful attempt to take Paris, the French suffered
some fifteen hundred casualties. The Maid herself was
wounded in the thigh by an arrow. Her comrades were
surprised to find that she felt pain, like anyone else. This
was on September 8, the feast day of the Virgin's birth,
and some claimed that the defeat came because they
fought on a holy day. The winter passed in a stalemate.

On May 23, x43o, Joan led a sally from Compigne
against the Burgundians, who were allies of the English.
Though her armies were forced to retreat, Joan stayed
behind with the rear guard. The gates of the town
closed before she could enter. An archer dragged her
from her horse and the noble, Jean de Luxembourg,
took her prisoner. Her splendid days as a soldier were
over.


I


$oA ov t,u¢ [47]


That was eight months before she was brought to
trial. During her lonely prison life at Luxembourg's
chateau of Beaurevoir, she must have wondered why
the former Dauphin made no effort to secure her

lease. It may have seemed strange to her too that her
close companions in battle, the valiant La Hire, the
brave Jean Dunois, the gal]ant Due d'Alenon, hand-some
Gilles de Rais, did not come to rescue her. Nor
could she guess the joy with which the English learned
of her capture, or the large ransom they offered to have
her transferred to them, only so they could give her to
the Church--and to the Bishop of Cauehon--to be tried
as a heretic and sorceress.

Not all Church authorities approved the proceedings.
In fact, during the preliminary discussions, Bishop Cau-chon
had thrown into prison a Rouen priest named
Nicolas de Houppeville for pointing out that the Arch-bishop
of Reims, who outranked Cauchon, had vouched
for Joan's saintliness, thus casting a doubt over the legal-ity
of the trial. Other churchmen were forced to appear
under the threat of losing their freedom or their posts.

To Joan, on that first day of the preparatory trial, it
may have seemed that she had not a friend in the world.
If so, she did not let herself betray distress or sorrow. An
nner strength sustained her, and' pounds om the beginning she
displayed a firmness and a resolution that astounded

everyone.

She would not promise Cauchon to answer all the
questions that were put her. "As for the revelations sent
me from God, never will I reveal them save to Charles,
my King." He had to be content with her vow "to tell
everything about which I shall be questioned about the
Faith.',


[48] Seven Famous Trials in History


The opening interrogation had to do with her child-hood
in the village of Domrmy, in the province of
Lorraine. She answered freely.

She was bapdzed Jeanne, though at home her family
called her Jeannette, she told Cauchon. Her father, a
farmer, was Jacques Darc.* Her mother was named
Ysabeau. She gave him the names of her godparents and
of her priest. She had three brothers and two sisters. She
was nineteen years old, she thought. And she wished
they would not keep her in irons. "Ever since I was
brought here my hands and feet have been fettered with
iron manacles that hurt terribly."

Cauchon informed her that he had ordered the fetters
because she had several times tried to escape.

"I would like to escape, as is lawful for every pris-oner,''
Joan said.

He asked her to say the Pater Noster and the Ave
Maria.

She would do so, she said, if he would hear her con-fession,
a privilege denied her since her capture. He in-sisted
she should say the Pater Noster and Ave Maria to
"two notable persons of this company." She shook her
head. "I will not say them at all, if they do not hear my
confession."

The first session was over. She was taken back to her
cell, a dismal chamber in one of the seven towers of the
castle held by the Earl of Warwick, the English-ap-pointed
Governor of Rouen. Her feet were put in fet-ters.
A chain, secured to an overhead beam, was fas-tened
around her waist. Though theoretically she was a


* More than a century later a poet of Orldans renamed Jeanne Darc,
calling her "Jeanne d'Arc," implying she came of noble birth, which
was not so. In English, this was translated as "Joan of Arc."


.IO-N or AlPC [49]


prisoner of the Church, English soldiers guarded her.
Two of them were stationed outside her door. Three
others stayed in her cell night and day. Rough and un-couth,
they took advantage of her helplessness to curse
and mistreat her.

The preparatory trial continued the next day, Febru-ary
22, not in the chapel but in a smaller hall. Again

Cauchon ordered her to take a vow to tell the truth.

"I did so yesterday. That will suffice."

He asked more questions about her childhood.

Had she as a child been taught any profession?

She answered proudly that she could sew and spin and
could challenge any woman of Rouen in these crafts.

He asked next about the voices that she claimed
guided her in all her actions. She answered fully and
frankly.

She was thirteen when she had first heard one of them
and she had been gready afraid. It was noon on a
summer's day in her parents' garden. The voice had
come from the right, from the direction of the church,
and it had been accompanied by a light. After she had
heard it three times she knew it was the voice of the
Archangel Michael. Later, St. Catherine and St. Mar-garet
spoke to her. They came two or three times a
week, sometimes in the garden, sometimes in the forest,
us.ually after the church bells sounded. Both St. Cath-enne
and St. Margaret wore crowns on their heads and
Were robed in beautiful garments. In their first visits
they simply told her to take care of herself and attend
church frequently.

From her mother she learned the story of these saints.
Both had taken a vow of chastity, swearing they would
never marry but would devote themselves to God's


[50]


Seven Famous Trials in History


will. Joan, too, took a vow of chastity. It was after this
that her saints told her of her unique destiny: "Daugl-ter
of God, you must go into France and raise the siege
of Orleans."

She asked them how she, a young girl without money,
could cross France alone. They gave her specific instruc-tions.
"Daughter of God, you will go to the captain,
Robert De Baudricourt, in the town of Vaucouleurs.
He will provide you with soldiers who will take you to
the Dauphin."

Vaucouleurs was not far distant. Joan coaxed an uncle
to take her there. Somehow she obtained an audience
with de Baudricourt. How the captain laughed when
this peasant lass, clad in a patched red dress, announced
that she was sent by the King of Heaven to raise the sic'ge
of Orleans!

"Take the wench back to her father and tell him to
give her a good spanking," he roared.

There was nothing she could do but go home. A few
months later the English attacked their valley and pil
laged Domr6my. With the enemy at their doorstep, Joan
came again to see De Baudricourt, telling him, almost
ordering him, to send her to the Dauphin quickly. Her
voices had now instructed her to have him crowned
King of France. Perhaps from desperation, since all
other succor had failed, De Bauddcourt decided to com-ply
with her wishes. Joan was provided with a horse and
six of De Baudricourt's men to take her to Chinon.

"On whose authority do you wear men's clothing,
Joan?" This question came from Jean Beaupre, a pro-English
priest whom Cauchon had assigned to examine
her that day.

"I charge nobody," she said, though later, in answer


JOAI 01* ARC: [51]


	tO the same question, she claimed that her voices had in
	structed
her to cut her hair and dress as she did. If so, it

	was practical advice. No woman in womanly garb

	would have been safe on that long cold trip across

	France, sleeping in the open, traveling unfrequented

	roads to avoid thieving bands, with the hoofs of their

	horses wrapped in cloth so they would make no sound.

	Nor would it have been feasible to lead the Dauphin's

	armies in a woman's gown and fichu.

	"How did you recognize the Dauphin?" Beaupre

	asked her. How had she known that the handsome knight

	in royal robes seated on the throne was not he? How

	was she able to go directly to where the real Dauphin

	stood, in ordinary clothes, among his courtiers?

	She recognized him among many others by the advice

	of her voices, she replied. In truth, it could not have

	been dif/icult. Everyone had heard what the Dauphin

	looked like--a meek, homely man with thick lips, a long

	nose, watery eyes, no eyelashes, spindly bowed legs.

	"Was there a light about him?" Beaupre demanded.

	"Go on to the next question," Joan said.

	She confided later that the King and several members

	of his council heard and saw her voices.

	Beaupre asked her what revelations they made to

	the Dauphin.

	If the judges wished to know, she demanded, why

	did they not send a message to the King and ask him?

	Baffled, Beaupre changed the subject. "About ,a'hat

do you question
	·,,

	your vmces.

He wanted her to admit she asked favors of them, but

Joan disappointed him:

"I have never asked for any reward other than the

salvation of my soul."


[52]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


He asked if the attack she had led on Paris had taken
place on a Church feast day. She told him she believed
it had.

"Was that a good thing?"

She refused to answer. Perhaps she thought it absurd
to do so. After all, the English never showed any
scruples about fighting on feast days.

The second session was adjourned.

Afterward, Cauchon summoned the recording clerk,
Manchon, to suggest that he amend certain of Joan's
statements in the minutes. Manchon made some excuse
not to obey. It is said that Cauchon made five separate
attempts during the preparatory trial to alter Joan's
testimony, but due to Manchon's stubborn and coura-geous
refusal, he never succeeded.

A third examination took place on February 24. Once
more Cauchon told Joan she must tell the whole truth
without reservation. She did not reply. He repeated this
order three times over, then burst out wrathfully, as-suring
Joan she was exposing herself to great perils.
She told him she accepted the perils and to stop bother-ing
her about them.

Cauchon again turned over the investigation to Beau-pre.
This learned man was far more subtle than Can-chon.
His voice was gentle and he gave the impression
of being Joan's friend, which he was not.

"When did you eat and drink last?" he asked her.

"I have neither eaten nor drunk since-yesterday at
noon."

He continued with questions about her voices.

"At which hour did you hear the voice yesterday?"

"I heard it three times yesterday," Joan said, "in the
morning, at the time of Vespers, and when Ave Maria


jo, oF *ac [5]


was said in the evening. Often I hear it more times than
I can say."

"When the voice came to you yesterday morning--what
were you doing?"

"I slept. The voice woke me."

"Did he touch your arm?"

"It woke me without touching me."

"Was the voice in your room?"

"Not so far as I know. But it was in the castle."

"Has the voice ever changed its meaning?"

"I have never noticed that it contradicts itself. Last
night it only told me to answer bravely," she said.

He asked if her voice had a face and eyes, but Joan
would not answer.

Then he demanded abruptly, "Do you know if you
are in a state of grace?"

"If I am not," Joan said deliberately, "I pray to God
to make me so. If I am, may God keep me so."

The examiners, some against their will, were im-pressed
with the beautiful simplicity of her response to
this difficult question. Beaupre, embarrassed, started
asking her about the political beliefs of her childhood
playmates.

There was only one boy in the village whose sympa-thies
were with Burgundy, the English ally, Joan said.
She added with the disdain of any patriot for a traitor,
"I would have wished that they had cut off his head--of
course, if it were the will of God."

Casually, Beaupre asked if her voices had told her to
hate the Burgundians. But he did not succeed, as he
hoped he would, in leading Joan to say that God could
inspire one human being to hate another.

"When I realized my voices were for the King of


[54]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


France, I could not greatly love the Burgundians," she
answered him. "They will get war if they do not act as
they should. That I know from the voices."

Then Beaupre asked her a most dangerous question,
aimed to make her admit an alliance with unholy forces.
"What do you know about a certain tree near your vil-lage?"

Joan understood at once what he meant. Not far
from her home in Domrmy, surrounded by the most
brilliant flowers of the countryside, was an enormous
beech tree whose mighty branches touched the ground.
Sometimes, with other girls of the village, Joan had
danced beneath the tree and hung garlands on its
branches. People believed that fairies and other spirits
lived there. It was claimed that the nearby spring had
magic powers and that the sick could be cured by
drinking its water.

She knew of the legends about the tree and the spring.
How could she not know? She den/ed that she believed
them. She did not know what to think of such matters.
She had never seen any fairies herself, and after her
voices began to speak to her she no longer wished to
dance beneath the tree with her playmates.

That night Joan fell violently ill, apparently as a re-sult
of eating a fish Cauchon had sent for her dinner.
The prosecutor, Jean d'Estivet, ironically nicknamed "the
blessed," came to her cell and cursed her for her erecdi-ness.
But the English, terrified lest she die before he end
of her trial, sent doctors to examine her. Cauchon, too,
was upset and for the first time allowed her to have a
confessor, a priest named Nicolas Loiseleur. Joan could
not guess that he was a spy, in the pay of the English,


joAs ov ARC [55]


and that everything she told him was repeated to her
captors.

About this time, Cauchon discussed the progress of
the trial with a visiting Norman priest, Jean Lohier,
who was an authority on Church law. He wanted Lohier
to give his approval, but instead the Norman chimed the
trial was invalid. He gave several reasons for his opin-ion.
No information had been made public to support
the accusations against Joan. The honor of the King of
France, whom Joan supported, was involved. Moreover,
Joan was a simple and uneducated girl who could not
be expected to answer questions on theological matters.

"One can easily see on which foot he limps," Cauchon
muttered angrily, meaning that Lohier was a loyal
Frenchman.

For his own safety, Lohier promptly left for Rome.
Later he said that Joan's judges were motivated by re-venge
and that "they wanted her killed."

By February 27, Joan, though still weak, was well
enough in the opinion of her doctors for the trial to
resume. During this, the fourth session, she was ques-tioned
about the sword she carried at Od&ns and in her
other battles.

After the Dauphin had given her a horse and armor,
she had sent a messenger to a church dedicated to St.
Catherine de Fierbois, some nineteen miles from Chinon.
From ancient times knights had left their swords on the
altar of this church. Joan instructed her messenger to
look in the ground behind the altar for the sword she
wished; it was rusted but he would know it by the five
crosses that adorned it. He did as she asked and brought
the SWord back to her. (According to some, Joan's


[56]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


sword had once belonged to Charles Mattel, the grand
father of Charlemagne.)

"What blessing did you read or cause to be read over
the sword?" Beaupre asked her. He wanted her to
confess that she had cast a spell over it so it would be a
more deadly weapon than any ordinary sword.

"I have never read, or caused to be read, any blessing
of any kind over the sword," she said. "As far as I know,
nobody has done so .... I only loved that sword be-cause
it was found in the church of St. Catherine. I have
always loved her greatly."

Beaupre next asked her about the white banner she
carried in battle, an embroidered pennant showing God
with one hand raised in blessing and the other clasping
the globe of the world, and with angels kneeling at His
side.

Joan explained: "When I attacked the enemy I always
carried my banner so as not to kill anyone. ! have never
killed anyone."

The grueling and cruelly insinuating questions vent
on and on, but Joan did not falter. "Answer bravely,"
her voices told her. To the best of her ability she did so.

When the questions struck her as irrelevant, repeti-tious,
or merely stupid, she would say, "Pass on to the
next one," or "I will think this over and then answer
you." Frequently she said, "You have already been an-swered
as to this and you will have no further reply,"
and "! will not give you any other answer at present."

It was small wonder that Cauchon became increas-ingly
exasperated. As for the assessors, many of them
were beginning to sympathize with her. A number of
them dropped out of the trial and left Rouen, disgusted
at the way Joan was being treated.


JOAN OF ARC [57]


Father Massieu, the priest assigned to take her to and
from her cell, found only "goodness and honesty in her."
He permitted her to pray before the closed chapel door
that they passed on the way to the examination hall,
until Prosecutor d'Estivet happened to see her there. Fu-rious,
he shouted at Father Massieu that he would be
thrown in prison if he ever again let "that sinful woman"
approach the chapel. Henceforth Joan had no respite be~
tween the bitter strain of the long examinations and the
horror of her nights in her cell.

Her fifth examination, on March , began with more
questions about her voices.

"Do they speak in English or in French?"

"How could they speak English when they are not
on the side of the English?" she asked guilelessly.

There were more attempts to make her admit she in-dulged
in magic.

"What have you done with your mandrake?" Super-stitious
people attributed supernatural qualifies to the
root of the mandrake plant.

"I do not have a mandrake and never had one," Joan
said. "I was told that they are dangerous things but I do
not know vhy."

"What have you been told about the use of the man-drake?"

"I have heard people say it could produce money, bur
I do not believe that in the least. My voices have never
spoken of it."

She was asked about the appearance of the Archangel
Michael.

"Vas he naked?"

"Do you imagine God could not afford to dress him?"
Her voice was disdainful.


[58] Seven Famous Trials in History


"Did he carry scales?"

"I know nothing about all that. I only know that
when I see him I am always very happy and have a
feeling that I am not in a state of sin."

At her sixth examination, on March 3, the judges
made a frenzied attempt to prove her guilty of witch-craft.
Had she not performed magic by pretending to
sprinkle holy water on her arms? Did she not let herself
be worshiped by the common people as though she were
of divine origin? What about the story that she had con-jured
up a glove that a knight had host during the coro-nation
at Reims?

Such tales were nonsense, Joan said.

Did she not believe she had resurrected a dead child
at Lagny?

"I know nothing of it."

The child to which they referred was born almost
lifeless. When it was three days old, the mother brought
it to church to have prayers said for it. Joan joined in
those prayers. The baby stirred a little and the priest
baptized it before it died. The rumor spread that Joan
had brought it back to life, however briefly, but she
made no such claim herself.

Then her judges made another damning charge: Joan
had sinned by trying to take her own life. Had she not,
while still imprisoned at Beaurevoir, thrown herself from
the tower where she was kept prisoner?

It was true that she had leaped from the window of
her cell some sixty feet to the ground. As a result she
lost consciousness but luckily escaped serious iniury. She
hid in the castle three days with nothing to eat before
she was captured again. She insisted she had not tried to
kill herself. Word had reached her that everyone over


JOA or c [59]


seven years of age in Compigne was to be murdered.
She had made this desperate attempt to escape only be-cause
she wanted to go to the aid of her people.

Had she not said, her judge asked next, that she would
rather die than fall into the hands of the English?

"I said that I would sooner commit my soul to God
than fall into the hands of the English," she corrected
him.

"Have you not lost your temper and cursed the name
of God?"

"I have never cursed any saint and I have never used
bad language," Joan said wearily.

At the end of the first six sessions of the preparatory
trial, Cauchon decided that further examinations would
be limited to a small group of men he could trust, and
that they should take place in Joan's cell. From March
io to March i7, he and several other examiners ques-tioned
her there, sometimes both morning and afternoon.
They arrived in their fine clothes, welLfed, elegant,
haughty, patronizing--and without pity for the ragged
and wretched prisoner.

"Joan," they demanded, "do you or do you not wish

	submit to the Church and recognize its authority?"

	t°"I submit to God," she said. "I cannot understand

	otherwise than that it is the same thing, God and the

Church 	Why
do you complicate it?"
"Does
God hate the English?" they persisted.
"I
lnow nothing about the love or the hate that
God
can feel toward the English or how He deals with
their
souls," she answered this disturbing question. "I
do
know that they will be thrown out of
France."
1- D!d s.he not agree that she had behaved shamelessly
by avng
her
parents
without
permission?


[60]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


"Even had I a hundred fathers and a hundred mothers,"
she said, "and even if I had been the daughter of the
King, I would have gone when God ordered it."

Over and over, they pressed her as to why she dressed
in men's clothes. Would she be willing to change to
woman's attire if they allowed her to go to Holy Com-munion?

She might be willing to do so, she said, if she could
change back to her own clothes afterward. She still
fused to admit it a sin to wear the garb that God had told
her was suitable for her mission.

There were ten of these meetings in Joan's cell, mak-ing
a total of sixteen sessions in all for the long prepara-tory
trial. From the "evidence" thus gathered, Prose-cutor
d'Esdvet prepared the accusation, a massive sheaf
of papers with seventy separate articles. The accusation
was presented at the trial proper, which opened on
March 27.

Joan was sumoned once more to the examination
hall. Cauchon, d'Estivet, and the deputy inquisitor, Jean
LeMaltre, were present, along with some thirty theolo-gians,
priests, and doctors--only about half the number
who had attended the opening of the preparatory trial.
Two Dominican monks, Jean Duval and Ysambard de
la Pierre, and a lawyer, Jean de la Fontaine, sat near to
where Joan stood. Their glances were friendly.

Cauchon rose to open the trial. His hands were folded
over his Episcopal cross. His expression was benign.
These learned and pious men had assembled there be-cause
of her great sins, he told Joan. They were not
against her. They wanted to help her to attain salvation.

The long accusation was read by Thomas de Cour-celles.
Since it was in Latin, Joan understood nothing.


He translated the articles into French, one by one. Joan
was given a chance to reply to each in turn.

Article One stated that the full authority to punish
heresy rested in this court--the court of Pierre Cauchon.
Joan commented that she was aware that the Hoiy
Father, the Pope of Rome, and other ecclesiastical per-sons
had the right to protect the Christian faith, but for
herself and her deed, she would submit them only to the
Church in Heaven. She added that she firmly believed
she had not failed in Christian fakh.

The Dominican monk, Ysambard de la Pierre, whis-pered
to her that she should ask that her case be sub-mitred
to the General Church Council in Basle, Switzer-land.
She did so, but Cauchon angrily signaled to the
recording clerk, Manchon, to ignore her request. The
translation continued.

Article Two said that Joan was guilty of magic and
witchcraft, that she had evoked demons and evil spirits,
and that she had allowed herself to be worshiped as an
idol.

Article Three said she had uttered heresy.

The next three articles expanded the accusations about
witchcraft, and flagrantly asserted she had danced and
chanted spells beneath the beech tree at Domrmy.

Article Seven said she had attempted to acquire wealth
by means of the mandrake plant.

Article Eight said she had left her home against the
will of her parents. (They had not wanted her to go but
they had not interfered, since both her father and
mother believed in her divine mission.) And that she
had lived with an innkeeper of evil repute. (While
DOmrmy was being invaded by the English, Joan and
SOme other Women of the village had fled to NeucMtel


[62]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


several miles away, staying at an inn for a few days.
This was the sole basis for that charge.)

The rest of the thirty articles read to her on this day
accused her in turn of preferring to abstain from the
sacraments rather than giving up her male attire; of

fusing to live the simple life of a woman; of predicting
important military events by means of witchcraft; of
finding her sword with the help of demons; of be-witching
her ring, her banner, and her sword; of mis-using
the names of Jesus and Mary; of saying that she
had shed blood by the order of God.

Indeed, it was as though every word she had spoken
during the interminable preparatory trial had been viped
from the record. Her judges had put in the accusation
only what they wanted to believe. She offered denials of
one article after another but it was futile--all the articles
were lies.

"Why do you put down that which is against me but
not that which is for me?" she cried out.

That evening, the two Dominican monks, Jean Duval
and Ysambard de la Pierre, and the lawyer, Jean de la
Fontaine, came to her cell. They assured her that
Pierre Cauchon's tribunal did not represent the Church
Militant, in spite of his claims. The Pope, they said, was
the only one who had the right to judge her, and they
told her again that she should appeal to the Gencral
Church Council. They were interrupted by the arrival
of the Earl of Warwick, the English Governor of
Rouen, who had evidently been warned of the visit.

a rage, he threatened to throw Ysambard de La Pierre
in the Seine River unless he stopped meddling, and he
ordered them all to leave.


joan or ,Rc [63]


The last forty articles of the accusation were trans-lated
for Joan on March 28. They were as distorted as
the first ones: She had the presumption to claim she
could distinguish angels and saints. She had insolently
asserted that she was in a state of grace. She had at-tempted
suicide. She had said that her voices had hu-man
bodies, spoke French, and hated the English. She
had worshiped evil spirits. She had been in alliance with
demons, calling them angels. She had refused to submit
herself to the Church Militant.

That was not true, Joan burst out at this latter charge.
"My heart is filled with veneration and reverence for
the Church Militant. I appeal to our Holy Father, the
Pope, and to the Holy Church Council."

The Pope could help her. The lawyer, La Fontaine,
and the two good Dominican monks had told her that.
But the Pope was far away and her appeal was again
ignored.

Article Sixty-six summed up the preceding accusa-tions.

"Have you anything to say, Joan?"

What was there to say about this mountain of mis-statement?

"I am a good Christian. I will answer all these accusa-tions
before God."

The next three articles stated that Joan had ignored
all the kindly advice given her. The last, Article Sev-enty,
said that the accused had admitted the truth of the
other articles. One final falsehood to add to the others.

On the next day, Good Friday, Joan's judges and exa-miners
attended a special mass held at the beautiful
Cathedral of Rouen. No one can say what their thoughts


[64]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


were as they shared in the holy ceremonies. Joan spent
the day in her dark cell, chained and fettered as always.
Her English guards, taking the occasion to torment her
more viciously than usual, struck her face, shouted
curses at her, tore at her clothes.

She was saved from further indignities by a visit from
Father Loiseleur. Unable to control herself, she burst
into tears and moaned out her sorrow. In kindly fashion
he consoled her. She still did not know he was sent to
spy on her. From that one disillusion she was spared.

On April 8, Cauchon had her brought before the
judges to hear a long and tedious "public admonition" of
her sins. Unmoved, she insisted she had done nothing but
follow the instructions of the King of Heaven. Cau-chon
warned her that unless she submitted to the Church,
she would be in danger "both of body and soul."

She was ill and so weak her voice could hardly be
heard, but she replied boldly: "You will not do as you
say against me without suffering evil, both of body and
soul."

With all his airs of assurance, Cauchon found himself
in an unpleasant situation. He dared not release the
minutes so accurately kept by the clerk Manchon and
his assistant Bois-Guillaume, lest they arouse public sym-pathy
for Joan. Her refusal to admit to any truth in the
seventy articles also made things awkward for him. He
had to find some way of breaking her spirit. Other-wise
the Church authorities would surely censure him
for his handling of her trial.

In the dungeon of the castle of Rouen, he had his
executioner prepare instruments of torture. Then Joan
was brought in. She shuddered.

"If you do not tell the truth you shall be tortured so


JOA Or .UC [65]


you can be brought back to the path of truth," Cauchon
told her.

"Even if you were to tear me limb from limb, I
would not tell you more than I have," she said stub-bornly.
"And even if I should say something, I would
always insist later that you forced me to do so."

He had her taken away. That afternoon he invited
twelve of his colleagues to his home to get their official
sanction of the use of torture.

"It might spoil the effect of this admirably conducted
trial," one of them objected. One after another they
found some excuse to vote against this drastic measure.
Father Loiseleur said pompously, "For the sake of her
soul I think it would be beneficial if she were tortured."
He added, "I bow before that which has already been
said."

Reluctantly, Cauchon abandoned this method of pro-curing
Joan's confession. Ah, well, there were other
ways of getting the results he wished.

The seventy articles of the accusation were condensed
to twelve articles and sent to the theologians at the
University of Paris for consideration. Since Paris was in
effect an English town, their opinion was foreseen. On
May 23, Pierre Maurice, doctor in theology, read the
twelve articles to Joan, giving the University's verdict
on each.

"You, Joan, have said that from the age of thirteen
you have had revelations and apparitions of angels ....
The clergy of the University of Paris . . . have said
that all the afore-mentioned things are lies, untrue, per-nieious,
and evil .... "

"You have said that you recognized the angels and
the saints by the good advice and the comfort and


[66]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


teaching they gave you. And you also believe that it was

St. Michael who appeared to you 	The
clergy say
that
. . . you err in faith..."
"You
have said that, by God's command, you have continually
worn man's dress . . . that you have also worn
your hair short .... As for these points, the clergy
say that you blaspheme God in His sacraments ·
. . you boast vainly; you are suspect of idolatry .... "
"You
have said . . . that ever since you learned that
the voices were on your King's side, you have not loved
the Burgundians .... The clergy say that this is . . .
blasphemy against the saints and transgression of God's
commandment to love one's neighbor .... "

His voice droned on until he had recited the entire list
of "charges" contained in the twelve articles--along
with the condemnation by the University of Paris
clergy. When he had finished he called the prisoner be-fore
him:

"Joan, my dear friend, it is now time, at the end of
your trial, to think carefully of what you have said and
done."

He continued to admonish her at length, in a gentle
and fatherly manner, pleading with her to put aside her
"arrogance" and submit herself to the judgment of the
Church.

Listening to him, Cauchon must have beamed with
pleasure. Surely the Church had shown infinite patience
with this recalcitrant sinner. No one could now say that
everything possible had not been done to lead her to
repentance.

"I will maintain what I have always said at my trial,"
Joan stated when the Paris theologian finished his ad-monition.


JOA OV ,V,C [67]


The next day, May 24, guards escorted her from her
cell and outside the castle gates. A cart was waiting to
take her to the town of Saint-Ouen. She was not told the
purpose of the journey, nor did she care. Momentarily
her spirits soared. It was wonderful to breathe fresh air
once more, to gaze at the countryside in its spring
greenery.

The driver stopped at the Saint-Ouen cemetery. A
group of dignitaries were waiting for her. "Get out,
Joan." Jean Beaupre helped her down. Father Loiseleur
joined her. If she would do what the priests told her to
do, he whispered, she would be released from the Eng-lish
guards and surrendered to the Church.

Mystified, she followed him through the gate of the
churchyard. It was crowded with notables--Church offi-cials
and English officers.

A French priest named Guillaume Erard delivered a
sermon. It was based on the parable from St. John about
the branch that cannot bear fruit of itself "except it abide
in the vine," and he compared Joan to the branch broken
from its vine. At the end he spoke to her directly: "Joan,
I say to you that your King is a heretic."

How could a French priest utter such slander?

"Speak of me, not of the King," Joan called out
dearly. "I dare swear that my King is the most noble
Christian of all Christians!" No matter that the former
Dauphin had not raised a hand to relieve her sufferings.

He was still her King and she was faithful to him.
"Silence her," shouted Cauchon.

He then prepared to read her sentence. The Church
Would give her, he said, one more chance to recant--that
is, to admit she had sinned. Otherwise she would be
burned at a stake.


[68]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


"You are going to burn me?"-she cried out in terror.
"Unless you recant . . ."

"I do not know what is meant by 'recant,'" she said
dully.

Someone attempted to explain the meaning of the
word. She still did not understand. Her impression was
that her life would be spared if she would promise not
to bear arms, dress as a man, or wear her hair short.
That if she would so oblige them, she would, as Father
Loiseleur had whispered, be taken from her brutish
English guards and turned over to the Church.

"I will do what you will have me do," she agreed.

Far longer than anyone could have expected, she had
held out against her judges--those erudite men who
knew how to twist everything she said to their own
aims. Her voices, so she believed, had given her the
strength to do so. But her voices had never warned her
that she might be burned. They had only told her to
have no fear. It seemed to her they had deceived her
and she felt betrayed and defeated. The thought of dying
in such a cruel manner was more than she could bear,
and so, at last, she yielded.

The deputy inquisitor, LeMaltre, handed her a short
document. It read:


1, loan, called T. he Maid, a miserable sinner, after I rec-ognized
the snare of error in which I was held; and now
that 1 have, by God's grace, returned to our nzother
Holy Church; in order that it may be apparent that not
feignedly but .with good heart and will I have re-turned
to her; I do confess that I have grievously slimed,
in falsely pretending that I have had revelations from
God and His angels, St. Catherine and St. Margaret, etc.


JOAN (V ARC [69]


And all my words and areeds ,which are contrary to the
Church, 1 do revoke; and 1 desire to live in unity vith
the Church, nevermore departing therefrom.


"Sign, Joan. Recant."

A pen was put in her hand. She did not know how to
read or write, but she obediently made a cross for her
signature. Someone guide d her hand to write her name.

Cauchon read the amended sentence. It was still a se-vere
one: "Joan, we condemn you to pass the rest of
your days in prison, on the bread of grief and water
of anguish, and so to mourn your sins."

Dazedly, she replied only that she wanted to be sur-rendered
to the Church and freed from her English
guards.

The Earl of Warwick called Cauchon aside in great
indignation. Joan must die as a heretic, he said. To the
blazes with all this nonsense of a recantation. Only if
people saw her burned would they renounce her. For
the glory of England this must be done. The French
bishop told him in effect to be patient. Warwick would
have his wish--eventually. But it must be done in the
proper manner and at the proper time.

Joan was taken back to her old cell and once more put
in chains. The same English soldiers guarded her. A
tailor brought her a dress. Her male attire was stuffed
in a sack and thrown in a corner.

"Let me now have women around me and send me
to the Church prison so I can be guarded by priests,"
she pleaded.

In answer, her guards beat her until her blood flowed.
When Cauchon next visited her she had exchanged


[70]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


her dress for her old tunic and long hose. Some say that
the English guards forced her to do this.

"Did you not recant and promise to dress as a
woman?" Cauchon reproached her piously.

"I shall do what the Church asks," Joan said, "if I am
allowed to attend Mass, released from fetters, and given
a woman to look after me."

Craftily, Cauchon asked her if she had heard from
her voices.

"Yes, I have. God told me by St. Catherine and St.
Margaret that I had committed a serious act of treachery
in agreeing to recant so as to save my life."

This was all Cauchon needed to hear. He paid a visit
to the Earl of Warwick. "Have no fear," he said. "She is

ours."

To his colleagues he reported that Joan, after recant-ing
her heresies, again claimed to hear her demon voices
and was again wearing male clothes. In so doing, she
had committed the worst of all sins. She had repented
and fallen from grace. No mercy could be shown her
now. Her execution was set for May 3 , 43 -

They came for her at eight in the morning, released
her chains, and clad her in a long linen gown. She was
placed in a cart. Father Massieu, her friend, was per-mitted
to sit at her side. Eight hundred armed English
troops preceded and followed her cart as it drove down
the street.

Her confessor, Father Loiseleur, watched the proces-sion.
There is a legend that suddenly he pushed his way
through the crowd, ran up to the cart, and, weeping,
begged Joan to forgive him.

At the town square, three stands had been erected.
One was for the men of the Church--Pierre Cauchon,


jo.r oF .Rc [7]


the deputy inquisitor, the English cardinal. The second
stand was for the city counsellors and lawyers, and in
the third stood notables from the University of Paris.

In front of the stands was the stake, built unusually
high so that all could have a clear view. Joan was led
up ro it. She was praying, and asked for a crucifix. An
English soldier made a cross from two twigs and handed
k to her. She pressed it close.

She made one other request: "I beg of you to bring
me a crucifix from the Church and hold it iust before
my eyes until I die."

Father Massieu granted this, her last wish. Others
of the priests left, unable to watch any longer. The ex-ecutioner
lashed her to the stake and set his torch to the
faggots at her feet.

"St. Catherine! St. Margaret! St. Michael!" Joan
called in her agony.

Slowly the flames climbed higher.

There is a story that the executioner came sobbing
to the door of the Dominican monastery the next morn-ing.
In spite of the oil and sulphur he had thrown into
the flames, he said, Joan's heart had refused to burn. "I
have burned a saint!" he lamented.

An English soldier claimed that he saw a white dove
rise from the flames.

The rumor spread that all who had a hand in Joan's
death would be punished. In many cases this proved
true. The war dragged on for another twenty-odd
years, with constant losses for the English. Finally they
gave up their conquests in France. The struggle that his-tory
would call the "Hundred Years' War" ended
officially in 43 when Charles VII, the former Dau-plain,
took Bordeaux.


[7z] Seven Famous Trials in History


Three years later he made tardy recognition to the
peasant girl who had insisted he be crowned King of
France. At N6tre Dame, in Paris, her "Rehabilitation
Trial" was held. All evidence was re-examined, as were
the judges and assessors who were still living. Among
these were Ysambard de la Pierre, the Dominican monk;
Manchon, the recording clerk; Father Massieu; and the
examiner, Jean Beaupre. Pierre Cauchon had died thir-teen
years before, in 44z.

The testimony revealed that the trial of Joan of Are
had not been conducted with impartiality and that she
had been treated brutally and unjustly. Her own con-duct
was proved to have been irreproachable. On July

7, 456, after seven months of deliberation, she was pro-nounced
innocent of witchcraft and heresy.

A cross was placed on the spot where she had been
burned. There were festivities all over France, but the
biggest and gayest celebration was in Orleans, where
she had known her first victory. Charles VII defrayed
all costs.

In i92o, nearly five centuries after her death, Joan of
Arc was canonized as a saint by the Catholic Church.

Over the years many learned persons have attempted
to explain Joan's "voices" from a rational viewpoint. No
scientific interpretation can alter the beauty and tragedy
of her story. Her trial and execution brought none of
the results her enemies intended. They succeeded only
in making her a martyr, whose ordeal would be told and
retold the world over--in painting, pageantry, scul?ture,
poetry, drama, literature. For millions everywhere she
remains the symbol of their aspirations and dreams.


GALILEO


Galileo was the first man on earth to view the heavens
through a telescope. He located new stars and nebulae
and discovered many hitherto unknown truths about
the sun and planets. Because of his studies on the laws
of motion and gravity, he is known as the founder of
modem physics. He was at once scientist, engineer, in-ventor,
and a brilliant writer.

On April

22,
x633, when he was nearly seventy, he
was brought before the Roman Inquisition, charged
with "holding, defending, and teaching" the theory of
Nicolaus Copernicus that the earth moves around the
SUn. This was some two thousand years after Anaxago-fas,
the first teacher of Socrates, had been condemned to
death for calling the sun "a mass of stone on fire."

Like Anaxagoras so many years before, Galileo was
on trial for extolling scientific theories deemed contra-dictory
to religious teaching. He was nearly the same


[76]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


age as Socrates when his trial took place and, as in the
case of Socrates, the real crime against Galileo was that
he had dared to say what he thought.

His full name was Galileo Galilei. Like many older
sons of his time, his first name was derived from the fam-ily
name. He was born on February x5, 564, the year
of Shakespeare's birth and of the death of the sculptor,
Michelangelo. The glorious Renaissance, an age of cul-tural
achievement rivaled only by that of Athens in the
time of Pericles, was drawing to a dose. Seventy-two
years before, Columbus had discovered a new world.
More than a century had passed since Johann Guten-berg
perfected his invention of printing from movable
type.

The birthplace of Galileo was Pisa on the banks of the
Arno River, a lovely town of many white marble build-ings,
among them the famous Leaning Tower. Pisa, like
its sister city Florence, was part of the Duchy of Tus-cany,
an independent state ruled by a grand duke of
the Medici family.

Vincenzio Galilei, Galileo's father, was a Florentine
nobleman who because of family reverses had come to
Pisa to work as a cloth merchant. He was a liberal
thinker, a man of unusual intelligence and of many tal-ents,
especially in music. The man that Galileo became
was due in no small part to his father's influence.

From his father he learned to play the lute and he
also mastered sketching and drawing at an early age.
The monks of Vallombroso, who gave him his first
schooling, instilled in him a lasting religious piety.
When he was ten the Galilei family moved back to
Florence. He was sixteen when his father, seeing how
quickly he learned, arranged for him to study medicine


GALILEO [77]


at the University of Pisa. During his stay there, he lived
with relatives.

As a university student he listened to lectures based on
the works of Aristotle (384-322 B.C.), whose numerous
treatises covered anatomy, zoology, botany, astronomy,
logic, and a host of other sciences, often with great intui-tive
brilliance and inevitably with innumerable errors.
For medicine, he was taught to rely on Galen, who had
lived in the second century A.D. According to the ortho-dox
scholars, Aristotle and Galen were indisputable au-thorities
on all scientific or philosophical subjects; there
was nothing new to be learned. Before long, Galileo re-belled
at this smug attitude and turned from medicine to
the more precise studies of mathematics and physics.

One day, inside the Pisa Cathedral, he noted that some
workmen had set a lamp swinging from the ceiling. He
timed the swings, or oscillations, by his pulse beats, find-ing
that each oscillation took the same length of time,
even as the arc of the swings decreased. In his room, he
verified his observations by swinging balls from a piece
of string. Moreover, when one ball was of cork and an-other
of lead, their oscillations were almost the same,
provided that the strings were of the same length. The
invention of the pendulum clock resulted later from this
discovery of Galileo of the uniformity of pendulum
vibration.

When he was nineteen and in his third year of the uni-versity,
he attended a class on Euclid's geometry, given
by Ostilio Ricci, the court mathematician of the Grand
DUke of Tuscany. Geometry so fascinated him that he
decided to abandon medicine altogether. Very probably
his father was disappointed. A physician had more chance
of acquiring wealth than a mathematician. Galileo's sis

[78] Seven Famous Trials in History


ters were growing up and needed dowries if they were to
make good marriages. Whatever his objections, Vin-cenzio
did not press them, perhaps because he knew by
personal experience that it is sad for a man to spend his
life in a distasteful profession.

Galileo left the University of Pisa in I586, when he was

twenty-two, but continued his studies at home in Flor-ence.
In Archimedes (2877-212 B.C.), the genius of an-cient
Syracuse in the field of mechanics, he found a
mind kindred to his own. Archimedes' observations on
the center of gravity in planes inspired him to prepare a
work in Latin on the center of gravity in solid bodies,
which he circulated in manuscript form and which
won him some recognition in scientific circles. Also un-der
the influence of Archimedes, he invented a water
balance, or hydrostatic scales, by which could be de-termined
the proportion of weight in double alloys, such
as a mixture of gold and copper. This invention he de-scribed
in a treatise, written in Italian, called The Little
Balance.

To help pay his expenses, this young university gradu-ate
also did some private tutoring and gave a few public
lectures, not only in mathematics but in literature. (He
once, in a lecture on Dante's The Divine Comedy, cal-culated
mathematically the size of hell as Dante de-scribed
it.) Not until he was twenty-five did he at last
succeed in getting himself a steady position, as professor
of mathematics at the University of Pisa. His salary was
small but in compensation he was given time to pursue
his own experiments.

The speed of falling bodies was one of his interestS.
According to Aristotle, objects fall in ratio to their
weight: a five-pound object would fall five tines as


GALILEO [79]


fast as an object weighing one pound. Galileo's own in-vestigation
indicated that objects fall at practically the
same speed, no matter what their weight. It is said that
he proved this dramatically when, according to his bi-ographer
and student, Viviani, he stood at the top of
the Leaning Tower and dropped simultaneously a hun-dred-pound
weight and a one-pound weight; observers
reportedly were thunderstruck to see both hit the
ground at the same instant. Galileo himself, however,
never referred to this experiment in his own writings.

He went ou to other experiments, proving that the
path of a projectile is a parabola, and finding a new curve
that he called a cycloid--the curve made by the path of
a dot on a rolling cylinder, such as a wheel. His cycloid
had been overlooked even by Euclid.

Gradually he gained a certain assurance, acquired the
art of expressing himself freely in lively discussions with
his colleagues, found time for amusements and distrac-tions,
and once wrote a poem ridiculing a regulation
that professors must wear togas even outside their
classrooms.

One day Giovanni de Medici, a member of Tuscany's
.ruling family, sent for him to ask his opinion on a dredg.
mg machine he had invented. From the model, Galileo
decided that the contraption was worthless and said so,
Giovanni dismissed him angrily and had the expensive
machine built anyway. That it did not work and th
Galileo was proved right did not improve his temper.

Giovanni's hostility was one of the reasons for GalJ'
ho's decision to quit the Universiw of Pisa after three
years. Moreover, he was irritated b) the conservative
titude of the university authorities, who were contina-ally
being shocked at Galileo's effrontery in daring ro


[8o]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


contradict the great Aristotle. On a trip to Venice, he
made such an excellent impression on the officials of the
Republic of Venice that they offered him the chair of
mathematics at the University of Padua, with three
times his former salary. He accepted with alacrity, hold-ing
this post for eighteen years.

The Republic of Venice was the most progressive and
enlightened state in Italy, and in Padua there was an
academic freedom unknown at Pisa. Galileo found him-self
appreciated as he had never been in his beloved Tus-cany.
Students flocked to his classes, attracted by his
engaging personality and original thinking. Many of
them were rich sons of nobles and arrived clad in bro-cades
and velvets, carrying their swords, and with serv-ants
to tend their needs. To those who could afford it,
Galileo gave private lessons; he later took some of his
students into his home as boarders.

Rich and cultured Venetians sought his companion-ship;
among them was one who became his closest friend,
Giovanni Francesco Sagredo, a young Venetian noble-man
with a boundless curiosity about science and a re-ceptive
mind. Galileo and Sagredo talked endlessly about
a variety of matters, they shared private jokes, and on
more than one occasion they participated in amusing
escapades.

During one of his first summers at Padua, Galileo and
two other young men spent a few days at a friend's villa
outside the cky. Their host had installed a primitive air
conditioner--a tunnel that brought cool, moist air from
a nearby cavern. At the hot noon hour the three ?ests
took a nap by the tunnel opening. The refreshig draf
had a terrible and unforeseen effect. They awoke racke


with pain, and all fell ill with a fever. One of them died
as a result. Galileo survived but suffered with arthritis
to the end of his life.

In ,597, he invented a "geometric compass," by means
of which a variety of mathematical problems could be
solved quickly and easily. Since logarithms were still un-known,
the compasses were soon in much demand by
engineers and military men; Galileo had to hire a crafts-man
to produce them in quantity. The extra money
from their sale vanished as quickly as it appeared, for
his father had died, leaving him a heavy debt for the
dowry of one of his sisters.

His own tastes had grown more extravagant and he
needed all he could earn for his house, his servants, the
sumptuous garments his position required, and the lav-ish
table at which his friends and students were always
welcomed. His responsibilities increased when he fell in
love with a young woman named Marina Gamba, of
whom little is known except that she was "a lady of
quality." He never married her, although she lived with
him as his wife and bore him three children, two girls
and a boy, for whom he provided until they reached
maturity. He and Marina were close for many years but
eventually she left him to marry someone else.

As professor of mathematics he taught not only ge-oraetry
but military engineering and fortifications (val-uable
knowledge in an Italy divided into many warring
states) and astronomy. At first he is said to have been
only mildly interested in astronomy, and did not bother
to question the stand of the Church of Rome that the
earth was the fixed center of the universe, with the sun
and planets circling around it. This was what Aristode


[82 ] Seven Famous Trials in History


had believed. So had Claudius Ptolemy of Alexandria,
born in the second century a.x)., who was still considered
the greatest of all astronomers.

Ptolemy had applied observation and mathematics
to his study of the heavens and had duly noted that the
planets appear from time to time to slow down, stop, and
temporarily reverse their motion among the fixed stars.
To account for this phenomenon, he devised an elabo-rate
explanation. The planets moved around the earth,
according to his theory, in what he called eccentric or-bits;
these orbits had their centers at some distance from
the earth. Within their large eccentric orbits, however,
he theorized that the planets also moved in small cir-cular
orbits, which he called epicycles.

Galileo was much too rational to go on forever ignor-ing
the discrepancies in the complicated Ptolemaic
system with its eccentric and epicycle orbits. Some-time
before 597--the exact date is not known--he
came across a book called The Revolution of the Heav-enly
Bodies by a Polish scientist named Nicolaus Coper-nicus,
which had been published in 543.

Copernicus advanced the unorthodox theory that the
earth revolved around the sun! He estimated that the
rotation took 365 days, six hours, nine minutes, and
forty seconds. (This is just thirty seconds more than
the figure accepted by modern science.) He further
claimed that the earth revolved on its axis in twenty'
four hours and that it was a planet, as were Saturn, Ju-piter,
Mars, Venus, and Mercury, which all revolved
not around the earth but around the sun. (Like Ptolemy,
however, Copernicus believed that the planets moved
in perfect circles.)

How did it happen that a book with such revolution'


[83]


ary contentions had been almost ignored by the scholas-tic
world? In part, it was because of a preface that ad-vised
readers its theories were "hypothetical" and not
to be taken literally. Copernicus had waited many years
to publish his book, fearing it would create controversy.
He was on his deathbed when the first copy was placed
in his hands, and never saw this preface, written by an
anonymous clergyman.

There is no doubt that Galileo found the Copernican
theory extremely enticing, but he waited some time be-fore
he said anything about it. Then, in 397, a German
colleague, Johannes Kepler (57-63o), published a
book called Mysterium, in which he presented pure
mathematical support of the Copernican theory. Galileo
sent him a letter of congratulations.

"Many years ago I became a convert to the opinions
of Copernicus . . . ," he wrote Kepler in part. "I have
arranged many arguments . . . which, however, I have
not yet dared to publish, fearing the fate of our master
Copernicus, who has earned immortal fame among few,
yet by an infinite number (for such,is the number of
fools) is held in contempt and derision.

Kepler promptly wrote back, saying how delighted he
was to find someone to share his beliefs, and urging Gal-ileo
to "persevere on the road to truth." It was the be-ginning
of a long friendship-by-correspondence. Kepler
was at this time an obscure professor at the University
of (raz, a sickly young man weighed down with family
and financial troubles. Four years later he was appointed
''Imperlal Mathematician" to assist the Danish nobleman
ycho Brahe (i5466o) who had, under the patron-age
of Rudolph II of Bohemia, set up a splendid ob-servatory
on the island of Hven. Brahe, who never ac

[84]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


cepted the Copernican theory, was the best-known as-tronomer
of the time. Galileo once wrote him to praise
some phase of his work but Brahe did not deign to reply.
Eventually he would be eclipsed by both Kepler and
Galileo.

The caution observed by Galileo in not openly spon-soring
Copernicus in his own country was well war-ranted.
Since 592, a former Dominican moult named
Giordano Bruno had languished in the dungeon of the
Roman Inquisition. Bruno was not an astronomer nor
even a mathematician; he was a dreamer, able intuitively
to divine scientific truths. Not only had he accepted the
Copernican theory; he had stated that some stars ap-peared
dim only because they were farther away than
others, that space was infinite, and that even this solar
system might not be the center of the universe.

Forced to leave the Dominican order because of his
unorthodox views, he had lived for years in exile, teach-lng
his theories in France and England, but finally be-cause
of homesickness returning to Venice. Agents of
the Inquisition promptly arrested him and brought him
to Rome. Eight years in prison failed to break his spirit.
He held to his own beliefs, renouncing the teachings of
the Church. On February x6, x6oo (when Galileo was
thirty-six and had taught eight years at Padua), Gior-dano
Bruno was burned at the stake.

His terrible fate struck horror among scholars and
scientists everywhere. Galileo's friends warned him to
be careful. He assured them that he would. He was a de-vout
Catholic and would not act contrary to the wishes
of the Church. But the Copernican theory continued to
attract him like an elusive will-o'-the-wisp.


GALILEO [85]


Fie could understand Bruno's desperate wish to ret-urn
to Italy, for even in Padua, where his many friends
spoke his own language, he yearned for his native Tus-cany.
In x6o5 he was granted a much-coveted appoint-ment,
as mathematics tutor during the summer months
to Cosimo, the heir of the Medici family. In contrast
to his relative Giovanni, of the dredging machine failure,
young Cosimo adored Galileo. His esteem continued
after he became Cosimo II, Grand Duke of Tuscany,
and lasted the rest of his life.

To please his royal pupil, Galileo dedicated to him, in
x6o6, his first published work, a handbook of instruc-tions
on his "geometric compass," written in the Tus-can
dialect. The next year a Padua student named Baldas-sar
Capra published a very similar work, but written in
Latin, and boldly declared himself the inventor of the
compass. Galileo brought charges against him for pla-giarism,
as a result of which the Capra handbook was
withdrawn, and in a further effort to Clear his own name
and reputation wrote a pamphlet titled Defense Against
the Calumdes and Impostures of Baldassar Capra. It was
readable, entertaining, and devastating. Galileo's special
gift for polemics--the art of disputation or argument--was
first evident in this pamphlet. In time his enemies ac-quired
a healthy fear of his literary abilities and de-veloped
more undercover ways of working against him.

For several years Galileo was too busy with his classes
at Padua, his social life, his writing, and with tutoring
young Cosimo to give much thought to astronomy. In
the meantime Johannes Kepler, more single-minded,
Wrote a massive volume called New Astronomy, which
Was published in x6o9 and which for the first time ad

[86]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


vanced the theory that planets do not move in perfect
circles, as even Copernicus had thought, but in elliptical
orbits.

This discovery, so vital to the development of astron.
omy, created little sensation, mainly because Kepler's
book, written in Latin, was so obscure in style, so mys-tical
in tone, and so filled with digressions that almost
everyone missed its significance. Galileo, so far as any-one
knows, never read it through, nor did he ever
grasp the importance of the theory of elliptical orbits. As
a matter of fact, at the time Kepler's book was published,
he was deeply absorbed in what seemed at first no more
than an amusing scientific diversion.

It had come to his attention that a Dutch optician
named Hans Lippershey had, from the same lenses he
used for spectacles, constructed a curious toy by which
far objects could be made to appear quite near. For in-stance,
if one looked through it at the weathercock of a
distant church spire, the weathercock loomed mysteri-ously
close.

Curious as to how this trick was accomplished, Gal-ileo
purchased lenses of various types, experimented
with them, discovered Lippershey's secret, and improved
on it. The contraption he devised consisted of a piece of
lead pipe with a concave lens in one end and a convex
lens in the other. When he stared through it, he saw
"objects satisfactorily large and near," as he wrote later,
"for they appeared one-third of the distance off and nine
times larger than when they are seen with the natural
eye alone."

In modern terms, his "eyeglass" magnified an obiect
to three times its diameter. He did not call it a tele-scope;
that word was not invented until two years later.


ALILEO [87]


Soon he made a better instrument that magnified objects
eight diameters, with which he could see ships at sea two
hours before they were visible to the naked eye. This
he presented to the officials of the Republic of Venice
in a splendid ceremony. They were so vastly pleased
with him that they doubled his university salary and told
him the position was his for life.

Subsequently he undertook making an even larger
telescope. Finding that the eyeglass makers did not know
how to grind the lenses he needed for it, he mastered
their trade and ground his own lenses. His third tele-scope
caused objects to appear "more than thirty times
nearer than if viewed by the natural powers of sight
alone." Today it is preserved at the Galileo Museum in
Florence--a paper tube four feet long, with lenses about
two inches in diameter.

One cloudless night in Padua, Galileo went out into
his garden, turned his crude telescope toward the stars,
and saw sights that no man had ever seen before. Night
after night the mysteries of the starry skies unraveled
one by one. He forgot to eat and neglected to sleep. For
months he lived in a state of exaltation, feeling himself
both humble and proud that he had been chosen to wit-ness
these marvels.

In i6io he wrote Message from the Stars (commonly
known in English more poetically and less accurately as
The Star7 Messenger), in which he shared his discover-ies
with the world.

Through his telescope the moon was no longer a
golden ball hanging like a lamp in the sky, but a world
like our own. "The moon certainly does not possess a
Smooth and polished surface," he wrote, "but one rough
and uneven, and, just like the face of the earth itself, is


[88]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


everywhere full of vast heights, deep chasms, and
shadowed curves."

His telescope revealed a marked difference between
planets and fixed .stars: "The planets show their globes
perfectly round and definitely bounded, looking like
little moons, spherical and flooded all over with light;
the fixed stars are never seen to be bounded by a cir-cular
periphery, but have rather the aspect of blazes
whose rays vibrate about them and scintillate a great
deal."

The telescope made stars of the fifth or sixth magni-tude
(Ptolemy had first classified them in degrees of
brightness, or "magnitude") as bright as Sirius, the bright-est
of all stars. It showed "a host of other stars, which
escape the unassisted sight, so numerous as to be almost
beyond belief .... "The Milky Way, which had baf-fled
astronomers for centuries, was not a frothy stuff;
it was "nothing else but a mass of inmxmerable stars
planted together in clusters."

One of his incredible and innumerable discoveries
pleased him perhaps more than all the rest. This was that
the giant planet Jupiter had four moons--he called them
planets--revoiving around it. (Jupiter has twelve moons,
but his telescope was not strong enough to see them all.)
Ironically, nothing in Message from the Stars caused
more controversy than the four "planets" of Jupiter.

One critic stated that Galileo must be wrong because
there could not possibly be more than seven planets:
"There are seven windows in the head, two nostrils,
two eyes, two ears and a mouth .... From which and
many other similar phenomena of nature, such as the
seven metals, etc., which it were tedious to enutcr-ate,
we gather that the number of planets is necessarily


GALILEO [89]


seven. Moreover, the satellites are invisible to the naked
ese, and therefore can have no influence on th earth,

ahd therefore would be useless, and therefore do not
exist."

An invitation from Galileo to look through h is tele-scope
was promptly refused. The critic had no desire to
see the planets that were not there. There were others
like him, both churchmen and scholars, who felt: it be-neath
their dignity to squint an eye and stare intm Gali-leo's
fantastic little instrument. One academician loftily
announced that the telescope had been invented b]y Aris-tote--who
had later discarded it since only with mnaided
sight should one look at the stars.

"Oh, my dear Kepler," Galileo wrote his fellow as-tronomer,
"how I wish that we could have one hearty
laugh together! Here, at Padua, is the principal profes-sor
of philosophy whom I have repeatedly and urgently
requested to look at the moon and planets throtugh my
glass, which he obstinately refuses to do. Why aare you
not here? What shouts of laughter we should have at this
glorious folly!"

He must have felt like laughing at everything ina those
days. The sneers of the jealous, the ignorant, aand the
prejudiced were like drops in the great ocean of lomage
and praise. A first printing of five hundred co.pies of
Message from the Stars was sold out at once and orders
for more streamed in. Kepler had a special edition
printed at Frankfurt. Galileo was flooded with orders
for telescopes. News of his discoveries spread tharough-out
the world. Five years later an edition of th. e book
Came out in Chinese.

Message from the Stars, like his handbook on due com-pass,
he dedicated to his former pupil, now Cos:imo II,


[9°] Seven Famous Trials in History


Grand Duke of Tuscany. He called the four moons of

Jupiter "the Medician stars," after the Medici family.

These signs of allegiance helped him to attain what he

had long wanted. He was appointed Chief Mathemad.

cian and Philosopher to the Grand Duke, as well as

Head Mathematician of the University of Pisa, where he

had been both student and professor, an honorary posi
tion
requiring no lectures or other responsibilities. At

last he could go home.

The authorities of the Republic of Venice accused

him, with some justification, of ingratitude. For eighteen

years they had permitted him to work, write, and think

as he wished. They had given him a secure post for life.

Was this the way to repay them? And from his dear

and close friend, Sagredo, who was away at the time he

left, came a prophetic letter:

"Where will you find freedom and sovereignty of

yourself as in Venice? . . . At present you serve your

natural Prince, a great, virtuous man of singular promise;

but here you had command over those who command

and govern others, and you had to serve only yourself.

You were as the ruler of the universe 	Who
knows
what
the infinite and incomprehensible events of the world
may cause if aided by the impostures of evil and envious
men? . . . I am very much worried by your being
in a place where the authority of the friends of the Jesuits
counts heavily."
It
was true that the Medici of Florence accepted un-questioningly the
dictates of the Holy City, whereas Ven-ice refused
to tolerate interference in its affairs, even from the
Church. Galileo was aware of the situation and knew there
was reason for Sagredo's fears. Optimis' tically, he
hoped that whenever and however he de-

dderl openly to sponsor Copernicus, he would be abl
to sway the Church to his way of thinking.

One of the arguments against the Copernican theory
then current was that Venus and Mercury could not b
planets since they did not show phases; that is, they dict
not, like the moon, appear in turn in the crescent, quarter.:,
and gibbous (three-quarter) stages. Thus, the antx
Copernicans reasoned, these bodies could not possibly re
volve around the sun. (In ancient Babylon, a dry coun-try
where, unlike Europe, clouds and mist rarely obscurecE1
the heavens, astronomers had claimed that they saw th
crescent of Venus, but this was either forgotten or ig
nored.)

There came a time when Galileo turned his telescop
on Venus and saw clearly her successive phases. Fo
him, here was the factual proof he wanted that Ptolemyq
was wrong and Copernicus was fight. He communicateclcl
his findings to Kepler and a few other scholars but he
did not yet publish them. Shrewdly, he decided he mustrt
first go to Rome and make as many friends there as h
could.

His visit to the Holy Gity took place in the spring orr
6 and was a great success. A full day of ceremonie
to honor "the great Galileo" was arranged by Fathe
Clavius, a Jesuit and head mathematician of the Romarra
College. Pope Paul V granted him an audience andzl
treated him with benevolence and kindness. He wass
made a member of the Lincean Academy (named aftenx
the sharp-eyed lynx), a group of scholars dedicated to
the development of the arts and sciences without inter-'-ference
from the pedantic universities, and became in--timate
friends with the academy's founder, a culture(::t
young prince named Federico Ceso.


[92] Seven Famous Trials in History


"I have been received and feted by many illustrious
cardinals, prelates, and princes of this city," he Wrote
to his friend, the Florentine nobleman Filippo Salviati,
"who wanted to see the things I have observed [through
his telescope] and were much pleased, as I was too on
my part in viewing the marvels of their statuary, paint-ings,
frescoed rooms, palaces, gardens, etc."

One of the dignitaries who looked through Galileo's
telescope was Cardinal Robert Bellarmine, a prominent
Catholic theologian and a member of the Roman In-quisition,
the same high tribunal of the Roman Church
that had condemned Giordano Bruno to death eleven
years earlier. Soon after meeting Galileo, Bellarmine asked
for an opinion from the Jesuits of the Roman College on
the "reality" of his discoveries. Even though Father
Clavius and his colleagues warmly praised the scientist
and his work, Bellarmine privately sent a letter to the
inquisitor of Padua, demanding additional information
about their visitor.

Back in Florence, Galileo attended a banquet' given
by Cosimo II, which was to have a long-term influence
on his career. The Grand Duke frequently invited schol-ars
to dine so he could listen to their ideas on philosophi-cal
subjects. Present on this day were two visiting car-dinals,
Maffeo Barberini and Ferdinand Gonzaga. The
guests discussed a matter of physics--why some objects,
like ice, float in water, while others sink. Cardinal Gon-zaga
sided with the followers of Aristotle who insisted
that bodies float if their shape is wide and smooth. Galileo
maintained that any object will float if its specific
gravity is less than that of water. Cardinal Barberini,
who took an active part in the argument, wholeheart'
edly supported Galileo. Not only had the scientist


GALILEO [93]


made a new and important ecclesiastical friend, but
Cosirno II was so pleased with him he persuaded him. to
publish his views in a work called Discourse on Floating
Bodies.

About this time, when everything was going so splen-didly
for him, Galileo quite unintentionally antagonized
a Jesuit, a member of the powerful religious order that
served as adviser to the Church on educational affairs.
It happened in a controversy over sunspots.

In the course of his telescopic study of the heavens,
Galileo had noted "dark spots in the solar disk." "Some
are always being produced and others dissolved," he de-scribed
them. "... In addition to changing shape,
some of them divide into three or four, and often Several
unite into one . . . they have in common a general uni
form
motion across the face of the sun 	From
spe- -
cial
characteristics of this motion one may learn that'
the
sun is absolutely spherical, that it rotates from west '
to
east and around its own center, carries the spots along '
with
it in parallel circles, and completes an entire revolution

in about a lunar month."
Galileo firmly
believed he was the first to observe:
sunspots. Actually
they had been observed in ancient'
times and
more recently a certain Johann Fabricius of:
Wittenburg had
mentioned them. In any case, Galileo's;
first paper
on them preceded a letter published under'
the pseudonym
of "Apelles" but in fact written by a.
German Jest
it father, Christopher Scheiner, who claimed .

their discoverv.

Galileo sulsequently composed three Letters on Sun- -

spots, which he sent to the publisher of "Apelles," crit- ·

icizing the farter's interpretation of this phenomenon..

The Jesuit, for instance had stated that sunspots were


[94]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


small planets revolving around the sun; they could not
be part of it since no blemishes could possibly exist on
the face of the "celestial sun"! Galileo pointed out that
the spots by their very nature must be on the sun's sur-face,
or very close to it. Even more rashly, in his second
letter he for the first time openly endorsed the Coperni-can
system.

"You must be careful, Galileo!" How often he must
have heard this warning. He was tired of being careful.

One of his former pupils, Father Benedetto Castelli,
now a mathematics professor at the University of Pisa,
sent him a worried letter. At a royal dinner party at the
court of Tuscany, the Dowager Grand Duchess Chris-tina,
mother of Cosimo II, had expressed her convictions
that the earth could not move because its motion would
contradict the Holy Scriptures. This was bringing the
camp of the "enemy" very close to home, and caused
Galileo to do some serious thinking on the relation of
science and faith in the modern world.

To Castelli he sent a letter in which he attempted to
reconcile his scientific beliefs with the Holy Scriptures,
making additional copies for other trusted friends. One
copy fell into the hands of a Dominican priest, Niccoli
Lorini. (The Dominican order was more rigid and ortho-dox
than was the Jesuit.) Lorini, who was so ignoran, t
about astronomy that he spelled Copernicus as "Iperru-cus,"
forwarded Galileo's letter to the Holy Office in
Rome, proposing that the "Galileists" be investigated.

Taking up the cudgel, another Dominican, Father
Tommasco Caccini, preached a sermon in FlorenCe
against Galileo, in which he is said to have made a clever
paraphrase of the Scriptures: "Ye men of Galileo, why
stand ye gazing up into heaven?" The rest of his set,non


GALILEO [95]


was a denunciation of the Copernican system, mathe
matics
in general, and all mathematicians and astrono
mers.

Back
of Lorini and Caccini was an arrogant Aristote
lian
named Lodovico delle Colombe. Since "colombo"

means pigeon in Italian, Galileo referred mockingly to

these men as the "Pigeon League." Foolish and percy as

their attacks seemed, he did not underestimate their po
tential
danger. To strengthen his own position, he ex
panded
the letter to Father Castelli into a lengthy and

persuasive Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina, after

which he begged permission of Cosimo II to go to Rome

to justify himself. He arrived there on December i,

65, and lodged, in accordance with the Grand Duke's

instructions, at the Florentine Embassy with "board for

himself, a secretary, a valet, and a small mule."

The Romans had been rebuilding since his last risk,

and the medieval city was transformed into a modern

one, with monumental squares, statues, lovely gardens,

and spectacular baroque fountains. Outwardly the wel
come
given Galileo was as warm as ever. He was in
vited
everywhere, and wherever he went he argued the

merits of Copernicus. "You have a way of bewitching

people," a friend told him. For a while k seemed as

though he had bewitched all Rome.

"We have here Sig. Galileo," wrote a certain Mon
signor
Querengo, "who often, in gatherings of men of

Curious mind, bemuses many concerning the opinion of

Copernicus that he holds for true 	He
discourses
	often
amid fifteen or twenty guests who make hot as	saults

Upon him, now in one house, now in another . . .
	What
I liked most was that, before answering the oppos	ing

reasons, he amplified them and fortified them him-

[96] Seven Famous Trials in History


self with new grounds with appeared invincible, so that,
in demolishing them subsequently, he made his op-ponents
look all the more ridiculous."

Cardinal Maffeo Barberini, whom he had met under
such auspicious circumstances at the Grand Duke's din-ner,
acted as his sponsor in high Church and State cir-cles.
He had many visitors. Among them, surprisingly,
was Father Caccini, the very man who had denounced
Galileo in his sermon in Florence. Caccini stayed a long
four hours, during which he alternated between making
abject apologies and trying to draw Galileo into admit-ting
he opposed the policy of the Church. Galileo was
unimpressed. "I discovered a very great ignorance, no
less than a mind full of venom and devoid of charity,"
he commented.

His triumph seemed complete. "From day to day I
am discovering what a good inspiration it was for me
to come here," he happily wrote the Tuscan secretary of
state on January 8, "for such snares had been laid
against me that I could not have hoped to save myself
later."

Unknown to him, while he was in Rome, the Holy
Office of the Roman Church carried through the investi-gation
set in motion by Father Lorini. For the benefit of
the qualifiers, "the experts on matters of heresy," the be-liefs
of Copernicus, and therefore of Galileo, were
summed up in two exceedingly unscientific and foggy
statements:


1. The Sun is the center of the world and hence immov-able
of local motion.

II. The Earth is not the center of the world, nor immov

GALILEO [97]


able, but moves according to the vhole of itself, also
with a diurnal [daily] motion.


The qualifiers voted the first proposition "foolish and
absurd.., heretical, inasmuch as it expressly con-tradicts
the doctrine of the Holy Scripture." The second
proposition received the same censure.

On February 26, 616, Cardinal Robert Bellarmine
summoned Galileo to appear at his palace, and in the
presence of several Dominican friars instructed him that
he must no longer hold or deend the views of Coperni-cus.

That was all. Bellarmine, a kindhearted and scholarly
man, showed no desire to pursue the matter further. Gal-ileo
was not at this time brought to trial and no formal ac-cusations
were made against him. The storm clouds that
the "Pigeon League" had stirred up were dissipated in
the lightest sprinkle. Grieved as Galileo was at the re-striction
placed upon him, he had the comfort that he
had not been forbidden to present the views of Coperni-cus
as a hypothesis.

Angrily he learned that a rumor was spreading that
he had been called to account by the Inquisition and "had
to go around like a whipped dog." To put a stop to the
slander, he asked Bellarmine for a letter stating exactly
what had been said to him. In due time, the Cardinal
graciously obliged him. Since the Bellarmine letter was
to play a part in Galileo's later, less fortuitous brush
with the Inquisition, it is quoted in full:

"We, Roberto Cardinal Bellarmino, having heard that
it is calumniously reported that Signor Galileo Galilei
has in our hand ab}ured and has also been punished with


[98]
	Seven Famous Trials in History


salutary penance, and being requested to state the truth
as to this, declare that the said Signor Galileo has not
abjured, ekher in our hand, or the hand of any other
person here in Rome, or anywhere else, so far as we
know, any opinion or doctrine held by him; neither has
any salutary penance been imposed on him; but that only
the declaration made by the Holy Father and published
by the Sacred Congregation of the Index has been
tiffed to him, wherein it is set forth that the doctrine
attributed to Copernicus, that the Earth moves around
the Sun and that the Sun is stationary in the center of
the world and does not move from east to west, is con-trary
to the Holy Scriptures and therefore cannot be
defended or held. [Italics ours] In witness whereof we
have written and subscribed these presents with our hand
this twenty-sixth day of May, 6 i6."

On his return to Tuscany Galileo made an effort to
keep out of the limelight. He turned his attention to
making a telescope for use at sea, and worked out other
methods to make his astronomical discoveries useful to
navigators. Sometimes his son Vincenzio, who was now
living wkh Marina Gamba, came to see him. Sometimes
he rode his mule up to the hill of Arcetri, overlooking
Florence, to visit his two daughters, who were both
nuns at the Convent of San Marco.

His younger daughter, Livia, Sister Arcangela, was an
unexceptional young woman, but the older, Virginia,
now Sister Celeste, was intelligent, warmhearted, and
compassionate. Of his three children, Sister Celeste was
always Galileo's favorite. Eventually he bought a house
at Arcetri so he could see her daily.

In 6zo, his friend and patron, Cosimo II, died at
age of thirty. In deference to his father, the new Grad


[99]


Duke Ferdinand II retained Galileo at the court, ttrlhough
he did not have his father's passion for science and p hilos-ophy.

Against his better judgment Galileo eventuallly be-came
involved in another skirmish in polemics, again
with a Jesuit, an astronomer named Father Heloratio
Grassi. Father Grassi had cited the appearance of ? three
comets in 68 as proof that Copernicus was wwrong.
Galileo published an anonymous criticism, which O Grassi
answered. Galileo, a better scientist and a better v writer
than his adversary, expanded his first criticism in Tt'be As-sayer,
one of his most brilliant works, to which he : reck-lessly
signed his name. Once more he had made an e:nemy
among the Jesuits who, in contrast to the Dominrnicans,
had been for the most part friendly to him.

In x624, tO Galileo's delight, Cardinal Maffeo t3arbe-rini
was appointed Pope Urban VIII. With this old fi friend
as head of the Papal States, he had reason to hopo0e that
the ban against the Copernican theory would be lifted
and that the conflict between the Church and sccience
would be peacefully resolved. That spring Galileo · jour-neyed
to Rome to bring his personal congratulaations.
The new Pope granted him six private audiences, p:oraised
The Assayer unreservedly, promised Galileo a peension
for the education of Vincenzio, and presented tlhim a
painting in a gold frame and some small sacred pictures.
In addition, he lauded Galileo highly in a long letvxter to
Grand Duke Ferdinand II.

It is understandable that these unprecedented mazrks of
favor blinded Galileo to a sad truth--that Pope CIJrban
VIII was no longer the same genial, tolerant person he
.had. been as Cardinal Barberini. The vices of vanit*ry and
lealousy and arrogance had come with his high office.


[tool Seven Famous Trials in History


He could afford to be gracious to his adherents when it
suited him, but he had the power to be equally ruthless
to any of them who crossed him, as Galileo was unwit-tingly
doomed to do.

Unsuspecting, Galileo felt that now it would be safe
to write the book of which he had long dreamed and
that he had long postponed--a book that would show
the truth of the Copernican theory on the basis of his
own astronomical discoveries. To avoid disobeying the
Church injunction not to hold or defend that theory, he
hit on the ingenious plan of presenting his material in the
form of conversations between three men of opposing
views, whom he called Sagredo, Salviati, and Simplicio.
He began work on Dialogue on the Tv:o Greatest
Systems of the World; the Ptolemaic and the Copernica
(usually shortened to Dialogue) early in 1625. It was
interrupted on several occasions, once by some intensive
studies on magnetism, and again by a serious illness. By
January, x63o, it was completed, an unwieldy manu-script
of some five hundred pages.

Two of the three characters in the book were named
after real people. Sagredo was the Venetian nobleman
who had been Galileo's friend in his happy days at Padua.
In Dialogue, he was also a Venetian nobleman, a man of
the world with the best qualities of his class, interested in
new developments of science, open to argument, though
careful not to commit himself on theoretical issues.

Salviati was another friend, a Florentine nobleman
whom Galileo had often visited. He was the scientist in
Dialogue, a man of Galileo's own views who took avid
pleasure in "deep speculation."

Sagredo had died in 62o and Salviati in I6I4. Galileo


GALILEO [IOI]


had grieved for them both. Now he was to give them
immortality.

Simplicio, the third character, was a composite of all
the ignorant and opinionated persons who had plagued
Galileo with their specious arguments. If he resembled
any one of them, it was perhaps Lodovico deIle Colombe,
the head of the "Pigeon League." Simplicio took liter-ally
every word written by Aristotle, and held doggedly
to Ptolemy's cumbersome plan of the heavens. Gener-ously,
Galileo portrayed him as a charming if simple-minded
youth who cheerfully endured innumerable ver-bal
defeats and came back for more of the same. For all
his elaborate subterfuge, no intelligent reader could
doubt that Galileo considered Simplicio a dunderhead,
that the author and the scientist Salviati were the same,
and that Sagredo represented the impartial observer.

From Rome came the encouraging news that the
Pope in a private audience had declared that the "pro-hibition
of Copernicus in. 6 6 was a nuisance." A Ro-man
friend of Galileo, on learning that his book was
finished, wrote, "You are awaited here more than any
most beloved damsel." He arrived with his manuscript in
May, x63o, then turned k over to Father Niccolo Ric-cardi,
the Chief Licenser of the Church, for the official
sanction he needed so it could be safely published.

Riccardi, a good-humored, enormously fat priest
known by his intimates as "Father Monster," promised
him quicc action. The Pope received him warmly, lis-tened
to his account of the book, and assured him that
the hypothetical treatment of his subject was entirely
acceptable.

There followed painful delays. Riccardi, after a hasty


[xo2 ] Seven Famous Trials in History


reading, concluded that the material was not as hypothe.
deal as it should be and called in a mathematician, Father
Raffaello Visconti, to edit it. Viseonti changed a few
words and then said in his opinion the manuscript was in
proper shape. Riccardi, who was no astronomer, still
hesitated, finally undertaking to revise it himself, page
by page.

Like any writer, Galileo suffered acutely at the idea of
having his work mutilated by an amateur, but there was
nothing he could do about it. While he was waiting,
news came of the death of Prince Cesi of the Lincean
Academy, who had promised to publish the book. On
the advice of other friends, Galileo asked Riccardi to
let him have it printed in Florence. Months later, after
the Florentine inquisitor had consented, Riccardi agreed
to release the manuscript. Not until February, x632,
was Galileo able to present the first printed copy to
Grand Duke Ferdinand II, to whom it was dedicated.

The Dialogue received ecstatic praise from the critics.
The first edition was sold out almost immediately, so
that it was June before the book was put on sale in Rome.
Almost at once there was trouble.

"I have heard that they are having a commission of
irate theologians to prohibit your Dialogue," wrote Ga-lileo's
staunch friend, Father Thomas Campanella, "and
there is no one on it who understands mathematics." He
added that "Father Monster" was making "fearful noises
against" the commission, and that he was sure His Holi-ness
was not informed about it.

In August came word that Rome had suspended the
book's sale. Galileo was first stunned, then angry. He
was certain this had been done without the knowledge
of the Pope and persuaded his Grand Duke to prepare a


GALILEO [103]


message to him, requesting a mixed commission to in-vestigate
the matter.

Francesco Niccolini, the Florentine Ambassador in
Rome, took the message personally to the Vatican. The
Pope received him icily. "Your Galileo has ventured
with things that he ought not and with the most grave
and dangerous subjects that can be stirred up in these
days," he said.

Could these be the words of the man who had show-ered
Galileo with kindness?

The reasons for the Pope's change of heart were a mys-tery
until long afterward. In spite of the ban of 616,
not all Church dignitaries were opposed to Copernicus,
and there was some talk of adopting a less literal inter-pretation
of the Holy Scriptures, should the findings of
science warrant it. But then, as has been the case so often
in the history of mankind, the voice of prejudice was
louder than the voice of reason. Among those who cried
most noisily against the Dialogue were the two Jesuits,
Father Scheiner and Father Grassi, whom Galileo had
mortally wounded in turn by his Letters on Sunspots
and The Assayers. Either they or others of his opponents
employed an extraordinarily clever maneuver to bring
about his dowafall. They let k be hinted to the Pope
that Galileo hod made fun of him, that his fool, Sim-plicio,
was, indeed, a caricature of His Holiness.

One passage at least of the Dialogue gave substance
to this allegatic)n. In this passage, Salviad, the scientist,
cited the ebb a. nd flow of the tides as evidence that the
earth, moves (n error of Galileo, but that is beside the
,p,omt). Simpliqio replied that such talk was blasphemy
uecause it Sems t) cast a doubt on God's power to
Control the tides." Galileo had certainly forgotten where


[o4] Seven Famous Trials in History


he had first heard this stupid argument. The Pope had
not; he had used it himself in one of his many conversa-tions
with Galileo. Like all vain people, he was unduly
vulnerable. It was easy to persuade him that Galileo had
done this on purpose; he could not and would not ever
forgive him.

Whatever Galileo suspected of these intrigues, the fact
of the Pope's anger was plain. He had feared his book
might be put on the Index--that is, banned in all Catho-lic
countries. Now he realized he must face something
much worse. Sooner or later he would be called before
the Inquisition.

The Roman Inquisition was an outgrowth of the Me-dieval
Inquisition. (A deputy inquisitor, it will be re-membered,
assisted at the medieval trial of Joan of
Arc.) The extreme corruption and venality that black-ened
the name of the Inquisition in Spain did not exist in
Rome. Torture to procure confessions was employed
rarely by the Roman Inquisition and there was a Church
ruling--not necessarily irrevocable--that it should not
be applied to anyone over sixty. But even as with the
Spanish Inquisition, to be called before the Roman In-quisition
meant one had already been found guilty of
heresy. The minimum penalty was public disgrace; the
maximum--death.

Several anxious months passed during which Galileo's

health steadily deteriorated. On October , I632, the

chief inquisitor of Florence came to his house with a
summons from the Holy Office--the Congregation of
the Inquisition--ordering him to appear in Rome within
thirty days. He knew there was no escaping the sum-mons
but he begged for more time, pleading his poor
health.


GALILEO [IOj]


His request was denied. "He must come," the Pope
sent word. "He can come by very easy stages, in a litter,
with every comfort, but he must be tried here in per-son."
On November 9, he received his second sum-mons.
He appealed again, offering a certificate signed by
three doctors.

"We find that his pulse intermits every three or four
beats," it read in part. "The patient has frequent at-tacks
of giddiness, hypochondriacal melancholy, weakness of
stomach, insomnia, and flying pains about the body. We
have also observed a serious hernia with rupture of the
peritoneum. All these symptoms, with the least aggrava-tion,
might become dangerous to life."

In response came a papal mandate. No more evasions
would be tolerated. In case of further delay a commis-sioner
would be assigned to bring Galileo back as a pris-oner
in irons.

Grand Duke Ferdinand II advised Galileo to leave
immediately. Much as he respected his father's former
tutor, even he dared not risk offending the Papal States.
Long ago Sagredo had warned Galileo that Tuscany
would never give him the protection he might have
found in the independent Republic of Venice. Now his
prophecy had come true. With his servants, Galileo set
out in January on the painful journey that lasted twenty-three
days, reaching the Florentine Embassy in Rome on
February 3. A warm bed was ready for him there. The
Ambassador's wife, Caterina Niccolini, whom he called
"queen of all kindness," took care of him.

Several prelates of the Inquisition visited him at the
Embassy in the next weeks. They seemed friendly and
Galileo talked more openly than wisely, confiding that
he still believed the Copernican theory, no matter what.


[o6] Seven Famous Trials in History


"Be more discreet, Master," Niccolini warned him.
The visits, he pointed out, were not purely social. They
were made only so that the case against him might be
strengthened.

Throughout all this dreadful period, the Ambassador
and his wife did everything possible for him, even risk-ing
their own prestige. In truth, they were genuinely
fond of him. "We find a wonderful pleasure in the
gentle conversation of the good old man," wrote Nic-colini.

Their loyalty gave Galileo new strength and he
planned his defense carefully, suddenly confident that
he could make his case so strong no judgment could be
granted against him. Gently, Niccolini endeavored to
persuade him that any defense was useless. Galileo must
submit "to whatever he may see they want in that busi-ness
of the motion of the earth." Only by submission
could he save his life.

He heard his friend's words, but neither his heart nor
his mind yet accepted them.

His trial opened on April I2, x633. It was held in the

large council chamber of the Inquisition building, not
far from the Vatican. Ten members of the Dominican
order clad in black robes served as both judges and jury.
The president of the court, Vincenzo Maculano da Firen-zuola,
and two of the other Dominicans sat on one side of
a long table, on which was a crucifix, in the center of
the chamber.

Galileo, who had officially surrendered to the Holy
Office that morning, was brought in, escorted by a
monk and a servant. The aged scientist was so feeble he
could barely stand erect.


GALILEO [o7]


The clerk took his description: "Galileo Galilei, court

mathematician, seventy years old, of Florence."

He repeated the oath: "I swear to speak the whole

truth 	So
help me, God, the Blessed Virgin, and all
the
saints of God."
He
was asked if he knew why he had been summoned. He
answered that he supposed it was on account of his last
book. The Dialogue was shown to him and he identified
it as his.
They
questioned him next about the events of i616. Had
not the Holy Office commanded him at that time to
appear in Rome?
Surprised,
he assured his judges that he had gone to Rome
in that year of his ovyn accord--so as to know what
opinion it was proper to hold in the matter of the Copernican
hypothesis and to be sure of not holding any but
holy and Catholic views. The humble words seemed to
come from afar, as though it was not he, the fiery Galileo,
who had spoken them but some other more docile
soul. Already he could see the drift of their .questioning.
They were trying to establish that the meet-lng at
Cardinal Bellarmine's palace had been in effect a trial, that
he had then been judged and condemned. It was not
true. He had to make that point clear.
They asked
him about certain conferences he had had with several
prelates prior to Bellarmine's decree. He ex-plained that
the prelates had wanted to be instructed about Copernicus'
book, which was difficult for non-scientists to understand.
Firenzuola asked him what hap-pened next.
.He
answered: "Respecting
the controversy which had arisen on the
aforesaid opinion that the sun is stationary

[Io8] Seven Famous Trials in History


and that the earth moves, it was decided by the Holy
Congregation of the Index that such an opinion, Con-sidered
as an established fact, contradicted Holy Scrip ture
and was only admissible as a conjecture, as it was
held by Copernicus."

Had he been informed of this decision, and if so, by
whom?

Cardinal Bellarmine had told him of the decision of
the Holy Congregation of the Index, he said.

He was told to state what Cardinal Bellarmine had
told him about this decision and whether anything else
was said on the subject.

He was ready with a clear answer on this point: "The
Lord Cardinal Bellarmine signified to me that the afore-said
opinion of Copernicus might be held as a conjecture,
as it had been held by Copernicus .... "

They asked him about Bellarmine's decree of Febru-ary,
616, and in what form that decree was made
known to him.

He told them. "In the month of February, i6x6, the
Lord Cardinal Bellarmine told me that, as the opinion of
Copernicus, if adopted absolutely, was contrary to Holy
Scripture, it must neither be held nor defended but that
it could be taken and used hypothetically. In accordance
with this I possess a certificate of Cardinal Bellarmine,
given on May 26, 1616, in which he says that the Coper-nican
opinion may neither be held nor defended, as it is
opposed to Holy Scripture, of which certificate I here-with
submit a copy."

He had not been sure he was going to use Bellarmine's
letter, but he saw no way out.
"When the above communication was made to you,


GALILEO [I09]


were any other persons present, and who?" he was asked
next.

He remembered those shadowy robed figures in the
meedng at Bellarmine's palace, and answered cautiously
that some Dominican fathers were present but that he
did not know them and had never seen them since.

They asked if any other command had been communi-cated
to him on this subject in the presence of the Do-minican
fathers, by them or anyone else, and what was
that other command?

He could only stare at them in bewilderment, repeat
Bellarmine's order not "to hold or defend" the Coperni-can
theory, and say that it escaped his memory whether
the Dominican fathers were present before or came in
afterward:

"I do not remember that anything else was said, nor
do I know that I should remember what was said to
me, even if it were read to me. I say freely what I do
remember, because I do not think that I have in any
way disobeyed the command, that is, have not by any
means held or defended the said opinion that the earth
moves and that the sun is stationary."

At this point the inquisitor informed Galileo that a
command had been issued to him before witnesses. The
command was that "he must not hold, defend, nor teach
that opinion in any way whatsoever."

Galileo must have wanted desperately to cry out that
this was not so. He had never been told not to "teach
that opinion in any way whatsoever." The phrase was
not in his letter from Bellarmine. But he could not ac
curse
his qttestioners, who represented the Holy Church,
ota misstatement. He stammered:


[IIO] Seven Famous Trials in History


"I do not remember that the command was intimated
to me by anybody but by the Cardinal verbally; and I
member that the command was 'not to hold or defend.,
It may be that 'and not to teach' was also there. I do not
remember it, neither the clause 'in any way whatsoever,,
but it may be that it was; for I thought no more about it
or took any pains to impress the words on my mem-ory

Coldly his examiners proceeded to the next point.
After the aforesaid command was issued to him, had he
received any permission to write the book that he had
acknoxvledged was his?

Galileo admitted that he had not thought of asking
for such permission. He had not considered that in writ-ing
it he was acting contrary to, far less disobeying, the
command not to hold or defend the Copernican system.

The president of the council now asked whether,
when he requested permission to print his book, he had
informed the Master of the Palace about the 6x6 com-mand.

It was the most important question of his first hearing
and Galileo answered it rather badly: "I did not happen
to discuss that command with the Master of the Palace
when I asked for the imprimatur, for I did not think it
necessary to say anything, because I had no doubts about
it; for I have neither maintained nor defended in that
book the opinion that the earth moves and that the sun is
stationary but have rather demonstrated the opposite
of the Copernican opinion and shown that the argumentS
of Copernicus are weak and not conclusive."

To state that the Dialogue "demonstrated the opposite
of the Copernican opinion" was certainly stretching the
truth, but Galileo in his pain and distress hardly knoV


GALILEO [III]


what he was saying. His signature on the protocol, the
minutes of this first session, was so shaky as to be almost
illegible.

It was a rule of the Inquisition that defendants be kept
in strict seclusion during their trials. Because of his age
and illness and high position in the Tuscan court, Ga-lileo
was not put in the dungeon but was given a suke of
comfortable rooms. A servant of Niccolini looked after
him. From the Embassy, Niccolini sent him cakes, cold
meats, fruit, and his favorite wines.

He had little appetite for these delicacies, and no spe-cial
privileges eased his inner agony. For many years he
had known, with one part of his mind, that this reckon-ing
might come. He had never really believed k. In
every way he knew he had tried to win over ecclesias-tical
opinion to Copernicus and the new astronomy. Up
until the last months, he had seemed very near success.
Now at last he was forced to admit that he had lost.

Night after night he must have lain awake in anguish,
trying to resolve the terrible conflict within him. As a
man of science, he knew he had been right. As a devout
Catholic--and he had always considered himself thus--he
knew there was no course open to him but that of
obedience to the Church.

The Inquisition moved slowly. On April 27, when
deliberations had been going on for ten long weeks,
Firenzuola, president of the council, came into his room
and sat down at his bedside. The inquisitor described the

r

eeting in a letter written the next day to Cardinal
ancesco Barberini, a nephew of Pope Urban VIII.
"That no time might be lost, I entered into discourse
with Galileo yesterday afternoon, and after many and
many arguments and rejoinders had passed between us,


Seven Famous Trials in History


by God's grace, I attained my objects, for I brought him
to a full sense of his error, so that he clearly recognized
that he had erred and had gone too far in his book. And
to all this he gave expression in words of much feeling,
like one who experienced great consolation in the recog.
nition of his error, and he was also willing to confess it
judicially. He requested, however, a little time in order
to consider the form in which he might most fittingly
make the confession, which, as far as its substance is con-cerned,
will, I hope, follow in the manner indicated .... "

There is no record of what went on in Galileo's mind
as he listened to Firenzuola's "many and many argu-ments.''
One can surmise that it was at this time he
finally made up his mind to renounce his life's work.

Two days later, on April 3°, he was called for another
hearing, and asked whether he had anything to say.
His statement--denying everything he believed most
strongly--was ready:

"In the course of some days' continuous and attentive
reflection on the interrogations put to me on the twelfth
of the present month, and in particular as to whether,
sixteen years ago, an injunction was intimated to me by
order of the Holy Office, forbidding me to hold, defend,
or teach 'in any manner' the opinion that had just been
condemned--of the motion of the earth and the stability
of the sun--it occurred to me to reperuse my printed
Dialogue, which for three years I had not seen, in order
carefully to note whether, contrary to my most sincere
intention, there had, by inadvertence, fallen from my
pen anything from which a reader or the authorities
might infer not only some taint of disobedience on my
part but also other particulars which might induce the


GALILEO III3]


belief that I had contravened the orders of the Holy
Church.

"Being, by the kind permission of the authorities, at
liberty to send about my servant, I succeeded in procur-ing
a copy of my book, and, having procured it, I

plied myself with the utmost diligence to its perusal and
to a most minute consideration thereof. And as, owing
to my not having seen it for so long, it presented itself to
me, as it were, like a new writing and by another author,
I freely confess that in several places it seemed to me set
forth in such a form that a reader ignorant of my real
purpose might have had reason to suppose that the argu-ments
brought on the false side, and which it was my
intention to confute, were so expressed as to be calcu~
lated rather to compel conviction by their cogency than
to be easy of solution.

"Two arguments there are in particular--the one
taken from the solar spots, the other from the ebb and
flow of the tide--which in truth come to the ear of the
reader with far greater show of force and power than
ought to have been imparted to them by one who re-garded
them as inconclusive and who intended to refute
them, as indeed I truly and sincerely held and do hold
them to be inconclusive and admitting of refutation.
And, as an excuse to myself for having fallen into an
error so foreign to my intention, not contenting myself
entirely with saying that when a man recites the argu-ments
of the opposite side with the object of refuting
them, he should, especially if writing in the form of
dialogue, state these in their strictest form and should
not cloak them to the disadvantage of his opponentM
not contenting myself, I say, with this excuse, I resorted


[4] Seven Famous Trials in History


to that of the natural complacency which every man
feels with regard to his own subtleties and in showing
himself more skillful than the generality of men in de-vising,
even in favor of false propositions, ingenious and
plausible arguments. With all this, although with Cicero
'avidior sim gloriae quam sat est,' if I had now to set
forth the same reasonings, without doubt I should so
weaken them that they should not be able to make an
apparent show of that force of which they are really and
essentially devoid. My error, then, has been--and I con-fess
it--one of vainglorious ambition and of pure igno-rance
and inadvertence.

"This is what it occurs to me to say with reference to
this particular and which suggested itself to me during
the reperusal of my book."

It would seem that no man could humble himself
more than he had done. Yet, after he was dismissed, he
returned to make an additional statement, in which he
offered to revise the Dialogue so that it would become a
refutation of what he knew to be true:

"And in confirmation of my assertion that I have not
held and do not hold as true the opinion which has been
condemned, of the motion of the earth and the stability
of the sun--if there shall be granted to me, as I desire,
means and time to make a clearer demonstration thereof,
I am ready to do so; and there is a most favorable

tunity for this, seeing that in the work already put)s.nea
the interlocutors agree to meet again after a certain
to discuss several distinct problems of Nature not con-nected
with the matter discoursed of at their mee6'
As this affords me an opportunity of adding one or two
other 'days,' I promise to resume the arguments already
brought in favor of the said opinion, which is false ad


GALILEO [ILS]


has been condemned, and to confute them in such most
effectual manner as by the blessing of God may be sup-plied
to me. I pray, therefore, this holy Tribunal to aid
me in this good resolution and to enable me to put it in
effect."

These two statements make up the recantation of
Galileo, which ever since has been a subject of the widest
speculation.

They were not exacted under torture, though he may
have been shown the instruments of torture and threat-ened
with them. Fear of death could have had little to do
with them. He knew his life span was drawing to a
close and in the midst of his disillusion and sorrow, death
could not have seemed too fearsome. He made them be-cause
he felt it was his duty to do so, because there was
no other way. If he had any consolation, it was that
neither his words nor anything else in the world could
change the truth; one day his science would triumph.

Temporarily Firenzuola released him in the custody
of Niccolini, who was overwhelmed to see him. "It is a
fearful thing to have to do with the Inquisition," the
Ambassador wrote his Grand Duke. "The poor man has
come back more dead than alive." He and Galileo's
other friends were confident that the worst was over.
His daughter, Sister Celeste, sent a loving letter. She was
stunned with joy at the good news, she wrote, and
chatted on about life in Arcetri:


"The potted oranges have been damaged by a storm

' ·· Your little mule become so haughty that she will be
ridden by none . . . I have bought six bushels of wheat,
so that as soon as it gets cooler, Piera [a servant] can go
about making bread. She says that her desire for your


[6] Seven Famous Trials in History


return is so much greater than yours, that i1they Were
put on a balance, yours would go highly up in the air."


The next interrogation of the Inquisition took place
on May xo. Firenzuola, on opening the session, informed
Galileo that according to the rules eight days were al-lowed
for him to present a defense. Galileo saw no rea-son
to postpone this empty formality and spoke at once.

He pleaded his "misunderstanding" about the decree
of i66, that he had been unaware he was "not to teach
in any way whatsoever" the doctrine of Copernicus. He
concluded, "... It remains for me to beg you to take
into consideration my pitiable state of bodily indisposi-tion,
to which, at the age of seventy years, I have been
reduced by ten months of constant mental anxiety .... "

The final hearing was on June 20. Once more he was
bidden to speak the truth under threat of torture, and
again he stated that he had once held the Copernican
doctrine to be true but that he no longer did so. The
repetitions of his recantation--and many were demanded
--must have been harder to bear than his first statements.
When asked to confess the truth for the third time, he
could only say dully, "I am here to obey, and I have not
held this opinion since the decision was pronounced, as
I have stated."

There is a story that after all of this, Galileo mur-mured
under his breath, "And the earth still moves." It
may be so; at least, no one can prove otherwise.

On Wednesday, June 22, x633, Galileo was taken to
a large hall in the Dominican monastery. Clad in a white
shirt of lenitence, he was made to kneel in the presen.Ce
of his jtdges while the sentence was read to him. As le
knelt, the long charge against him was reviewed, and


GALILEO [7]


only after that did he hear his punishment. The Dialogue
was to be prohibited. He was condemned to formal
prison for a length of time to be determined by the Holy
Office. For three years he was to come before them once
a week to repeat the seven penitential psalms.

The sentence was not enforced. After a few final days
with Ambassador Niccolini and his wife, he was sent to
Siena in the charge of Archbishop Piccolomini, where he
stayed for six months. In December, the Church grew
kind and alloved him to return to Arcetri, on condition
that he would not go to Florence or receive more than
two visitors at a time.

His reunion with his beloved daughter, Sister Celeste,
was tinged with melancholy. She had taken her father's
agony as her own and it had sapped her fragile strength.
The gentle nun lived on only until April, I634.

Work had been the habit of Galileo's life. Even the
Inquisition could not change that. He turned back to his
former interest in motion, falling bodies, energy, heat,
specific gravity. His book on these subjects, Two New
Sciences, was the first great work on physics and laid
the foundation for the laws of motion of Sir Isaac New-ton,
born the year of Galileo's death.

It was his last contribution to science. Soon afterward
blindness overtook him. In the summer of 638 he was
permitted to live with his son in Florence, but his visitors
were still limited. One of them came all the way from
England, a young poet with flashing brown eyes named
John Milton. Milton later referred briefly to this visit
in/ireopagitica, a speech addressed to Parliament against
an order requiting the licensing of all books: "...There
it was that I found and visited the famous Galileo,
grown old, a prisoner to the Inquisition for thinking in


[x 6] Seven Famous Trials in History


return is so much greater than yours, that ff they Were
put on a balance, yours would go highly up in the air."


The next interrogation of the Inquisition took place

on May o. Firenzuola, on opening the session, informed

Galileo that according to the rules eight days were al
lowed
for him to present a defense. Galileo saw no rca
son
to postpone this empty formality and spoke at once.

He pleaded his "misunderstanding" about the decree

of i616, that he had been unaware he was "not to te:',ch

in any way whatsoever" the doctrine of Copernicus. lie

concluded, "... It remains for me to beg you to take

into consideration my pitiable state of bodily indispo':d
tion,
to which, at the age of seventy years, I have been

reduced by ten months of constant mental anxiety 	"


The
final hearing was on June 20. Once more he was bidden
to speak the truth under threat of torture, and again
he stated that he had once held the Copernican doctrine
to be true but that he no longer did so. The repetitions
of his recantation--and many were demandcd --must
have been harder to bear than his first statements. When
asked to confess the truth for the third time, he could
only say dully, "I am here to obey, and I have not held
this opinion since the decision was pronounced, as I
have stated."
There
is a story that after all of this, Galileo mur-mured
under his breath, "And the earth still moves." It may
be so; at least, no one can prove otherwise.
On
Wednesday, June 22, 633, Galileo was taken to
a large hall in the Dominican monastery. Clad in a white
shirt of penitence, he was made to kneel in the presence
of his judges while the sentence was read to him. As he
knelt, the long charge against him was reviewed, and


GALILEO [II7]


only after that did he hear his punishment. The Dialogue
was to be prohibited. He was condemned to formal
prison for a length of time to be determined by the Holy
Office. For three years he was to come before them once
a week to repeat the seven penitential psalms.

The sentence was not enforced. After a few final days
with Ambassador Niccolini and his wife, he was sent to
Siena in the charge of Archbishop Piccolomini, where he
stayed for six months. In December, the Church grew
kind and allowed him to return to Arcetri, on condition
that he would not go to Florence or receive more than
two visitors at a time.

His reunion with his beloved daughter, Sister Celeste,
was tinged with melancholy. She had taken her father's
agony as her own and it had sapped her fragile strength.
The gentle nun lived on only until April, x634.

Work had been the habit of Galileo's life. Even the
Inquisition could not change that. He turned back to his
former interest in motion, falling bodies, energy, heat,
specific gravity. His book on these subjects, Two New
Sciewes, was the first great work on physics and laid
the foundation for the laws of motion of Sir Isaac New-ton,
born the year of Galileo's death.

It was his last contribution to science. Soon afterward
blindness overtook him. In the summer of x638 he was
permitted to live with his son in Florence, but his visitors
Were still limited. One of them came all the way from
England, a young poet with flashing brown eyes named
John Milton. Milton later referred briefly to this visit
in/lreopagitica, a speech addressed to Parliament against
an order requiting the licensing of all books: "...There
it was that I found and visited the famous Galileo,
grown old, a prisoner to the Inquisition for thinking in


[ i x8] Seven Famous Trials in History


astronomy otherwise than the Franciscan and Domini-can
licensers thought."

Pope Urban VIII never restored Galileo to his free-dom
or released him from house arrest. His vengeance
outlived the astronomer. When Galileo died at Arcetri,
on January 8, I642, at the age of seventy-eight, the Pope
forbade the Grand Duke to erect'a monument in his
honor lest any word on it "offend the reputation of the
Holy Office."

"The state hath its own reasons that reason knoxveth
not." The trial of Galileo, conducted by the Roman
Inquisition, had not been unfair by the standards of the
times. Its decisions remained on the records until 885,
when they were quietly reversed. The stargazer of Tus-cany
was vindicated at last.


PETER ZENGER


On August , x732, the citizens of the City of New
York were in a turmoil of excitement. The new gov-ernor
of New York and the Jerseys, appointed by the
British Crown, had just arrived from England. People
were justly curious about him. Though they had no say
in his appointment, for an indeterminate number of
years their welfare would be in his hands.

At the Black Horse Tavern, which in lieu of a popu-lar
newspaper served as a clearinghouse for news, men
gathered in clusters, exchanging their few meager bits
of information as they drank their ale. The name of
their new governor was William Cosby, and he was
formerly a brigadier general of the Royal Irish Army.
He was a close friend of the English nobleman, the Duke
Newcastle. His wife was a sister of the Earl of
His last post had been governor of Minorca,
no one knew whether he had resigned or been


[ 2 z ] Seven Famous Trials in History


forced to quit. Before coming to New York, he had
spent some time in London, securing repeal of a sugar
bill detrimental to colonial interests. This, at least, was
in his favor.

The colonists knew by experience that the Crown
appointees, however impressive their titles, were not al-ways
honorable men. William Cosby, they reasoned,
could hardly be worse than some of his predecessors,
such as the notorious Edward Hyde, Lord Cornbury,
whom Queen Anne had appointed governor back in
i7o3 and who had turned out to be a scamp, a spend-thrift,
and a drunkard. In the succession of New York
governors, men like Cornbury were the rule rather than
the exception.

Someone at the Black Horse Tavern may well have
grumbled that whether the Crown's choice was good or
bad was not the question: Free men should have the
right to vote for a governor of their own choice. Any-one
speaking so rashly would have been quickly silenced
by' his friends. Such sentiments were akin to treason,
punishable by a stretch in the pillory or a public flog-ging.

Compared to Boston or Philadelphia, early eight-eenth-century
New York, with a population of less than
ten thousand, was a small provincial town. There was
an air of prosperity about it, with its neat rows of hand-some
red-brick buildings and cobblestone-paved streets,
and its many well-dressed people, including a goodly
sprinkling of imposing British officials and red-coatel
British officers. Manhattan Island, bought from the In-dians
in 6z5 by the Netherlands East India Company
for trinkets worth twenty-four dollars, had been con-quered
by the English in x674, and New Amsterdam


PETER ZENGER [I2]


had been renamed New York. In the 73o's, most of
the inhabitants were still of Dutch descent. About one in
ten were Negro slaves; the English occupied many of
the higher posts, and there were some Germans and
other European nationals, but Dutch customs prevailed.

The townspeople saw their new governor, an impos-ing,
haughty man in appearance, the second day of his
arrival. At eleven in the morning he marched in a pa-rade
of important New York citizens from the gover-nor's
mansion, which was in the old Dutch fort near
Boxvling Green, to City Hall. A company of mounted
halberdiers in full-dress uniform preceded him and Brit-ish
militia lined the streets. Later, when His Excellency
returned to the fort, the soldiers drew up on the parade
grounds and saluted him with three volleys.

Gradually reports about Governor Cosby seeped
through to the Black Horse Tavern, and at first they
were favorable. He was charming and well-bred and
generous. At his parties at the governor's mansion, food
was abundant and excellent and his wines were the very
finest. Obviously he was a person of private means who
did not have to steal from the colonies to enrich himself.
Or so it seemed.

Another less pleasant story cropped up. The Gover-nor,
it was said, had been out driving in the country
when his carriage was blocked by a farmer and his cart.
Enraged because the farmer did not get off the road
quickly enough to suit his pleasure, Cosby ordered his
coachman to whip him. People went on hoping that this
Unsavory tale had been exaggerated in the telling.

At the next meeting of the New York Assembly,
Governor Cosby was voted an annual salary of fifteen
hundred pounds and an additional gratuity of 750


[x24] Seven Famous Trials in History


pounds for his services in repealing the unpopular sugar
bill. Lewis Morris, the elderly and beloved chief justice
of the New York Supreme Court, went to Cosby to in-form
him of this token of the citizens' appreciation. Far
from being pleased, the Governor sneered because the
sum was so small.

"Why didn't they add the shillings and pence?" he
exploded.

Shocked and mortified, Justice Morris reported the
Governor's reaction to the Assembly. There was some
grim discussion, after which the members voted to in-crease
the gratuity to a thousand pounds. Cosby gained
250 pounds by his outburst; he lost far more than money
in public esteem.

Soon he showed his temper again.

Governor John Montgomerie, whom Cosby was re-placing,
had died the year before. In the little more than
a year that New York had been without a governor,
the president of the Council, a respected and well-to-do
Dutchman named Rip Van Dam, served as acting gover-nor.
Now Cosby sent for Van Dam, waved in his face
an order from the King, telling him that by this order
he was entitled to half the salary of the office of gover-nor
from the time of his appointment until he reached
New York a year later. On the basis of this order, he
demanded that Van Dam refund him half of the monies
the Assembly had paid him as acting governor, a sum of
some nine hundred pounds.

The Dutchman was rightfully indignant. He had
earned that money and it was his. He would not give
Cosby a penny of it. In the next few days he had a
chance to study the King's order carefully. Cosby's in

erpretation of it was somewhat erroneous. The order
actually stated that all monies received for public serv-ices
by either Cosby or the acting governor over the
specified thirteen-month period should be divided
equally, not only the sum paid Van Dam by the New
York Assembly. A London friend of Van Dam's did
some checking for him. Letters across the ocean traveled
slowly; it was several months later that Van Dam
learned that Cosby had been granted an allotment by
the government before he left England. If their ioint
earmngs were evenly split, in accordance with the
King's order, Cosby would owe him, Van Dam, around
thirty-five hundred pounds.

"We will settle our accounts fairly and squarely," he
told Cosby blandly. "All that is,needed is for you to pay
me thirty-five hundred pounds.'

Governor Cosby stormed. The insolence of the Dutch-man!
He would teach him a lesson he would not forget.
He would sue ....

There was the question of how such a suit might be
handled. He dared not sue in chancery, as was customary
in litigation cases, since a iury would be called, and any
iury of New York freeholders would be certain to favor
Vam Dam, who was one of their own, a man they all
knew and trusted. Nor was this suit a normal matter for
the Supreme Court. On the advice of the attorney gen-eral,
Richard Bradley, the Governor undertook a tricky
legal procedure. By an ordinance dated December 4,
732, Cosby proclaimed that the Supreme Court iudges
had authority to hear cases as Barons of the Exchequer
in a "court of equity." Thereupon, Bradley brought
action against Van Dam in the King's name--on the


[ I26] Seven Famous Trials in History


unstable theory that since Cosby represented the King,
anything that benefited the governor would also benefit
the King.

For his defense Van Dam hired the two best lawyers
in New York, two young men named James Alexander
and William Smith. When the case came up, they ignored
the matter of who owed what and concentrated on one
point. They claimed that it was illegal to set up a "court
of equity" without the consent of the General Assembly,
that in doing so Governor Cosby had exceeded his au-thority.

The Supreme Court of New York--which Cosby
had temporarily transformed into his "court of equity"
was composed of three judges. Two of them, James
De Lancey and Frederick Philipse, found it to their own
Best interests to side with the Governor. The chief jus-tice,
Lewis Morris, had the power of veto over the other
txvo and possessed more courage than ekher. He ruled
xaith the two lawyers that the "court of equity" was
illegal and had no authority to act.

His verdict, dated April 9, x733, concluded: "And as
I take it, the giving of a new jurisdiction in equity by
letters patent to an old court, that never had such juris-dScdon
before, or erecting a new court of equity by
letters patent or ordinance of the Governor and Coun-cil,
without assent of the Legislature, are equally unlaw-fY1,
and not . . . sufficient warrant to justify this court
to proceed in a cause of equky, and therefore by the
-race of God, I, as Chief Justice of this Province, shall
not pay any obedience to them in that point."

Governor Cosby learned about Morris' verdict in
N[ew Jersey, and promptly sent him a vkriolic letter
acusing him of lack of integrky and demanding a copy


PETER ZENGER [I27]


remarks in court. With the copy of his speech, :he
ustice enclosed a letter that read in part:

"As to my integrity, I have given you no occasion to
call it in question. I have been in this office almost
twenty years, my hands were never fouled with a britz>e;
nor am I conscious to myself that Power or Pover7 ty
hath been able to induce me to be partial in the faro. ur
of either of them, and as I have no reason to expect amy
favour from you so am I neither afraid or ashamed to
stand the test of the strictest inquiry you can make com-cerning
my conduct. I have served the public fait-fully
and honestly, according to the best of my knove-1-edge;
and I have and do appeal to them for my iustific-tion."

There was only one way for any man in the Colonie ,
even such an important one as Chief Justice Morris, t7o
appeal to the public for iustification. He gave a secon t
copy of his speech in court to a young German-borxx
printer named John Peter Zenger, so it could be printel
in quantity and distributed widely.

Up until now, this drama of local politics has beem
confined to a cast of eight characters: on one side, thc
arrogant Governor William Cosby, Attorney General
Richard Bradley, the iudges, De Lancey and Philipse; ira
opposition to their policies were Chief Justice Lewi
Morris, the stubborn Dutchman, Rip Van Dam, the twc
young lawyers, James Alexander and William Smith.

All eight of these men were well-to-do and prominent.
Ironically, they would mostly be forgotten were it nol:
for this Peter Zenger, a poor printer with no social
position at all, who spoke English haltingly and wrote it
with difficulty, who worked as hard as any Negro slave
to provide for his wife and children.


[28] Seven Famous Trials in History


No one ever bothered to make a portrait of Peter
Zenger, which is a shame. Only a few facts are known
of his early life.

The Zenger family set sail for America in 7 o, when
Peter was thirteen. They were German refugees from
the lower Palatinate on the Rhine, who, like thous2nds
of others, had been driven from their homes by the
French. The English Government advanced money to
pay passage to the Colonies for these unfortunntes,
which they were obligated to pay back from future
earnings.

The long and stormy crossing took six to seven weeks.
Passengers were crowded below decks in the dark and
unpleasant hold. To add to their misery, a typhus epi-demic
broke out. (Robert Hunter, then New York
governor, reported that some four hundred and fifty of
the refugees en route for America died in a single
month.) It is believed that Peter Zenger's father was
among the casualties. His widow, Hannah Zenger, Petcr,
and a younger brother and sister landed safely at the
port of New York.

Most of the Palatinates were employed in the pine
forests up the Hudson, in a project to produce tar ald
turpentine for British ships. The Zenger family might
have gone to one of these river communities had Peter's
father lived, but the work there was not for women or
children. It is probable that Hannah Zenger found a
position as a household servant in New York and kept
her two youngest with her.

It is known that on October 26, 7o, she signed a
paper apprenticing her oldest son Peter to the New York
printer, William Bradford. By this legal agreement, Petcr
had to work as Bradford's servant and shop assistant for


PETER ZEN'GER [29]


eight years. He received board and food but no wages and
he learned the printing trade. So far as is known, he was
treated as a member of the Bradford family and was
neither overworked nor underfed. Such apprenticeships
were common for youths of poor families who wanted to
learn a trade. While Zenger was working for Bradford,
another colonial boy named Benjamin Franklin was serv-ing
as an apprentice to his brother James in a Boston print-ing
shop.

William Bradford was then the only printer in New
York. Previously he had been Pennsylvania's first printer,
having settled in Philadelplfia after coming from Eng-land
in x685. The first thing off his press was an accurate
copy of William Penn's Pennsylvania Charter. Certain
pronfinent Philadelphians who had distorted the charter
for their personal benefit raised such a stir that Bradford
was summoned before the Governor and the City Coun-cil
and put under a five-hundred-dollar bond. Three
years after this episode he published a pamphlet that
offended the Society of Friends. His press was seized
and he was taken to court, but because the jury disa-greed
he was released. By this time he had had enough of
Philadelphia politics and moved to New York. For the
rest of his life, his motto was prudence.

In New York Bradford printed almanacs and religious
works in English, Dutch, and French, as well as official
reports and paper money for the government, and in

75 he issued a prayer book in the Mohawk Indian
!angtage. Possibly young Peter helped him set type on
t. None of this output could have provided much enter-tainment--there
were no novels or poetry or humorM

he was not there to be amused but to learn.

He was twenty-one when his long apprenticeship


[3o] Seven Famous Trials in History


ended, and he left New York at once, possibly to satis pounds
a long-suppressed desire to see more of his adoptel
country. In Chestertown, Maryland, he set up his OWn
printing shop and got married. His young wife died
after giving birth to a boy named John, but he stayed
on and within two years had become official printer for
the entire Province of Maryland. On October 27, X72o,
Zenger applied for his naturalization papers; he Was
granted citizenship nearly three years later, on July 6,
x723.

In the meantime he had returned with his small son to
New York to work as a journeyman for his forrner
patron, William Bradford. He may have been in the
shop the day that seventeen-year-old Benjamin Franldin,
having quit his brother's printing shop in Boston, wan-dered
in and asked for a job. Bradford turned him down,
advising him to go to Philadelphia, where Franklin be-came
that city's most famous citizen.

Soon after his return to New York, Peter Zenger
married a second time. His bride, Anna Catherine Mau-lin,
was an attractive, intelligent young woman of a
good family. She helped him in the shop and kept house
as well. Everything indicates that the two loved each
other deeply and that their marriage was a happy one.

Anna Zenger is known today as the "mother of Sun-day
schools." In her time, children went to church with
their elders, squirming and fidgeting on hard benches as
the preacher delivered a sermon that might last several
hours. Anna suffered with them and for them. Cn-vinced
that this grueling ordeal did nothing for their
souls or their minds, she persuaded the parents to let her
hold Sunday classes where she taught boys and girls


Bible stories in simple language. This was the beginning
of the institution of Sunday schools.

In 1725, William Bradford made Peter Zenger his
partner and in the same year started New York's first
newspaper, the Gazette. It was a dull paper devoted al-most
entirely to legal notices and government adver-tising,
devoid of current events or human interest. Nat-urally
it mirrored the view of the British Crown and the
English officials, causing someone to say it was a paper
for "those who had," not for "those who had not."

It is indicative of Zenger's disinterest in this sheet that
he stayed with Bradford only a year longer. Their
partnership was disbanded after they produced one book
together. In I726, no doubt with Anna's encourage-ment,
Zenger set up his own printing shop on Smith
Street (now William Street), which was then in the
heart of New York City.

Sixteen years had passed since he had disembarked at
the port of New York, a frightened, shabby lad who
knew not a word of English. Now, at twenty-nine, he
was the head of his own business, a married man with
two children, his first-born, John, and another boy born
in 1725 named Pieter. (Four more were added to his
family in the next years: Nicolas, in i727; Elizabeth,
the following year; Evert, in i732, and the sixth,
Frederick, in 1734.) With no proof to the contrary, one
can imagine him as a big blond young man, good-hu-mored,
slow to anger and hardworking, hands stained
with printer's ink, who except on Sundays rarely ap-peared
without the leather apron of his trade.

While Bradford held a monopoly on government
printing, there was plenty of other work, less profitable,


[ I 3 z ] Seven Famous Trials in History


to be sure, for a good printer in this thriving community.
He did Dutch religious tracts, in i73o printed New
York's first arithmetic book, called Vanema's Aritbe-tica,
and a variety of miscellaneous jobs. Even so, it was
not easy to feed and buy shoes for his growing family.

Through a friend he learned to play the organ. Wlen
he had become sufficiently Eood at it, the Old Dutch
Church offered to pay him twelve pounds a year to
play at Sunday services. It Seemed a stroke of lucl at
the time, but months passed without a mention of money.
Had the church elders forgotten him? How can one
submit a bill to a church witlout seeming to lack pie?
One day Zenger drew up a solemn petkion, requesting
that the church authorities permit him to take up a col-lection
from the congregaticn for his back salary. The
petition may have been presented humorously but it
shamed the elders into payin[g him. Peter Zenger was an
honest man, and he expected others, no matter bow
highly placed, to be honest with him.

In the absence of a people's press, whenever anyone
had something important to .,ay, he had to get it priCted
himself. Sometimes Zenger X.vas asked to print political
tracts that the prudent Bradford declined to handle be-cause
of their controversial nature. From these tracts
and from talking to the mea who wrote them, ZeCger
became aware of the existerce of injustice even in this
country that had been so kinc to him.

There was the sad situatr:ion of his fellow German
Palatine refugees, for exarrple, the families who had
come to America at the same time as he and been set to
work along the Hudson in the English-sponsored tar-making
project. The proje:t had collapsed because the
pines of that region proved unsuitable for the produc

PETER ZEITGER [x33]


don of tar in large quantities, and misery had struck the
river communities. Rather than providing them a more
profitable way to earn a living, the English had comman-deered
their men for an expedition against Canada, leav-ing
women and children to face starvation or servitude.
Some families became so desperate they turned to the
Indians for help. The Indians gave them permission to
settle at Schoharie, where many went, in defiance of a
British order forbidding them to do so.

It was wrong, very wrong, to bring helpless people to
the Colonies and then treat them like cattle. Zenger
might not have much education, but he knew what was
right. It was not by accident that Chief Justice Lewis
Morris asked him to print his speech about the illegal
"court of equity." Zenger already had a reputation as a
man who was not afraid to take the side of truth.

That, by publicizing this speech, Morris would fur-ther
incur Governor Cosby's displeasure was a foregone
conclusion. To the Duke of Newcastle, on May 3, x733,
Cosby sent a bitter letter:

"Things are now gone that length that I must either
discipline Morris or suffer myself to be affronted, or,
what is still vorse, see the King's authority trampled on
and disrespect and irreverence to it taught from the
Bench .... "

In August, four months later, he summarily dismissed
Morris as chief justice, a post he had held so long and
faithfully, and commissioned James De Lancey in his
place. Frederick Philipse automatically became second
justice. Thus, instead of three justices, the Supreme Court
of New York now had but two, both supporters of
Governor Cosby.

It was hardly a year since Governor Cosby had as

[I34] Seven Famous Trials in History


sumed his post in New York, and the Black Horse
Tavern was buzzing with a list of his misdeeds, over and
above his dismissal of Lewis Morris and his wretched
attempt to dupe Rip Van Dam of his salary. On a trip to
Albany, Cosby had destroyed a deed made with the
Mohawk Indians to protect them against the rapid set-tling
of their country, solely so he might receive a fee
when a new grant was executed. There were several
other instances when he had granted lands to settlers
only on the condition that a third of the grant be re-served
for his personal use. The man the friendly New
Yorkers had first called generous had turned out to be
greedier than any of his predecessors. There were rum-blings
in the tavern that no caution would still.

A new political organization sprang into being. It was
called the Popular Party and was made up of men whose
indignation was aroused by Cosby's highhanded meth-ods.
The Popularists persuaded Lewis Morris to bring
his case to the people by standing for election as West-chester
representative of the General Assembly. The
election was scheduled to be held at Eastchester Green
in October, i733. As was the custom, Nicolas Cooper,
the High Sheriff of Westchester County, placed posters
on the church and at other public places, announcing the
day and place. The posters omitted to give the time of
the election, however, an oversight that aroused suspi-cion
among the Popular Party membership.

Some fifty of them showed up on Eastchester Green
at midnight the night before the election and kept watch
all night long. Others met in New York and headed on
horseback toward New Rochelle, stopping at various
houses along the way to enjoy bountiful repasts pre-pared
for them in advance and to collect new recruits.


PETER ZENGER [I35]


By the time they reached the house of one William
LeCount of New Rochelle, their number had so snow-balled
there was not room for them inside. They built a

· large fire in the street and sat around it till dawn.

The next morning a parade of some three hundred

horsemen verged on Eastchester Green. At the head of
it were two trumpeters and three violin players, fol-lowed
by four voters, each carrying a banner embroid-ered
in gold with "King George" on one side and
"Liberty and Law" on the other. The candidate, Lewis
Morris, rode next, and behind him, the rest of the horse-men.
Never had so many showed up to vote for one
assemblyman since the country was settled.

At Eastchester Green, the fifty men who had been on
guard all night scrambled to their feet, jumped on their
horses, and joined the others. With horns blasting, they
rode three times around the green, then dispersed to
nearby taverns for a hearty breakfast.

The opposition did not appear until about eleven that
morning--Governor Cosby's choice as candidate, a
schoolteacher named William Forster who had paid
Cosby some four hundred dollars for the nomination,
escorted by the two judges, De Lancey and Philipse, and
a mere hundred and seventy horsemen. At high noon ·
Sheriff Cooper galloped up on a handsome horse with a

splendid saddle trimmed with scarlet and silver.
The election could now begin and the sheriff read
His Majesty's Writ, showing he had the right to conduct
it. He needed only a glance to see that Morris' three
hundred and fifty supporters, to which were now
added thirty-seven somberly clad Quakers, could out-Vote
Forster's party. But though an oral vote was con-sidered
sufficient unless there was some doubt about the


[I36] Seven Famous Trials in History


outcome, the sheriff insisted on a written poll. There
was a two-hour delay to get the ballot boxes ready. The
voting was not secret and each man announced his
choice as he approached the table where the sheriff sat.

When it came the turn of the Quakers, the first stated
he was voting for Lewis Morris.

"Do you have property?" the sheriff asked him. In
colonial New York, a man had to have property to
have the right to vote.

"I do," the Quaker said.

The sheriff ordered him to swear on the Bible that
this was true. The Quaker explained that taking an oath
on the Bible was forbidden by his religion but that he
would gladly take a solemn affirmation as to the truth
of his statement, a practice legally accepted in both
England and America for those of his faith. Sheriff
Cooper, who was a law unto himself, disqualified him,
as well as all the other thirty-seven Quakers.

In the end it made no difference. Lewis Morris won
by a large majority. The cheers that broke out could be
heard all over Eastchester.

It is believed that Peter Zenger was present at the
election, and though he could not vote, since he was
not a property owner, that he took notes on everything
that went on. A full account of the election, including
the illegal ban on Quaker votes, appeared in the first
issue of a new newspaper called the Weekly Journal on
November 5, I733.

The Journal, like Bradford's Gazette, was a small
paper, folded to make four pages printed in double
columns, each page about eight by twelve inches. It
offered "subscriptions at three shillings per quarter and
advertisements at three shillings the first week and one


PETER Z E T GER [137]


shilling every week thereafter." Only one name appeared
on the masthead: "Peter Zenger, Printer." It was the
first newspaper in the American colonies to expose cor-ruption
of English rule.

It must be admitted that the Journal was not planned
by Zenger alone. Back of it were Lewis Morris; his son,
Lewis Morris, Jr.; the lawyers James Alexander and
William Smith; Cadwalader Colden, a prominent New
York scholar and politician; and perhaps Rip Van Dam.
These men, who for political reasons did not want their
names used, wrote most of the Journal's articles and
editorials. James Alexander apparently served as editor-in-chief.
But it was Zenger who did the printing--and
took full responsibility for it.

The appearance of the Journal was a major event in
New York. Whereas few bothered to read Bradford's
pedantic Gazette, everybody bought the Journal and
everybody talked about it. It was a medley of witticisms,
satire, lampoons, squibs, ballads--the latter thought to
be written by Zenger--and some extremely well-written
political articles. In its second issue it defended the
liberty of the press: "The Liberty of the Press is a Sub-ject
of the greatest Importance and in which every
Individual is as much concern'd as he is in any other Part
of Liberty."

Most of all, it campaigned against Governor Cosby
and his policies, in pieces signed noncommittally "Cato"
or "Philo Patriae" or "Thomas Standby."

In successive issues the Governor was accused of vot-ing
as a member of the Council during its legislative
sessions, of demanding that Assembly bills be presented
to him before the Council saw them, of adjourning the
in his own name instead of the King's--all in


[38] Seven Famous Trials in History


violation of the rules by which a governor was bound--and
of other crimes against the people. "A Governor
turned rogue, does a thousand things for which a small
rogue would have deserved a halter .... "read one
editorial. "A Governor does all he can to chain you, and
it being difficult to prevent him, it is prudent in you
(in order to keep out of prison) to help him put the
chains on and to rivet them fast."

As the Journal continued to appear, week after week,
Cosby's cries of pain crossed the ocean. "A press sup-ported
by him [Alexander] and his party," he wrote,
"has begun to swarm with the most virulent libels.
· . . They [Van Dam and Alexander] are so implaca-ble
in their malice that I am to look for all the insolent,
false and scandalous aspersions that such bold and profli-gate
wretches can invent." But though he knew who
stood behind the Journal, he had no way of proving it.

Bradford's Gazette was assigned a new editor--a spe-cial
friend of Governor Cosby named Francis Harison.
Harison was a cocky little man who had been whee-dling
easy jobs for himself for about twenty years. In
turn he had been governor's council, recorder of the
City of New York, and judge of the admiralty. Once
when he was assigned to settle a boundary dispute be-tween
New York and Connecticut, Harison learned that
some fifty thousand acres were to be turned over to New
York and wrote friends in London, advising them to
snap them up before the colonists could get them. The
trouble was he gave his friends the wrong acreage, as
they learned to their sorrow when they tried to get
land grants. This incident brought Harison a reputation
for both underhand dealings and stupidity.

With Harison on the editorial staff, the Gazette


VETv.t ZEt [I39]


launched into flowery prose. It spoke of the "harmoney
and good understanding between the several branches of
the legislature--whereby nothing came to be demanded
on one side but what was for the public general good
and welfare of His Majesty's people," and of "all those
blessings which we enjoy under a government greatly
envied." Sometimes it blossomed into verse:


"Cosby, the mild, the happy, good and great
The strongest guard of our little state..."


For a while the Gazette ignored the Journal, as if
stony silence could force its rival out of existence. In
contrast, the Journal had a good deal of fun at the ex-pense
of Bradford's sheet. One mock advertisement was
obviously directed to Francis Harison:

"A large spaniel of about five foot five inches high
has lately strayed from his kennel with his mouth full of
fulsome panegyrics, and in his ramble dropped them in
the New' York Gazette. When a puppy he was marked
(FH), and a cross in the middle of his forehead;
the mark being worn out, he has taken upon him in a
manner to abuse mankind by imposing a
many gross falsehoods on them. Whoever will
strip the said panegyrics of their fulsomeness and send
the beast back to his kennel, shall have the thanks of all
honest men, and all reasonable charges."

The "spaniel" endured the barbs of ridicule just so
long and then lashed back in the Gazette:

"Supposing another should turn the tables upon the
authors of these infamous and fictitious advertisements,
how easily might it be done? The real or imagined de-fects
of the AMSTERDAM CRANE, the CONNECTICUT MAS

[I4O] Seven Famous Trials in History


TIFF PHILLIP BABOON SENIOR PHILLIP BABOON JUNIOR,
the SCY. THIAN UNICORN and WILD PETER FROM THE BANKs

oF Tm; amNl; might be enlarged upon, and placed in a
most ludicrous light."

This example of Harison's poor wit is worth quoting
only because it identifies the backers of the Journal. Rip
Van Dam was the "Amsterdam Crane. The "Connecti-cut
Mastiff" was lawyer William Smith; "Phillip Bab,on
Senior and Junior" were Lewis Morris, father and
The "Scythian Unicorn" was apparently James
an&r, though no one knows why, while "Wild Peter
from the Banks of the Rhine" was, of course, the
hal's printer.

In the war between the two papers, the lournal had
even greater advantage than its humor and
writing. Peter Zenger and his supporters were all known
to be honorable men, with no black marks on their rec-ord.
Governor Cosby and Francis Harison could
compete in this respect, and everyone knew it. Copies:
the ]ournal reached England, with the resuk that Par!la-ment
warned Cosby to watch his step. In New York, thc
proud Governor sensed that his colonial subiects, who
should have given him loyalty and respect, were laugh-ing
at him behind his back. It was an unbearable situa-tion,
and he vowed to have revenge.

To silence the troublemakers, the Governor ordered
Chief Justice De Lancey to get a grand iury indictment
against the Journal on the ground of libel. De Lanccy
made the attempt twice but failed both times. The
jurors claimed that since the editors did not sign their
names, there was no one to indict.

Finally, in October, 1734, De Lancey, under orders of


PETER ZEIGER [I4I]


the Governor, brought an indictment to the grand jury
against Peter Zenger, specifying that "certain low bal-lads''
in the Journal were libelous. "Sometimes heavy,
half-witted men get a knack of rhyming," said De
Lancey loftily, "but k is time to break them of it when
they grow abusive and insolent and nuschevous wth .

In the name of "His Majesty's Council" Cosby re-leased
an order that four of the most offensive issues of
the Journal be "burnt by the hands of the common hang-man,
or whipper, near the pillory." The mayor and other
city magistrates were instructed to witness the burning.
Again he met with frustration. The court refused to ac-cept
the order, the aldermen protested it as arbitrary
and illegal, and the magistrates forbade anyone within
their authority, including the hangman, to have anything
to do with it. Nearly all copies of the condemned issues
disappeared. At the hour of the scheduled burning citi-zens
stayed indoors and the streets of New York
were empty. Only Francis Harison was there to super-vise,
and in place of the hangman, Harison's Negro
slave set the tiny blaze. At the Black Horse Tavern and
elsewhere in the city, people laughed at Cosby's folly.

The popularity of the Journal could not alter the fact
that Cosby was still governor, lashed firmly to his posi-tion
by the Crown appointment. Sometime in x734,
Lewis Morris sailed to London to try and get him re-called.
He failed because there were too many impor-tant
people in England who wanted Cosby to stay safely
on the other side of the ocean. To James Alexander,
Morris wrote:

"Everybody here agrees in a contemptible opinion of
Cosby . . . and it may be you will be surprised to hear


[x42] Seven Famous Trials in History


	that the most nefarious crime a Governor can commit is

	not by some counted so bad as the crime of complaining

of it 	"

Possibly
it was in England that Morris learned what happened
in Minorca while Cosby was governor there.
By his greed and his arrogance, he had also exasperated
the Minorcans, and they, too, had repeatedly and vainly
tried to get him recalled. Eventually he overstepped
himself. At a time when England and Spain were at
peace, Cosby seized the cargo of a Spanish merchant
ship, had it sold at auction, and took the proceeds for
himself. In spke of the fact that his act might have
caused the outbreak of a new war, all that happened to
him was that he was ordered to reimburse the Spaniards
and called home. His high-placed friends in England
forestalled any formal reprimand. By granting him the
governorship of New York, Parliament apparently felt
they were rid of him at last.

While Lewis Morris continued his fruitless campaign
in England, Cosby in New York decided on the drastic
step of arresting Peter Zenger.

"It is ordered," read the warrant, "that the sheriff for
the City of New York do forthwith take and apprehend
John Peter Zenger for printing and publishing several
seditious libels dispersed throughout his journals or
newspapers, entitled The New York Weekly Journal; as
having in them many things tending to raise factions and
tumults among the people of this Province, inflamit*g
their minds with contempt of His Majesty's govern-ment,
and greatly disturbing the peace thereof. And
upon his taking the said John Peter Zenger, to commit
him to the prison or common jail of the said city and
county."


PWTZR Z;NR [x43]


Peter Zenger was taken into custody on November

7, 734, and held in the jail on the third floor of New
York's City Hall (now Federal Hall, at the corner of
Wall and Nassau Streets, where the John Peter Zenger
Museum is open to the public). He was forbidden to
see his wife, children, friends, or lawyers, and refused
pen, ink, and paper. The Journal was scheduled for the
next day. It missed its publication date for the only time
in its existence.

The following Wednesday, when the prisoner was
brought before Chief Justice De Lancey, he complained
vociferously about the harsh treatment he had received.
After that he was permitted to speak to his wife Anna
and other visitors through a small opening in his cel.l
door and allowed to have writing materials. On No-vember
9 the Journal appeared on schedule; it told the
story of his arrest and imprisonment. His remarkable
wife had calmly taken over the printing end of the
paper, setting the type and running the press, with the
aid of a journeyman and her sons. Throughout her hus-band's
imprisonment she continued to see that their pa-per
appeared on time each week--the first American
woman to run a newspaper. It is believed that during
this period she even wrote some of the articles and edi-torials.

Anna undoubtedly would have claimed that any other
Woman in her position would have done the same.
Though the women of New York had very likely never
Ieard the word "emancipation," on many occasions they
had shown they could do a man's work. It was not un-COmmon
for widows to carry on their husbands' busi-nesses
efficiently. One woman ran a thriving blacksmith
after her husband's death. Another acted as her hus

[44] Seven Famous Trials in History


band's attorney while he was in Europe getting cus-tomers
for his foreign trade. Margaret Filipse, an
eighteenth-century "career woman," owned a number
of ships that she sent out regularly to foreign ports.
Women frequently went into the wilderness to make
trade agreements with the Indians; they had a special
talent for Indian languages and the Indians often pre-ferred
dealing with "white squaws" rather than their
men. James Alexander's wife, on her own, ran a store
and amassed a considerable fortune.

In prison, Peter Zenger was being questioned night
and day. Who was the editor of the Journal? Who wrote
the copy? Who financed it? The printer stubbornly re-fused
to give his captors any satisfaction. The Joural
was all his, he said. He was responsible for everything
in it.

With feigned pity, the Gazette commented on "the
pretended patriots of our days . . . who are so tenacious
of their own [safety] as to neglect that of their poor
printer." For once Bradford's paper was on the side of
truth. No one of the Journal's true editors and writers
stepped forward to go to prison in Zenger's place, al-though
James Alexander and William Smith did volun-teer
their services as his counsel.

On a writ of habeas corpus, Zenger was brought be-fore
Chief Justice De Lancey. Alexander and Smith de-manded
that a reasonable bail be set for him. In re-sponse
to De Lancey's questioning, Zenger swore he was
worth no more than forty pounds, excepting the tools
of his trade and his clothes. The court promptly set bail
at four hundred pounds. Over the protests of his law-yers
that no man should be asked for a bail ten times
his fortune, he was taken back to prison. There is no


explanation as to why some of his backers, several of
whom were quite wealthy, did not pay his bail for him.

His case was brought to the grand jury. They found
no valid charge against him, but he was still not re-leased.
On January 28, 735, after he had spent two
months in prison, Attorney General Richard Bradley
filed a charge against him of "false, scandalous, malicious
and seditious libels." Since the court term had just been
terminated, nothing more could be done until the new
court term three months later.

When the term opened on April tS, Alexander and
Smith promptly petkioned to contest the proceedings.
Their petition was denied. Chief Justice De Lancey fur-ther
accused them of contempt and disbarred them from
legal practice in New York! Disconsolately, the two
men consuked with their client. They could no longer
act for him, at least openly. He must petition the court
to appoint a new lawyer as his counsel.

The court's choice was a fashionable society lawyer
named John Chambers, competent but not brilliant. It
was too much to hope that he would risk offending
Cosby and the chief justice by putting up a strong de-fense.
Actually, he tried harder than anyone expected
him to.

By law, Peter Zenger's case had to be tried by a
"struck jury." This meant that the clerk of the court
should, in the presence of wknesses, "strike off" the
names of the jurymen from the Freeholders Book. (A
freeholder was a property-owning ckizen wkh the right
to vote.) The list the clerk produced obviously had not
come from the Freeholders Book. There were non-property
owners on it who had no legal right to serve on
a jury. Several of the names suggested were men de

[ 46] Seven Famous Trials in History


pendent on Governor Cosby's bounty--his baker, tailor,
shoemaker, and candlemaker.

To the surprise of Zenger's friends, John Chambers
found the courage to protest this flagrant infraction of
legal practice. Judge De Lancey, with every evidence
of sincerity, claimed he had no idea how the "error" had
occurred and ordered a proper jury "struck off."

The twelve men selected on that jury deserve to be
mentioned by name: Thomas Hunt (the jury foreman),
Harmanus Rutgers, Stanley Holmes, Edward Man,
John Bell, Samuel Weaver, Andries Marschalk, Egbert
van Borsom, Benjamin Hildreth, Abraham Keteltas,
John Goelet, and Hercules Wendover.

For nearly nine months the defendant had been held
in jail. The Journal, which over this period was filled
with editorials on justice and on freedom of the press
and attacks on Governor Cosby's unscrupulous methods,
omitted all mention of the sufferings of ks printer. One
can guess, from contemporary descriptions, that his cell
was sweltering in the summer and wretchedly cold as
winter approached, that prison fare was miserable, and
that Zenger survived it only by grace of the food
Anna smuggled to him. His confinement must certaily
have left him emaciated and haggard, but that he still re-fused
to name his editors is proof that his morale re-mained
unshaken.

On August 4, x735, the German printer who held no
sacrifice too great for the cause in which he believed,
was brought to trial. Chief Justice James De Lancey and
his associate justice, Frederick Philipse, presided. Attor-ney
General Richard Bradley was prosecutor for the
"court of the King." The jury was sworn in.

The court-appointed lawyer, John Chambers, pfc

sented Zenger's Cae, basing his plea oa the

that the Journal Prxte,- hould not be held rest°,la

	' J o
	CtlUx'4


for the aer's edio ·
	· He did the best

	p P
	a[ ohcy.

under the ckcumsaces but that the prisoner

fod guiltseemd foreordaed.

	ne was nnishin h: 	cch
when an elderly '
o

TM gendp , Seated in the rear 0f the
c?, rose and waive slowly and
with some d
culq


e aisle
toward th
	,,	.	ff d
	May r please
vur Honor," he
said in a stI

the
resouhdin
vmce, ,,	this
caus

	I a COBCCrt
u
part f Mr. Zenge
, the de/chad .	sed and
' ' ' nt"

Tis courtly Stranger' who was elegantly
dr.4omed
wore a ma¢ficeht ;ig, had
the ak of one acCe
out-to C
mmand resp}ct
'
He
was Andrew
Hamdton, }
phila-
	s

g
ing lawyer .In all the Colonies and on
(of
the

	}e
Pm's
m°s(&tm
mshed citens,
a mem
e(hlv' an
	renqsvlvania Uoh cuo		e Phfladel
		.o
	'	hid Asse
	. a	n .ndth	P	' te

	architect as well a
. · -- of
the pennsvlva0
	,,
	.	.
u designer
	olo
	nOUe, whmh m the
not-too-distant furore
	co¢? knw a?Independenc
e
Hall."	, he had
	-
ougn mgntears old
and
in feeble
healtJ

,xander
	o to New Yr'k at the request
of James YTess 0f
	to 2fend
Peter e-	- - freedom of the
	aB
- -.	uger aba mc	. none
	2
he achmveents of his
illustrious
careVffe

s
e
of

	W
°

ld
brin

hi


,
..
c

than
his
d

	this

,
more
msung
*

	poor
and
oosc

re
'
er
"I
-

	t

,.
	print
·
	..<
	oo

	(f

s
first

tate

ent
took
the
court
by
y
rpr,
.
d
pub
	li

kb

my
chent)
Confess
that
he
both
pnnted
)}

ation

	°
}

d
the

o
he

s

a.ers
set
forth
in
the

nl

}re
d
no

	.hd
I
hop
that
in
so
doing
he
has
corn&


h;
court
had
subpoenaed
Zenger'S
journey
man
and


[ 48] Seven Famous Trials in History


two of his sons to testify that Zenger had printed two
issues of the Journal labeled "libelous." In view of Ham-iiton's
admission, the prosecuting attorney, Bradley,
moved for the dismissal of these witnesses, as their tes-timony
was now unnecessary. Hamilton affably agreed:

"If you brought them here only to prove the printing
and publishing of these newspapers, we have acknowl-edged
that, and shall abide by it."

With this acknowledgment, Bradley--too quickly--assumed
that the case was closed and that there was
nothing more to be said: "Indeed, sir," he addressed Jus-tice
De Lancey, "as Mr. Hamilton has confessed the
printing and publishing of these libels, I think the jury
must find a verdict for the King .... "

"Not so, Mr. Attorney," Hamilton interrupted him.
"There are two words to that bargain. I hope it is not
our bare printing and publishing a paper that will make
it a libel. You will have something more to do before
you make my client a libeler. For the words themselves
must be libelous--that is false, scandalous, and seditious
--or else we are not guilty."

A libel could not be so called unless it was false. That
was the basis of Hamilton's defense. Anything that was
true could not be called a libel--by the attorney's own
words, "scandalous, seditious, and false." To substantiate
his claim, Hamilton quoted from English law to show
precedent where men accused of libel had been allowed
to defend themselves on the grounds that what they hd
written was true.

Prosecuting Attorney Bradley continued to argue that
whether the person defamed was a private individual
or a public figure, living or dead, whether the libel xvas
true or false, it was nevertheless a libel. There was ab

PETER ZElqGER [X49]


solutely nothing to be said in defense of a man who had
so "notoriously scandahzed" the Governor and the prin-cipal
magistrates and officers of the government. If these
two newspapers were not libelous, he did not know
what a libel was ....

While he blustered on, Hamilton waited patiently.
Then, in measured tones, he addressed the bench: "May
it please Your Honor, I agree with Mr. Attorney that
government is a sacred thing, but I differ widely from
him when he would insinuate that the just complaints
of a number of men who suffer under a bad adminis-tration
is libeling that administration. Had I believed that
to be law, I should not have given the Court the trouble
of hearing anything that I could say in this cause ....

"No, the falsehood makes the scandal, and both make
the libel. And to show the Court that I am in good
earnest, and to save the Court's time and Mr. Attorney's
trouble, I will agree that if he can prove the facts
charged upon us to be false, I shall own them to be
scandalous, seditious, and a libel. So the work seems
now to be pretty much shortened, and Mr. Attorney
has now only to prove the words false in order to make
us guilty."

"We have nothing to prove," the prosecuting attor-ney
burst out angrily. "You have confessed the printing
and publishing." By his shouting, he no doubt hoped to
distract the jury from the simple fact that there was no
one who could disprove the ]ournal's accusations against
the Governor and his associates. Indeed, he knew very
well it was impossible to do so.

"If a libel is understood in the large and unlimited
sense urged by Mr. Attorney," continued Hamilton, un-disturbed,
"there is scarce a writing I know that may


[xSo] Seven Famous Trials in History


not be called a Libel, or scarce a person safe from being
called to an account as a libeler. For Moses, meek as he
was, libeled Cain; and who is it that has not libeled the
Devil? . . ."

He turned to the jury: "Gentlemen: The danger is
great in proportion to the mischief that may happen
through our too great credulity. A proper confidence in
a court is commendable, but as the verdict (whatever it
is) will be yours, you ought to refer no part of your
duty to the discretion of other persons. If you should be
of the opinion that there is no falsehood in Mr. Zenger's
papers, you will, nay (pardon me for the expression)
you ought, to say so--becanse you do not know
whether others (I mean the Court) may be of that opin-ion.
It is your right to do so, and there is much depend-Lng
upon your resolution as well as upon your integrity.

"The loss of liberty, to a generous mind, is worse
than death. And yet we know that there have been
those in all ages who, for the sake of preferment, or
some imaginary honor, have freely lent a helping hand
to oppress, nay to destroy, their country.

"This brings to my mind that saying of the immortal
Bntus when he looked upon the creatures of Caesar,
who were very great men but by no means good nen.
'You Romans,' said Brutus, 'if yet I may call you so,
consider what you are doing. Remember that you are
assisting Caesar to forge those very chains that one day
he will make you yourselves wear.'

"Power may justly be compared to a great river," he
continued. "While kept within its due bounds it is both
beautiful and useful. But when it overflows its banks, it
is then too impetuous to b stemmed; it bears down


before it, and brings destruction and desolation
wherever it comes. If, then, this is the nature of power,
let us at least do our duty, and like wise men (who value
freedom) use our utmost care to support liberty, the
only bulwark against lawless power, which in all ages
has sacrificed to its wild lust and boundless ambition

blood of the best men that ever lived.

the"I hope to be pardoned, Sir, for my zeal upon this oc-casion.
It is an old and wise caution that when our
neighbor's house is on fire we ought to take care of our
own. For though (blessed be God) I live in a govern-ment
where liberty is well understood and freely en-joyed,
yet experience has shown us all (I am sure it has
to me) that a bad precedent in one government is soon
set up for an authority in another. And therefore I can-not
but think it my, and every honest man's, duty that
(while we pay all due obedience to men in authority)
we ought at the same time to be upon our guard against
power wherever we apprehend that it may affect our-selves
or our fellow subiects.

"I am truly very unequal to such an undertaking on
many accounts. You see that I labor under the weight of
many years, and am bowed down with great infirmities
of body. Yet, old and weak as I am, I should think it my
duty, if required, to go to the utmost part of the land
where my services could be of any use in assisting to
quench the flame of prosecutions upon informations, set
on foot by the government to deprive a people of the
right of remonstrating (and complaining too) of the
arbitrary attempts of men in power.

"Men who iniure and oppress the people under their
administration provoke them to cry out and complain,


[I52] Seven Famous Trials in History


and then make that very complaint the foundation for
new oppressions and prosecutions. I wish I could say that
there were no instances of this kind."

From a mere case of libel, Andrew Hamilton, with
his eloquence, had transformed the trial of Peter Zenger
to a defense of the rights of free men everywhere. Now
he was ready to conclude.

"The question before the Court and you, Gentlemen
of the Jury, is not of small or private concern. It is not
the cause of one poor printer, nor of New York alone,
which you are now trying. No! It may in. its conse-quence
affect every free man that lives under a British
government on the main of America. It is the best cause.
It is the cause of liberty. And I make no doubt but
your upright conduct this day will not only entitle you
to the love and esteem of your fellow citizens, but every
man who prefers freedom to a life of slavery will bless
and honor you as men who have baffled the attempt of
tyranny, and by an impartial and uncorrupt verdict
have laid a noble foundation for securing to ourselves,
our posterity, and our neighbors, that to which nature
and the laws of our country have given us a right--the
liberty of both exposing and opposing arbitrary power
(in these parts of the world at least) by speaking and
writing truth."

Attorney Bradley, in his closing comments, "observed
that Mr. Hamilton had gone very much out of the way,
and had made himself and the people very merry," but
insisted once more that since the printing and pub-lishing
of the paper had been admitted, the jury had no
choice but to vote the defendant guilty. Justice De Lan-cey
warned the jurors that regardless of Hamilton's sug-gestions
to the contrary, their task was simply to de

VETER ZE!qGER [x53]


termine if the words in the information were libelous;
the law was to be left to the court.

The jury felt otherwise. They were out of the court-room
a bare ten minutes. When they returned, Thomas

Hunt, as their foreman, announced their verdict:

"Not guilty."

"Huzzahs and cheers," as Peter Zenger wrote later,
broke out in the crowded courtroom.

That evening the victory was celebrated by a dinner
in honor of Andrew Hamilton at the Black Horse Tav-ern.
Conspicuously absent from this happy affair was
Hamilton's client, Peter Zenger. Although he was
technically free, he had been taken back to his cell until
the next day--when friends arrived with the funds to
pay for his keep during the eight and a half months he
had been in custody!

He bore no grudge at being omitted from the celebra-tion
and later wrote Hamilton a warm note of gratitude.

Hamilton left New York the next day to return to
Philadelphia. As he departed he was saluted by the guns
of several ships in the harbor--as a public testimony of
lhe glorious defense he had made in the cause of liberty
the province. Some five weeks later the Common
l(2ouncil of the City of New York voted to present Ham
lllton
with the freedom of the corporation in honor of his
"learned and generous defense of the Rights of Mankind
and the Liberty of the Press." As an additional memento,
Hamilton was given a gold box made by the silversmith
La Roux, inscribed with the coat of arms of the govern
ment
and the colony, and filled with gold coins donated
New York's leading citizens.

A few months afterward, James Alexander and Wil
Smith
were reinstated to the bar. About the same


[ x 54] Seven Famous Trials in History


time, Francis Harison, the notorious "little spaniel," was
found guilty of a piece of chicanery and had to flee the
country. He died in England, penniless. Governor Cosby
survived the humiliation of his defeat only for a year,
dying in 736. Lewis Morris, the former chief justice, re-turned
to America to become Governor of New Jersey.
His son, Lewis Morris, Jr., became speaker of the New
York Assembly, and his two grandsons, Lewis Morris
III and Gouverneur Morris, were both signers of the
Declaration of Independence.

As for Peter Zenger, he quietly returned to his shop
to resume printing the Journal. As long as Cosby lived,
he continued his attacks on the Governor's corrupt ad-ministration,
ignoring the advice of friends who feared
for his life and wanted him to leave New York.

After Cosby's death, the Crown appointed a more lib-eral-minded
governor, George Clark, and a comparative
calm settled on the New York scene. In 2737, Zenger
Was made public printer of New York, in belated ac-knowledgment
of his dogged courage. A year later he
became public printer for New Jersey as well. After his
death in x746, Anna Zenger published the Journal for
two years by herself. It was then taken over by Zenger's
son John until 75 , when publication ceased.

Andrew Hamilton's defense of Peter Zenger was
widely distributed throughout the Colonies and helped
to form the philosophy of the new generation who were
to drive English tyranny from America forever. The
verdict of Zenger's twelve-man jury, which anticipated
modern libel laws by three-quarters of a century, has
remained a landmark in American history. Thereafter
no governor of any colony dared try to suppress the
public press.


History awarded a proper place to Peter Zenger only
after his lifetime. The loyal and fakhful printer has
come to be known as the founder of freedom of the press
in America, the first of the Four Freedoms on which
American democracy is based.


ROBERT EMMET


The trial of Robert Emmet, Irish patriot, opened at ten
o'clock the morning of Monday, September 9, 8o3, at
the Green Street Courthouse, in Dublin. The charge
was high treason--conspiracy and rebellion against the
British Crown that then governed Ireland.

The defendant's two lawyers, Leonard McNally and
Peter Burrowes, were both secretly in the pay of his ac-cusers,
and there was no witness to speak in his defense.
The Crown had four attorneys (John Townsend,

liam Conyingham Plunket, William Ridgway, and a Mr.
Mayne), as well as a long stream of witnesses to give
evidence of the prisoner's guilt.

A little before nine o'clock mounted soldiers escorted
Robert Emmet from his prison to the courthouse, through
a laneway from Halston Street. Until time for him to
appear he was kept waiting below the courtroom in a


ROBERT EMMET liS7]


brick-walled cell with an arched ceiling so low he could
barely stand erect.

When the court opened, the guards led him, in chains
and with fetters on his ankles, to the prisoner's dock, fac-ing
judges and iury. He was a slight, pale young man of
twenty-five with brown hair and eyes and regular fea-tures.
Since the day before he had eaten nothing. For more
than twelve hours he would stand in the prisoner's dock.
His expression was serene and occasionally contemptuous.

For love of Ireland he had done the things for which
he was to be judged. Love of a woman had helped lead
him to his doom. He was certain he would be con-demned
and he was resigned to it, knowing that if it
were all to do over he would not and could not have
acted otherwise. He was sustained with the knowledge
that it was Ireland, not he alone, who was on trialmfor
the crime of wishing to be free.

For more than six hundred years, Ireland had suffered
from the oppressive measures of British rule. The Irish
Parliament was made up largely of British appointees
and in no way represented the Irish people. Dublin Castle
was the seat of this Irish Parliament, and to the common
people "the Castle" was synonymous with the British
rulers and the Irish who collaborated with them.

The majority of the Irish were Catholics, still living
with the searing memory of the harsh Penal Laws, the
cruelest measures ever legally enacted by one country on
another. By the Penal Laws, no Catholic could be a mem-ber
of Parliament, a magistrate, lawyer, soldier, sailor,
juryman, voter, sheriff, policeman, schoolmaster, or even
a private tutor. Catholic schools were forbidden, nor
could a Catholic child be sent abroad for the education


[x6o] Seven Famous Trials in History


refused at home. A Catholic could not buy land, inherit
land, or receive land as a gift from a Protestant. He
could not own a horse worth more than five pounds.
Catholics could not marry Protestants, and a Catholic
who converted a Protestant could be condemned to
death.

Though most of the Penal Laws had been revoked, at
least on paper, the poverty, misery, and bitterness they
had induced remained unabated.

The harsh treatment of Irish Catholics had not di-rectly
affected the distinguished and wealthy Emmet
family, who were Protestant. Robert Emmet was born
in a large and stately mansion across from Dublin's fash-ionable
St. Stephen's Green on March 4, x778, at the
time America was fighting what seemed a losing battle
for her independence. His father, Dr. Robert Emmet,
was State Physician of Ireland and held other important
official posts. Unlike most of Ireland's upper classes, Dr.
Emmet never hesitated to speak out on the need for Par-liamentary
reform and gave regularly to Dublin's many
poor and destitute. Mrs. Emmet, a woman of warm anl
tender nature with high principles about honor and moral
conduct, assisted her husband in his charities.

Robert was the youngest of seventeen brothers and
sisters, of whom only four survived childhood. The old-est,
Christopher Temple Emmet, was a promising young
lawyer, handsome and talented. As a child, Robert may
have heard him rehearse this passage from one of his
speeches:

"America! America! the land of arts and arms, where
that Goddess, Liberty, was wooed and won, and twelve
young eagles springing from her nest bore freedom up-ward
on her soaring wings."


ROBERT EMMET [I6]


That there were thirteen, not twelve, states in the new
United States did not make the lines less stirring.

Christopher died when he was twenty-eight and Rob-ert
was eleven. Robert's second brother, Thomas Addis
Emmet, had just received his medical degree at the Uni-versity
of Edinburgh. Dr. Emmet summoned him home,
insisting he must switch to law as a career so he could re-place
Christopher at the bar.

Thomas Addis lacked the oratorical power of Chris-topher,
but he had a quiet intelligence combined with
determination and integrity. Within three years he had
completed his law studies, One of his first clients was
James Napper Tandy, an Irish patriot accused of sub-versive
activities against the Crown. His defense was so
brilliant that the government, in an effort to buy him
for their side, offered him a court post, but Thomas Ad-dis,
whose revolutionary ideals had been nourished in
Edinburgh, turned them down.

Robert's one sister, Mary Anne, had the same princi-ples
as the rest of the Emmets. As a young girl she wrote
several political pamphlets, one on the false patriotism of
the Irish who worked at the Castle. She later married a
la;vyer named Robert Holmes, as dedicated to the cause
of Irish freedom as she was.

Of all this talented family, young Robert was the
least impressive--an undersized, quiet child who kept
his thoughts to himself. At school he showed a special
aptitude for mathematics and chemistry. At home one
day he did an experiment involving corrosive sublimate
(mercuric chloride) and that evening, while studying
his algebra, he became violently ill. While concentrating,
he had been biting his nails, thus swallowing traces of
the poison. Rather than disturb his sleeping family, he


[I62] Seven Famous Trials in History


looked up an antidote for corrosive sublimate in his
ther's medical encyclopedia. It recommended chalk. He
found some in the coach house, but chewing on it
brought lfim no relief. All night he tried to forget his
excruciating pain by working out algebra problems in
his mind, and the next morning at the breakfast table his
face was "as small and yellow as an orange."

To ask help for trouble he had brought on himself
was contrary to his nature, even at this early age.

In secret he composed poetry. His first surviving ef-fort,
written at the age of twelve, was titled "Erin's
Call" and began:


Brothers arise: Our country calls--

Let us gain her rights or die;

In her cause ,who nobly falls,

Decked ,ith brightest qreaths shall lie;

And Freedom's genius o'er his bier

Shall place the qzreath and drop a tear ....


With time his verses improved in style but all had the
same theme--the freedom of Ireland.

When he was fourteen he got hold of a copy of John
Locke's The Origin, Extent and End of Civil
merit. Robert found this heavy work fascinating read-ing,
and his copy, which still exists, shows underlining
and marginal notes in his handwriting on almost every
page. One paragraph marked for emphasis stated that a
people owe no obligation to a government if force, not
choice, compels them to submission.

At fifteen he entered Dublin's Trinity College, as
Christopher and Thomas Addis had done before him.
Already he knew much of Ireland's unhappy history.


ROBERT


The year before, Thomas Addis had joined a secret pa-triotic
organization, the Society of United Irishmen, a
fraternal union of all Irishmen, Catholic and Protestant
alike. Its aim was to fight the legal restrictions that bur-dened
Ireland and to end English oppression forever.
The plan--at first--was to accomplish its work by par-liamentary
reform, not by force.

Through his older brother, Robert met a number of
the society's leaders, among them its founder, Theobald
Wolfe Tone, son of a Belfast coachman, a fiery reckless
young man filled with patriotic zeal, and the cofounder,
tall handsome Thomas Russell, a former army officer
who had renounced his military career to join Wolfe
Tone.

At Trinity, meanwhile, Robert worked hard at his
studies. Latin and French came naturally to him since
they, rather than English, were commonly spoken in the
Emmet home. He still excelled in mathematics and
chemistry and in fact did well in all his subjects. The
Reverend Archibald Douglas, who knew him during his
college days, wrote of him later, "So gifted a creature
does not appear in a thousand years."

One of his classmates was a plump, rosy-cheeked
youth named Thomas Moore, the future author of "Be-lieve
Me, If All Those Endearing Young Charms," "The
Last Rose of Summer," and of another poem that would
immortalize Robert Emmet, "He Lived for His Love,
for His Country He Died." In his Memoirs, Thomas
Moore would speak of him as "wholly free from the
follies and frailties of youth."

Robert gave the impression of being reserved and
mild, but when he spoke before the college Historical
Society he became transformed, at once "excitingly


[ I64] Seven Famous Trials in History


powerful and inspired" and able to hold his listeners by
both his eloquence and the boldness of his opinions. In a
debate on whether an aristocracy or democracy was
most favorable to the advance of science and literature,
Robert Emmet defended democracy so ardently that
Thomas Moore claimed his words resounded in his ears
for years. The conservative college authorities were less
happy about what seemed to them dangerous ideas ema-nating
from the Historical Society and arbitrarily locked
their meeting room. The members, Robert Emmet
among them, promptly and gleefully rented a room in
Dublin, where they could continue their discussions un-disturbed.

In December, 796, at the age of eighteen, Robert
Emmet took an oath of allegiance to the Society o!
United Irishmen, as Thomas Addis had done. Soon he
was recruiting new members from arong his fellow col-legians.
Under the guise of a debatiag society, the col-lege
students formed their own branch of the UI.
Thomas Moore never joined them, although for the so-ciety's
publication, The Press, he wrote an inflammatory
piece urging students to be a "scourge to tyrants" so
they could serve their "sunken and degraded country."
Robert Emmet gently rebuked him. It might be danger-ous
to all of them, he pointed out, to call public attention
to the political activities of the college. Unknown to
either of them, the cruel and brutal head of the Dubli
secret police, Major Charles Henry Sirr, who had set
spies among the unsuspecting collegiates, already had :
full account of their activities.

A split occurred within the ranks of the United Irish-men
in December, 797, between those who felt revolu-tion
was inevitable and the moderates, such as Thomas


ROBERT EMMET [I65]


Addis, who wanted Irish independence but felt it could
be achieved by nonviolent means. The moderates tri-umphed
and Thomas Addis was made one of the direc-tors.
Robert, who had considerable artistic talent, de-signed
his insignia of office, a woman representing Ire-land,
or Eire, playing on a harp. This emblem became
the seal of the society's branch in the south of Ireland.

Thomas Addis had held his post only about three
months when, ,on March 3, 798, he was taken into
custody by the police at his father's home on St. Ste-phen's
Green and escorted to Kilmainham jail. There
was no specific charge against him, although he was
rightly regarded as a strong opponent of English rule.
Arrested the same night were most of the UI executive
committee, all victims of the Castle's net of informers.
To Dr. Emmet and his wife, Thomas Addis' arrest was a
shattering blow from which they never recovered. For
Robert, it was a catalyst that hardened to steel the ro-mantic
patriotism that had flooded his spirit since child-hood.
A few weeks later he was faced with his own first
crucial test.

In April, the Lord Chancellor of Ireland, Lord Clare,
a hatchet-faced man with a penetrating stare, visited
Trinity for the purpose of ferreting out the liberals or
patriots among the students. He had them brought be-fore
him one by one, made each take an oath of loyalty
to the Crown, then questioned them in detail about their
political beliefs. His manner was insulting. "This young
gentleman's reason seems to be affected," he said re-peatedly.
Some of the students were intimidated and told
all they knew, including the fact that Robert Emmet
was secretary of one of the college's UI branches. (There
were now four of them.) The Lord Chancellor no doubt


[66] Seven Famous Trials in History


planned an especially severe grilling for the young
brother of Thomas Addis Emmet. But Robert did not
give him that pleasure.

Even to remain in college, he was not going to give
information that might endanger others; he stayed away
from his classes during Lord Clare's inquisition. At the
dose of the questioning, Robert and eighteen others
were scheduled to be expelled for seditious activities.
Robert did not wait for the expulsion. With his father's
permission, he sent a letter of resignation to the college
board of fellows, at the same time denouncing their viola-tion
of the right of free speech. This magnificent gesture
ended his university education and with it any hope of
a professional career.

After the arrest of Thomas Addis and his comrades,
the leadership of the United Irishmen fell to Lord Ed-ward
Fitzgerald, a gallant young man from one of Ire-land's
most distinguished and aristocratic families, who
had long favored revolution. Acts of provocation intensi-fied,
as though the English were deliberately trying to
force the patience of the Irish beyond endurance. Al-ready,
the oppressed peasants and workers were arm-ing
for a struggle that seemed inevitable. The United
Irishmen numbered over two hundred thousand, and Fitz-gerald
estimated a minimum fighting force of ten thou-sand.
It is believed that Robert served briefly as an emis-sary
between Fitzgerald and his imprisoned brother,
Thomas Addis. The date of the uprising was set for May

22, 798, but on May 19, Fitzgerald was captured, like

his comrades betrayed by a Castle informer. In his at-tempt
to escape he was severely wounded and died in
Newgate prison a few days later, apparently as the re-sult
of blood poisoning.


OS:T .MM:T [67]


The uprising took place without him. All over Ire-land,
men armed with pikes and old muskets, a green
cockade on their hats and a handful of wheat in their
pockets, left their cabins and slipped into the darkness to
join their comrades. The "entire male inhabitants of
Wexford" were rebel soldiers, according to one govern-ment
informant. The uprising involved most of the men
in Wicklow, Kildare, Carlow, and Kilkenny. At Balli-tore,
an ex-Austrian army officer, Malachy Delaney, was
in command. He had won the people's confidence by
distributing copies of Thomas Paine's Rights of Man, the
"Koran" of the United Irishmen, according to Wolfe
Tone. (Paine's Common Sense had shown Americans the
road to independence. Rights of Man had caused him to
be outlawed from England.)

The Castle, seeing the rebellion get out of hand, re-taliated
with brutality, calling up soldiers and yeomen
to scour the countryside for rebels. When prisons over-flowed,
prison ships took the surplus.

In Dublin, the riding school on Marlborough Street
was turned into a flogging arena where prisoners were
whipped with cat-o'-nine-tails until their bones showed
through their flesh. A vicious torture called "pitchcap-ping"
was invented. Many United Irishmen wore their
hair cut short, earning for themselves the name of
Soldiers rounded up all those with short hair,
Irishmen and others, and forced them to wear a

of coarse linen or strong brown paper covered with
pitch, hence the name, "pitchcapping."
extended to anyone suspected of liberal con-Women
were not exempt, and were arrested,
on suspicion of favoring the rebels. Dublin lamp-were
publicly flogged, accused of putting water


[68] Seven Famous Trials in History


into street lamps so that rebels could assemble in dark-ness.
Martial law was proclaimed for the city.

Such stringent measures suppressed rebellion in Dub-lin,
but in the open country the fighting went on for
weeks. Gradually it died out except for a few bands of
guerrilla fighters who refused to admit defeat. One of
these bands, led by Michael Dwyer of County ¥Vicklow,
hid in the mountains for the next five years, resisting
the combined efforts of the Irish yeomanry and the
British army to capture them.

The United Irishmen had hoped that the French, who
were now at war with England, would come to their
rescue. On October so, i798, a fleet of eight French
ships headed for the coast of Ireland. Among their offi-cers
were several Irish exiles, including the founder of
the United Irishmen, Wolfe Tone. The English learned
of the plans and sent a fleet after the French ships. Some
of them escaped, but the Hoche, with Wolfe Tone
aboard, was captured. Tone was sentenced to the gal-lows
but committed suicide before the sentence could be
carried out. The defeat of the French ships marked the
official end of the Irish Rebellion of x 798.

While unquestionably Robert Emmet was working
with the rebels, there is no record as to his duties at this
period. Even the informers, whose detailed reports to
the Castle would prove invaluable to future historians,
were silent about him. There is no doubt that he suf-fered
bitterly at the defeat and that he resolved even
then to continue the fight.

In the meantime, harrowing experiences had been the
lot of his brother Tom. At Newgate he was confined in
total darkness in a narrow cell. He had no bed clothing
and slept on a stone shelf raised several inches from the


gO,EaT EMMEr [69]


floor. His diet was water and stale bread, with never
enough of either to satisfy thirst or hunger. The prison
attendant threw his bread to him as to a dog and placed
the water on the floor so roughly that a portion of it
spilled over. The prisoner had no way to keep himself
clean, or even to wash his hands and face. The only ven-tilation,
from a loophole above his cell door, gave barely
enough air to sustain life. Within six weeks he had be-come
so emaciated that he lacked the strength even to
hunt for his bread.

He was near death when a kindly official took pity on
him and had him transferred to larger quarters, where
friends were allowed to visit him. His wife, Jane, ob-tained
permission to share his lot, and she stayed with
him in his cell for the next year.

In March of 799, Thomas Addis Emmet and three
other prisoners, Arthur O'Connor, Sam Neilson, and one
Samuel Turner, who was actually an informer, were
transferred by prison ship to Fort George in Scotland.
The physical condkions were better than those in Dub-lin,
but the men, all closely confined in one cell, began
to have bitter arguments. Sam Turner, the spy, cleverly
encouraged each of them to think the others were trai-tors.

Into this charged atmosphere twenty-two-year-old
Robert Emmet arrived on a visit to his brother early in
tSoo. His idealism and boundless admiration for the
Courage and sacrifices of the prisoners in the name of
freedom put an end to their petty bickering and re-newed
their dormant hopes. Robert stayed at Fort
George near his brother for some two months.

The Castle was duly informed that Robert was very
active among the remaining members of the United Irish

[7o] Seven Famous Trials in History


men, and it was hinted that he had carried secret instruc
dons to his brother. A warrant was issued for his arrest,
but he was not to be found. After Tom's arrest, his
parents had moved to their country estate, the Casino, of
Milltown, some seven miles south of Dublin, to get
away from their town house with its memories of hap-pier
days. Robert stayed with them part of the time, but
when he learned the police were after him, he knew he
had to get out of the country for a while. Moreover, he
had conceived an ambitious plan, to go to France and see
if he could enlist the First Consul, Napoleon Bonaparte,
to support the bleeding Society of United Irishmen in a
new uprising.

He set sail for the Continent--the exact date is not
known in the company of Malachy Delaney, the ex-Austrian
officer who had been active in Kildare and Wex-ford
in i798. He landed in Hamburg and then went on
to Paris.

In Paris he was welcomed by Irish exiles and many
others. Polish patriots treated him as a comrade because
of his devotion to democracy. He made friends among
the American colony and found a home in the large and
hospitable mansion of Joel Barlow, a future American
ambassador. At the Barlows, he met Robert Fulton and
no doubt heard his dream of making a ship that would
be powered by steam. His interest in chemistry won him
the friendship of a number of French scientists.

His birth and breeding made him eligible to the most
elite salons of French intelligentsia, among them that of
Madame de Stall, one of the celebrated women of her
age. Madame de Stal's granddaughter, the Comtesse
d'Haussonville, on whom he made a deep impression,
left a vivid description of him:


ROBERT EMMET [ITI]


countenance pleasing and distinguished, his hair
brown and his complexion quite pale, the eyebrows
arched and the eyes black and large with dark eyelashes,
which gave his looks a remarkable expression of pride,
penetration and mildness. His nose aquiline, and his
mouth slightly disdainful. Energy, delicacy and tender-ness
are expressed in his melancholy features. Such was,
however, the total absence of affectation, and his sim-plicity,
that nothing seems to have at first attracted at-tention
to Robert Emmet. The modesty of his character,
joined to a sort of habitual reserve, hid the working of
his mind to the ordinary circumstances of life, but were
any subject started which was deeply interesting to him,
he appeared quite another man."

In furtherance of his plans for Ireland, Robert paid a
call on Talleyrand, the cynical and shrewd French Min-ister
of Foreign Affairs under Napoleon Bonaparte.

England signed its peace with France on May 25, 8oo.
The English, freed of fear of a French invasion from
Irish shores, gradually released some of their United
Irishmen prisoners. Thomas Addis was set free, on the
condition of permanent exile. Robert met him and his
wife and children in Amsterdam, in August of i8o2. The
two brothers were still close to each other. In spite of
his ordeal, Tom had lost none of his patriotic fervor,
but he dared not return to Ireland or aid Robert other
than with advice.

Early in the autumn, Robert went back to Paris, saw
Talleyrand again, and after that met Napoleon Bona-parte.
Both Bonaparte and Talleyrand were convinced
that the peace with England would not last. In theory
they Were interested in a new Irish uprising, but Napo-leon
said he had been informed that the Society' of


[x72] Seven Famous Trials in History


United Irishmen was practically extinct and that before
he sent any more French forces on vain missions--such
as the one in which Wolfe Tone had participated--the
Irish must reorganize. Robert agreed with him on this
point, although he had taken a strong dislike to the
French dictator.

On this second risk to Paris, he began a self-appointed
task of rounding up Irish expatriates and exiles. The
seasoned veterans of 798 looked askance at first on the
idealistic young conspirator, but one of them quickly
recognized that Robert Emmet had the qualities of a
leader. This was Thomas Russell, the big handsome man
who had organized the United Irishmen with Wolfe
Tone. Gradually Robert won over others.

An agent was sent to them--no one is sure of his
name--with the news that preparations were under **'ay
in Ireland for a new uprising and with an urgent plea
that Robert come home. It is now known that the agent
had been sent by William Pitt, the English Prime Minis-ter,
and that indeed, from beginning to end, Robert Em-met
and all his activities were under the constant scru-tiny
of the Castle and the British Crown. His weakess
--as well as part of his greatness--was that he could not
suspect anyone to whom he had once given his con-fidence.
He hastily made arrangements to return to Ire-land.

Before he left the Continent he returned to Brussels
to say good-by to Tom and his family. Thomas Addis
was planning eventually to go to America and he wanted
Robert to go with him. His wife, Jane, it is said, went
down on her knees to implore Robert to abandon what
she felt to be a futile endeavor. But there was, for Rob-ert,
no turning back from the course he had chosen.. He


ROBERT Ei!IET [73]


never again saw his brother, who later became one of
Anerica's most distinguished lawyers.

All his adult life, Robert Emmet had let hianself be
guided by Tom. As he set sail for Ireland after his sad
farewell, he knew that henceforth he was on his own.
From now on he must make decisions for himself and
others. It was a terrifying responsibility but one that
seemed to him inevitable.

He reached Dublin in December, i8o2. Soon after-ward,
his father died, leaving him about three thousand
pounds. There was no doubt in Robert's mind as to what
he would do with the money. It was at once set aside
for the work to which he would dedicate the rest of his
life.

One at a time he chose his close assistants, most of
them from the working class rather than from the
middle class and intelligensia that had furnished the
United Irishmen an undue quota of spies and cowards.

Jemmy Hope, a weaver and a staunch UI veteran,
was his first choice. Of all those who worked with him,
no one was more trustworthy or loved. Among others
in his close confidence were Michael Quigley, a brick-layer
and carpenter; John Hevey, a tobacconist; Thomas
Freyne, a gentleman farmer from Kildare; and Denis
Lambert Redmond, a coal merchant, who called their
young chief "the most brilliant and most inspiring crea-ture
who ever walked on earth." There were also,
among others, W. P. McCabe, an innkeeper; Felix
Rourke, a brewery clerk; Nicholas Stafford, a baker;
Henry Howley, a carpenter; and Miles Byrne, a leader
of the men of County Kildare in 5798 who had since
been working as a bookkeeper in Dublin. Bernard Dug-gan,
a cottonworker, was another admitted to Emmet's


[74] Seven Famous Trials in History


inner circle, but this was a mistake. Not until long after
Duggan's death was it revealed that the Dublin chief of
police, Major Sirr, had paid him five hundred pounds a
year as an informer.

With better iudgment, Emmet chose as his assistant a
County Wicldow man, Big Arthur Devlin, another vet-eran
of the Rebellion of i798 who had joined the Brit-ish
army to escape arrest. When he learned of Emmet's
forthcoming uprising, Big Arthur deserted the army and
came to Dublin to join him, bringing some fifty other
Wicklow men from his regiment. Emmet had been lodg-ing
at Harold Cross, outside Dublin, with a Mrs. Palmer,
but was looking for a house to use as his central head-quarters.
It was Big Arthur who found a suitable place,
a two-story house with an aura of middle-class respect
ability about it, on Butterfield Lane in Rathfarnham, a
few miles south of Dublin. In April, 803, Emmet leased
it under the name of "Mr. Ellis."

Nearby lived Big Arthur's uncle, Bryan Devlin, a
firmer, with his wife and seven children. They were all
patriots. Mrs. Devlin was the aunt of the famous Wick-low
outlaw, Michael Dwyer, while Bryan Devlin had
suffered more than two years in the Wicklow jail on the
charge of aiding the rebels. His second daughter, Anne, a
dark-haired spirited young woman of twenty-three, vol
unteered to serve as Robert Emmet's housekeeper at
Butterfield Lane, and soon was an active participant in
his activities.

They had almost no furniture. Their beds were mat-tresses
spread on the floor and they ate from packing
boxes. Sometimes as many as thirty men showed up for
dinner. The neighbors were duly curious, deciding the
new tenants were either in debt or counterfeiters. Vhat


ROBERT EVI1VF,T [x75]


ws Mr. Ellis' profession? they asked Anne. Was he an
attorney?

"Aye, is he?" she said. That was all the satisfaction

she would give.

Thomas Russell returned from Paris and came to live

at Butterfield Lane, giving the same loyalty to young
Emmet as he had to the martyred Wolfe Tone. He
brought word that Napoleon's interest in their under-taking
was waning, and that there was no use counting
on French aid. Emmet was almost relieved. His distrust
of the great Bonaparte had increased. Far better to fight
their own battles than to risk an ally of dubious motives.
From all over the country, his scouts brought word
that the veterans of ¥8 were ready and waiting. Even
wkhout the French, their hopes for success were high.

At Emmet's suggestion, Big Arthur Devlin and the
weaver, Jemmy Hope, went to the Wicklow mountains
to try and enlist the support of Michael Dwyer. They
found him and his men living in an underground cave in
the wilderness of the Glen of Imaal. Dwyer was plainly
skeptical about Emmet and his insurrection and said he
did not think his followers would risk another defeat.
Hope and Big Arthur dejectedly returned to Emmet.

A few days later, however, Michael Dwyer arrived at
Butterfield Lane wkh three companions, all big, burly,
roughly-dressed men. They stayed three days, during
which Dwyer neither ate nor slept. On the third day he
caught sight of a neighbor woman standing outside the
house and ordered his men to get ready to leave that
night, saying he would not stay in a house that was being
Watched. Just before he left he told Emmet he could de-pend
on his help. The slender young patriot had won
his trust.


[x76] Seven Famous Trials in History


Jemmy Hope next took a tour through Ulster, the
county organized by Wolfe Tone and Thomas Russell,
to sound out the former United Irishmen there. Cold at
first, they soon warmed to Jemmy's enthusiasm, particu.
larly when they learned that Thomas Russell was part
of the movement. Thus, slowly and steadily, the secret
army grew. Several thousand Kildare men promised sup-port.
Michael Dwyer could command a force from
Counties Carlow, Wicklow, and Wexford of more thou-sands.
There were several hundred Wexford United
Irishmen refugees in Dublin, ready to serve under Miles
Byrne. Jemmy Hope enlisted some five thousand work-lng-class
Dubliners, all personally devoted to him.

Emmet rented two buildings in Dublin as depots for
arms and ammunition, one on Patrick Street, the other
on Thomas Street. With the aid of Quigley, the carpen-ter,
he built secret cupboards and hidden passageways in
the Patrick Street depot, to be used in an emergency.
Later he rented other ammunition depots. In the last
weeks he rarely visited any one of them for more than
an hour or so, appearing without warning and leaving
abruptly.

Emmet never made a decision without consulting his
comrades, and when he made up his mind about some-thing
he spoke mildly. Yet they all give him implicit
obedience, in part because they came to trust his judg-ment,
in part because of his charm, his dedication, and a
certain purity about him that inspired confidence.

Only once did he overrule them. Miles Byrne and his
experienced fighters felt that their limited funds should
go for standard weapons such as pikes, pistols, and
blunderbusses. Emmet insisted they try out an-inve,tion
of his. Putting his knowledge of chemistry to a practicaI


ROBERT EMMET [x77]


use, he had at the Patrick Street depot perfected a rocket,
a conical iron tube filled with a mixture of gunpowder,
niter, and sulphur, and attached to a fuse.

Emmet, Thomas Russell, and Miles Byrne took the
rocket out to the country to test it. After placing it
against a trestle, they lit the fuse. With a noise between a
scream and a hiss, it tore along almost parallel with the
ground, pouring out flames and fire until it struck the
earth, where it tore out a great pit before it was ex-tinguished.
After this convincing demonstration, Miles
Byrne and the others yielded. The "Congreve Rocket"
the weapon was called later, though Robert Emmet's
model preceded that of William Congreve.

Blunderbusses and pistols were being stored on Patrick
or Thomas Street, and the men constructed their own
pikes. Emmet supervised everything. Pike handles were
made of red deal, a form of pine wood, rather than the
customary ash, because red deal was easier to obtain. The
men invented a "folding pike," which could be con-cealed
beneath their coats, and they hollowed out blocks
of wood, filled them with gunpowder, nails, stones, and
broken iron, and attached fuses. These "square bombs,"
as they called them, were designed to stop approaching
cavalry.

By the end of June, Robert Emmet felt certain of a
force of several thousand to start his insurrection in mo-tion.
How did he think he could overthrow the British
yoke with so few? His plan was fantastically simple, and
even later, when all was lost, it was generally agreed to
have been extremely practical.

The gates of Dublin Castle lay open until far into the
night, flaunting the arrogant self-confidence of the Eng-lish
usurpers. Inside, the Viceroy and other officials


[x78] Seven Famous Trials in History


walked about freely and unprotected. The Castle had
only a small guard.

Emmet planned to have a first detachment of patriots
enter the Castle gates in a stream of coaches--as though
they were visitors. Once inside, they were to fire off
rockets to call up the others. If only five thousand re-sponded,
the outcome was certain. Dublin Castle would
be in Irish hands. The government, deprived of its lead-ers
and central quarters, would be temporarily disorgan-ized.
By the time the British could send forces to re-capture
the Castle, the gates would be closed. Emmet
counted on the dramatic news that the green flag was
flying from the Castle to inspire the whole country to
rise.

Other minor assaults were planned for the same day at
Pigeon House Fort on Dublin Bay, the Royal Artillery
Barracks at Island Bridge, and another at the ammunition
magazine in Phoenix Park. The date set for this combined

operation was July 23, 1803, though only a trusted few

were told of it.

Until that year, women had played no part in
met's life, but sometime in the spring or early sm,mer
he fell in love, desperately and completely. The object
of his affection was the daughter of an old family frietd,
John Philpot Curran, the most famous liberal lawyer in
Ireland. Emmet had first met Sarah Curran as a 'clild.
She was twenty-two when he saw her again at the h(me
of a mutual friend, a slender, fragile girl with dark eves,
soft auburn hair, and very white skin lightly flc, c'kcd
with freckles. "She is kind, she is lovely," he wrote of
her ecstatically, "and heaven only knows how good."

The Curran family lived in a big stone house

as the Priory, about half a mile from Butterfield Lane.


ROBERT EMMET [I79]


Sarah's father was a widower. She had a brother named
Richard and a spinster sister, Amelia. When Emmet
came calling, he had difficulty seeing Sarah alone, nor in
the beginning did she pay much heed to her intense
young suitor. But her more observant father noticed
how Emmet's eyes followed his younger daughter and
instructed Amelia to warn him to make his risks less
frequent. Patriotism was fine in its place, so Barrister
Curran must have reasoned, but he had no desire for a
son-in-law who had never finished college and had no
profession but the dubious one of revolutionist.

It is the nature of love to flourish when there are ob-stacles
to surmount. Only after her father's ultimatum
did the willful and enchanting Sarah give her heart to
Robert Emmet. They met secretly whenever they could,
and when it was not possible to see each other they
wrote long and affectionate letters, which pretty Anne
Dcvlin delivered.

Since Sarah was the daughter of a patriot, Emmet was
certain she would understand his dreams and aspirations.
Rashly, he confided everything to her, where his depots
were, what they contained. The two sweethearts made
up a code for writing of these secret things, and as a
further precaution promised to destroy each other's let-ters,
a promise neither fulfilled.

Plans for the insurrection approached completion.
Knowing one mistake might be fatal, Emmet swore
that nothing must go wrong. Then, on July 6, a week
before the fateful day, something went very wrong in-deed.
At the Patrick Street depot, where some of Em-met's
men were making rockets, a spark ignited the
powder. There was a dull roar. The police arrived on
the scene to find windows shattered, a room wrecked,


[8o] Seven Famous Trials in History


and three men lying wounded. They were taken to the
hospital, where one of them, John Keenan, died a few
hours later. The police searched the house but did not
find the secret cupboards in which most of the ammuni-tion
was stored.

Emmet was sure the police would set a guard on the
depot but, incredible as it seemed, that night there was
no one near it. Miles Byrne and Big Arthur, in several
trips, emptied the secret cupboards, storing arms and
ammunition at the Thomas Street depot, at Butterfield
Lane, and at the homes of trusted comrades.

Even with this salvage, the explosion was a staggering
blow. How much did the men at the Castle suspect?
How could they not suspect something? Yet, judging
from the account in the official Dublin Evening Post, the
authorities were not at all concerned. While "alarmists
had not been idle," the newspaper item read, inquiries in-dicated
that "nothing of a political nature" was involved.
Somewhat reassured, Emmet and his comrades decided
to go ahead as planned.

The truth--not revealed until many years later--was
that William Wickham, chief secretary of the Castle, and
Alexander Marsden, the undersecretary, knew exactly
what was going on, but were under instructions from
William Pitt in England to let Emmet proceed. Not even
their superior, the Lord Lieutenant (the Viceroy) of Ire-land,
was informed of these devious political maneuvers.

For the next week Robert Emmet slept on a pallet on
the floor of the Thomas Street depot, eating food sent in
from a cookshop or in a tavern. There were a dozen men
with him there, including Quigley, the carpenter, Nich-olas
Stafford, the baker, and a tailor named TerenCe
Colgan, who was employed to make some truly hand'


ROBERT EMMET IISI]


some uniforms for the leaders wkh white cashmere pan-raloons
and green iackets trimmed with gold epaulettes.

In this confused and crowded atmosphere, it was al-wosr
impossible to complete the innumerable tasks still
to be done. In the midst of the pounding and hammering,
Emmet did find rime to do one thing he felt of supreme
importance: the writing of a proclamation to the people
of Ireland, to be printed and distributed, explaining the
reasons for the uprising and making a stirring plea for
Irish freedom.

Saturday, July 23, arrived--a fine, hot morning. In
Dublin was the usual Saturday-morning scene of rat-tling
carts, bleating beasts being led to market, noisy
drovers, bustling housewives. There was no undue
movement of troops and the gates of Dublin Caste were
open, with coaches going in and our. Since the day be-fore,
men in country clothes had been streaming into
Dublin, rugged in physique and determined in bearing.
Thcy came from Kildare and elsewhere to ioin "General
Emmet's" army.

Emmet rode out very early to Butterfield Lane to colo
lect his mail. He destroyed most of it but thrust into his
breast pocket a letter Anne Devlin had brought him
from Sarah. Big Arthur was there and he gave him some
fnal instructions, including the sending of a messenger to
Michael Dwyer in the Wicklow mountains to urge him
to come at once with as many men as he could rally.
(The messenger never was able to find Dwyer, for
which Emmet was later thankful.) Then he returned to
Thomas Street.

In the depot thousands of pikes had been brought out
from behind false partitions and stacked against the wall
in readiness for that night's attack, along with bushels of


[I82] Seven Famous Trials in Hstory


musket bails and numerous square bombs. Some of the
men were making hand grenades, and there was con-sternafion
when Quigley confessed he had forgotten
where he had hidden the fuses. Ladders to be used by re-inforcements
to scale the Castle gates still lacked cramp
irons; the smith sent them over so late that only one lad-der
was completed-not ten, as Emmet had planned.
The depot became increasingly noisy as more men piled
into it. Major Sirr's spies, who were watching, nust
surely have reported the unprecedented activity.

Sometime that morning Emmet conferred vith the
Kildare leaders. They were disappointed that there were
so few guns; they had not expected to fight with pikes.
To appease them, Emmet borrowed some money and
sent out a scout to try and buy more blunderbusses.
Nevertheless, in the early afternoon many of the out-of-towners
left Dublin to return to their homes. Their de-parture
was not for lack of courage but because of a
persistent rumor, perhaps started by informers, that the
rebellion was to be postponed.

It was a day of disaster, unforeseeable and unavoid-able,
that in the aggregate would prove fatal.

At about seven in the evening, Emmet called a halt to
the activity and read aloud from the freshly printed
Proclamation:

"The Provisional Government to the People of Ire-land:

"You are now called upon to show the world that you
are competent to take your place among nations; that
you have a right to claim their recognizance of you as an
independent country, by the only satisfactory, proof you
can furnish of your capability of maintaining your inde-pendence-your
wresting it from England with your


own hands .... Our object is to establish a free and in-dependent
republic in Ireland .... We war not against
property, we war against no religious sect, we war not
against past opinions or prejudices, we war against Eng-lish
dominion."

It had seemed urgent to Emmet that his men should
hear these words before the batde began, so that the
reason they were fighting would once more be impressed
on them. "Good," several of them murmured. "Very
good."

And then Ned Condon, who had gone out to get the
hackney coaches in which they planned to ride to the
Castle, came running in, a look of dismay on his face. An
officer had stopped him to ask where he was going wkh
so many carriages. He had lost his head and fired. The
hackney drivers had taken fright and driven off.

If Emmet was shaken at seeing the collapse of this
cherished part of his plan, he let no one know it. Very
well, they would go on foot. They still had enough men
to take the Castle. Michael Dwyer with his contingent
would soon arrive, or so he believed. Thomas Russell
was raising an army up in Ulster. Kerry and Limerick
Counties were sure to rise when Dublin was taken ....

Thus did he continue to reassure his men, though in
his heart he was afraid not for himself but for their
undertaking. Before his eyes the fruits of his months of
labored planning were withering away, as if some ter-rible
curse had been set on them. But he could not give
up. Too many had put their trust in him.

Shortly after eight o'clock, too late to call off their
attack and too soon to proceed wkh much hope of suc-cess,
Michael Quigley came rushing in, red-faced and out
of breath.


[84] Seven Famous Trials in History


"They are on us! The soldiers are coming!" he cried.
No soldiers were near. Quigley had made a mistal(e,
but there was no way of investigating his story. All that
Emmet knew was that it was better to die in action than

penned up in a coop.

"Come on, boys!"

He and several others slipped on their green and white
uniforms. Men hurriedly threw pikes from the upper
windows of the depot to others gathered below. Less
than three hundred set out on foot. In short order all but
forty or fifty had disappeared into the shadows. By the
time they turned into Patrick Street, about halfway to
the Castle, there were, according to one witness, no
more than fifteen men with their young leader. It was
about then, probably in the shadow of St. Patrick's Ca-thedral,
that Robert Emmet finally relinquished the
dream that had sustained him since childhood and gave
the order to disperse.

About eleven o'clock that night he, Quigley, and five
others, still in their fine uniforms, walked into the house
on Butterfield Lane, their faces dejected and gray with
fatigue. Anne Devlin, the young housekeeper, was there
impatiently awaiting news.

"Bad welcome to you," she cried out at the sight of
them. "Is the world lost by you, cowards that you are,
to lead the people to destruction and then to leave
them?"

"Don't blame me, Anne, the fault is not mine," Emet
told her wearily.

As she heard the story of their tragic day, her heart
softened with pity. Before dawn she sent them across the
fields to her father's farm, where they would be safe
until horses and dark cloaks to cover their bright uni

ROBERT EMMET [185]


forms could be found for them. She stayed on to warn
away any latecomers from this house that was sure to be
searched sooner or later. In the course of the day she di-rected
a dozen or so other comrades of Emmet to her
farIl.

From them Emmet learned of the sporadic fighting in
different parts of Dublin the night before and of the ar-rests
already made. That they were all in grave danger
he had no doubt, just as he was still certain that one day
Ireland would be free. He tried to cheer his men by sug-gesdng
they might still get French aid and start again,
but he could not fool himself. He knew his own part
in that struggle was over.

They were all sitting around the crowded Devlin
kitchen on Monday afternoon. Hevey, the baker, an
apron around his waist, was churning butter for Mrs.
Devlin. Most of them were in uniform. A neighbor
woman walked in, looked around in amazement, and
then, making some feeble excuse, backed out hastily.
From there she dashed over to the house of George
Grierson, the King's printer, who lived nearby, to re-port
that "fifty French officers" were staying with the
Devlins. Emmet knew of this because the Grierson's
butler, who had overheard her, soon rushed in to warn
them. It was fortunate that Grierson had just sat down
to his dinner, he said. Otherwise he would have taken off
at once for the Castle.

The refugees left at once. That night they slept at the
home of an old farmer, John Doyle, known as "Silky
Jock." One of their group knew the Doyle family and
thought they would be secure there, but Silky Jock
turned out to be a scared old man and they left early.
The following night they stayed in a comfortable farm

[x86] Seven Famous Trials in History


house owned by a Mrs. Rose Bagnell, and the night after
that they slept in the fields.

That afternoon they decided to separate. Their
chances were far better if each man was on his ovn.
Miles Byrne wanted Emmet to take refuge with Mi-chael
Dwyer, but he refused, saying he could not bear to
face Dwyer after their failure. Nor would he consider
the alternative of fleeing to France. He could not run
away and abandon his comrades.

He did not mention the other reason he wished to
stay in Ireland--Sarah Curran. After dividing the little
money he had among his men, he took leave of them and
went to stay with Mrs. Palmer at Harold Cross, the
lodging in which he had resided before moving to But-terfield
Lane. Mrs. Palmer liked him and he could count
on her discretion. He did not worry, if he knew, that a
nearby tavern was run by Simon Doyle, the son of
"Silky Jock," the farmer who had given them such a
grudging welcome, and he found consolation in the fact
that Harold Cross was not far from the Priory, where
Sarah lived.

Meanwhile a storm had broken loose in Dublin Castle.
The night of the insurrection, Chief Justice Lord Kil-warden
had been driving with his nephew and daughter.
Some drunken rowdies, aware only that this was the
night the common people were to have their revenge,
dragged them out of the carriage and in the skirmish
both Kilwarden and his nephew were killed. His daugh-ter
managed to make her way to the Castle to tell her
story. The worst part was that Lord Kilwarden was one
of the few Irishman in power who treated th patriots
with justice. Though Emmet was in no way responsible
for the tragedy, he shared the burden of it.


ROBERT EMMET [I87]


Dublin was put under martial law. Hundreds were ar-rested,
and no one was more assiduous than Secretary
Marsden in trying to get the prisoners to name their
comrades and leaders. In some cases he was successful.
To the Viceroy he wrote cynically, "This has been a
most unfortunate business, but however severe in its
present circumstance it will excite a feeling which may
materially serve us hereafter."

Two days after the insurrection, a contingent of yeo-men
came to Butterfield Lane, ransacked the house, and
tried to get Anne Devlin to tell them where "Mr. Ellis"
was. She put on a stupid look and said she was only a
servant and cared for nothing but that her salary be paid.
They pricked her with bayonets and even jabbed her
small sister who was staying with her, but could not
make Anne talk. Then they took her out in the court-yard,
saying they were going to hang her. When she
again defied them, they strung her up on an upturned
wagon long enough for her to lose consciousness. Not
then nor ever did she tell them anything.

After Emmet moved to Harold Cross, he sent for
Anne and asked her if she would continue to deliver his
letters to Sarah. Anne, whose loyalty to him was bound-less,
agreed willingly. She also brought Sarah's letters to
him, including two that were long, chatty, and indis-creet,
and that he kept in his jacket next to his heart, dis-obeying
Sarah's instructions to burn them. Though Sarah
passed Mrs. Palmer's house, where her sweetheart was
staying, on at least two occasions, there is no evidence
she ever saw him again.

Emmet seldom left the house, but occasionally he had
visitors. Simon Doyle, the tavernkeeper, delivered eggs
and butter to the Palmers and it is believed it was in

[88] Seven Famous Trials in History


directly through him or his father, Silky Jock, that Ma-jor
Sirr, the Dublin chief of police, learned a suspicious
stranger was staying there. The Doyles were never paid
for this valuable information, though there is record of
a thousand pounds paid by the English to a gentleman
farmer named Richard Jones, a friend of the Doyles.
Major Sirr also received three hundred pounds for Em
met's
arrest.

On August 25, Emmet spent the morning in the back
parlor working on a letter to the Viceroy, half plea and
half threat, to the effect that only if the government
would cease the merciless punishment of the prisoners in
custody would there be any chance for peace in the
country. He broke off his writing to go have dinner with
Mrs. Palmer. They were beginning their meal when Ma-jor
Sirr broke in.

"You are under arrest," the major said.

Sirr left a soldier to guard Emmet while he searched
the rest of the house. There was a scuffle in his absence.
Emmet attempted to escape, but the soldier knocked him
down with the butt of his pistol. When Sirr returned,
Emmet was leaning against the wall with blood
ing down his cheek. The soldier was holding two letters
he had taken from his prisoner's jacket, the letters frown
Sarah that Emmet had been unable to force himself to
destroy.

He was taken to Kilmainham jail, the great gr:y
building constructed some years before to incarcerte
those imbued with the "dangerous" ideas of indepen&
ence engendered by the American and French .Revolu-tion.
Since he was a "gentleman" of good family, he
was not put in a cell but in a pleasant, well-furnished
room with a desk and a good bed, and with only the


ROBERT EMMET [89]


barred windows as proof of his captivity. After five days
be was taken to Dublin Castle and examined by Lord
Chancellor Redesdale, Secretary William Wickham, and
Attorney General Standish O'Grady. O'Grady pre-sided.

"What is your name?" they demanded first.

"Robert Emmet," he said. "Having now answered my
name I must decline answering any other questions."

His examiners told him, kindly enough, that it would
be in his own interest to answer them. He replied,
equally politely, that he must persist in declining.

"Where did you first hear of the insurrection?" they
asked.

"I decline answering any question."

They continued to pound him with questions. Was he
in Dublin the night of July 23 ? Had he been in France
for two years? Had he seen the Proclamation of the
Provisional Government? He would tell them nothing.
The attorney general grew red with anger.

Abruptly he demanded, "By whom were the letters
written that were found on your person?"

His examiners believed they were from his sister,
.Mary Anne Holmes, but Emmet had no way of know-mg
this. He was frightened for Sarah, and because of
her, he broke his silence.

"As to the letters taken out of my possession by Major
Sirr, how can I avoid their being brought forward?" His
voice was anxious. "Has anything been done in conse-quence
of those letters being taken? May I learn what
has been done upon them?"

"You cannot be answered as to this," O'Grady told
him gloatingly.

Emmet pleaded with them: "You must, gentlemen, be


[x9o] Seven Famous Trials in History


sensible how disagreeable it would be to one of your-selves
to have a delicate and virtuous female brought into
notice. What means would be necessary to bring the
evidence in those letters forward, without bringing the
name forward? Might the passages in those letters be
read to me?"

His interrogators were sure now that the letters were
not written by Emmet's sister. Thinking they had a
good weapon in them, they hinted that the author of the
letters might well be protected if he gave information
about his organization and his colleagues. His composure
returned.

"May I know when my arraignment will take place?"
he asked haughtily.

O'Grady let the interview come to an end, and Emmet
was taken back to Kilmainham.

One redeeming feature of his imprisonment was the
solicitude shown him by his jailer, a pleasant-faced man
named George Dunn. Dunn did everything possible to
make him comfortable. When they were alone, he con-fided
that he had always been sympathetic to the cause
of Ireland. Emmet believed him. Pure in heart himself,
it was always difficult for him to detect hypocrisy in
others. When Dunn volunteered to deliver messages to
his friends, Emmet gave him a note to his cousin, St.
John Mason, who was also a prisoner. Dunn shortly
brought back an answer, which Emmet took as proof of
his good faith. After the exchange of several more let-ters,
Mason, a well-to-do businessman, offered Dunn a
bribe to help arrange their escape and that of four other
prisoners. Dunn seemed amenable but then suddenly ar-nounced
that the authorities had become suspicious asd
he could do nothing. Neither Mason nor Emmet guessed


ROBERT EMMET [191]


that Dunn was an informer and that Dr. Edward
Trevor, the prison supervisor, had seen all their corre-spondence.

Still trusting Dunn, Emmet committed the gravest in-discretion
of his life. He gave the jailer a note addressed
to Sarah Curran, in which he advised her to destroy all
his letters and warned her of the two letters his captors
had found.

The letter was never delivered. Early the next morn-ing,
Major Sirr with some of his men arrived at the
Priory. Barrister Curran was not at home. Amelia, Sarah's
sister, and her brother Richard, were having breakfast.
Sarah was still in bed. The major stormed up the stairs to
her bedroom and burst in, demanding Robert Emmet's
letters. The shock was too much for Sarah, who
screamed hysterically. In the resultant confusion, Amelia
cahnly took the letters from their hiding place and fed
them into the fire before Sirr realized what she was do-ing.

Maior Sirr later claimed that he had taken a stack of
correspondence "a yard square" between Emmet and
Sarah, all devoted to the subject of "public massacre and
wrong." Other evidence indicates that the two letters
Robert Emmet carried next to his heart were the only
ones the court ever saw.

Sarah was not arrested, nor did Maior Sirr ever fur-ther
bother any of the Curran family. The Castle author-ities
felt they did not wish to antagonize Sarah's father,
Barrister Curran, who had recently showed a willing-ness
to work with them. In truth, when this former
lawyer of the rebels learned of his daughter's relation-ship
with Robert Emmet, he disowned her and turned
her out of his house.


[192] Seven Famous Trials in History


For several years she stayed with friends in Cork, and
gradually she seemed to recover from her deep shock.
Sometimes she sang melancholy songs in her sweet,
pleasing voice. A British officer fell in love with her and
proposed marriage. She accepted him, perhaps because
she was tired of living on charity. She died in the first
year of their marriagemlong after her true love had met
his destiny.

On the same day that Major Sirr visited Sarah,
Thomas Russell was arrested and Robert Emmet's
mother died. Happily for his peace of mind, he did not
know of this triple tragedy. He had named Sarah's father
as his lawyer, but Curran would have nothing to do with
the case--not, as Emmet thought, because of Sarah, but
because he was through defending Irish patriots. Leon-ard
McNally, whom Emmet mistakenly believed to be
his friend, took his place. McNally served as counsel for
a large number of the rebels, winning their confidence
and promptly reporting to the Castle what his clients
told him. With him worked the attorney Peter Bur-rowes,
who had also sold himself to the Castle. But that
Robert Emmet's lawyers were not on his side mattered
very little.

The day of the trial, Monday, September 19, 18°3,

Dublin seethed with excitement. Dr. Robert Emmet had
been a public figure. His son and namesake was a roman-tic
one. Everyone had heard of how he had resigned
from Trinity College rather than betray his fellov stu-dents,
and of how he had been to France and talked with
Napoleon. They knew, too, that he had firled Dublin
storehouses with pikes and blunderbusses and ammuni-tion,
and that, dressed in a gold-trimmed uniform of
emerald hue, he had led an army toward the Casde. It


ROBERT EMMET [I93]


X,vas no wonder that he stirred the imagination of the
{bppressed and wretched working class of Dublin. They
rowded outside the courthouse, on the streets, gathered
ix taverns to discuss the gallant young man who had
acrificed everything because he wanted them to have a
letter life. Inside, the trial went on, hour after hour.

Attorney General Standish O'Grady, who had previ-ously
examined Emmet, opened the proceedings. His
duty, he said, was to state as concisely as he could the
nature of the charge. He went far beyond conciseness as
he held up to ridicule Emmet's "provisional govern-ment,''
pointing out tauntingly that it was made up of
such members of the lower orders as "an eminent
bricklayer" [Quigley] and "a bankrupt clerk [Miles
Byrne] sitting on the second floor of a malt house, medi-tating
without means and marshaling armies that never
enlisted."

The witnesses for the prosecution were called, one by
one, to the stand. All were under oath, all forced to tes-tify
under penalty of a thousand-pound fine.

The first was Joseph Rawlings, who had done legal
work for Dr. Emmet before his death. He was supposed
to say that Robert had uttered treasonable sentiments on
his return from Europe. Instead, all he could remember
was that Robert had heartily disliked Napoleon Bona-parte.
He was quicldy dismissed.

George Tyrrell, who had leased Emmet the house on
Butterfield Lane, testified that Emmet had used the name
of "Robert Ellis." Michael Frayne, a neighbor, related
that he had called on "Mr. Ellis" and been invited to din-ner,
but had not stayed: "There being no chairs, we felt
a little awkward."

John Fleming, a somewhat simple-minded hostler at


[i94] Seven Famous Trials in History


the White Bull Inn adjoining the Thomas Street depot,
was next. Fleming had been in Robert's confidence but
Major Sirr had easily persuaded him to turn state's evi-dence.
He knew the depot, he said, had seen men there
making pikes and ball cartridges, had seen a supply of
blunderbusses and pistols.

"Look at the prisoner at the bar," he was instructed.

"I know him. Mr. Emmet there," Fleming said un-comfortably.

Had he seen him before? "I have. The Tuesday morn-ing
after the blowing up in Patrick Street."

He was followed by Terence Colgan, the tailor who
had made the men's uniforms. Now he claimed that he
had been kidnaped while he was drunk, taken to the
depot, and forced to make the uniforms. But he admitted
that he would never have testified of his own accord,
and did so only so he would be freed to earn bread for
his family.

After him came Patrick Farrell, a middle-aged grocer,
surly and sharp-spoken. He had been caught eavesdrop-ping
at the Thomas Street depot one day, and the men
had dragged him inside. Some of them had wanted to
drop him then and there, but Robert Emmet had pre-vented
them. Farrell repaid this favor by describing what
he had seen.

Leonard McNally intervened at his client's request.
"Did you hear any printed paper read?" he asked, refer-ring
to the Proclamation Emmet had written. Farrell
said he had heard part of it. "Was anything said .about the
French?"

"Not the smallest, as I heard," Farrell admitted: "they
said they had no idea as to French relief but to make it
good themselves."


ROBERT EMMET [I95]


McNally then asked him what the men said about the
Proclamation.

"The observation I heard, listening like another," Far-tell
said, "was that it was very good."

This was the one and only time Emmet asked his
lawyer to cross-examine a witness. He was anxious to
defend not his life, but his intentions and his principles.
Several times when Burrowes rose to cross-examine,
he stopped him, saying, "No, no. The man's speaking
truth."

Every so often McNally cross-examined on his own.
The evidence he extracted was always unfavorable to his
client.

The next witnesses were official: the soldiers and the
magistrate who had found the military supplies and
batches of the Proclamation. The long Proclamation,
"The Provisional Government to the People of Ireland,"
was read in its entirety.

As hours passed without a break, it was obvious to all
that only will power kept the prisoner, laden with
chains, from collapsing. A spectator slipped him a bit of
lavender, but he had held it to his nostrils only a moment
when the court ordered him to put it aside. "The smile
that crossed his face as it was taken from him was
slightly disdainful," someone commented.

More soldiers were called, and after them, John "Silky
Jock" Doyle, the old farmer at whose house Robert and
his friends had stayed on leaving Butterfield Lane. He
injected the only humor in the proceedings, when he
described how he had awakened from a drunken slum-ber
to find himself in bed with several "French generals"
in green and gold uniforms.

Joseph Palmer, the son of Robert's landlady at Harold


[96] Seven Famous Trials in History


Cross, was summoned next. Reluctantly he testified that
their lodger had gone by the name of "Mr. Hewitt." He
said, under questioning, that Major Sirr had come there
and arrested their lodger, and that the major had come
into his (Joseph's) room where he was lying sick in bed.
When he was asked if the prisoner was the person who
had been arrested, the young man hesitated. Only after
Robert smiled and nodded his head to him did Joseph
Palmer identify him.

Major Sirr was on the stand after that, describing in
glowing terms his own part in the prisoner's arrest.
When Mrs. Palmer's lodger tried to escape, Sirr said, he
"instantly ran to the back part of the house, as the
most likely part for him to get out at. I saw him going
off, and ordered a sentinel to fire, and then pursued my
self,
regardless of the order 	I
overtook the pris-
oner,
and he said, 'I surrender' . . ."

Of the entire trial, there was no part more agonizing
for Robert Emmet than when copies of Sarah's letters
were put on the table and excerpts read to the jury.
The presiding judge, Lord Norbury, offered with obvi-ous
malice to have other parts of the letters read if the
prisoner wished. The matter was not pursued, certainly
to avoid affront to Sarah's father.

When the prosecution had called all its witnesses, the
court gave the floor to Leonard McNally for his de-fense.
There was none, McNally said. His client had in-structed
him to make no observations on the vidence.
He presumed that the case was therefore dosed.

The second prosecuting attorney, William Conying-ham
Plunker, was visibly upset. A former friend of the
Emmet family, he had once called the English "in-vaders''
and sworn he would protect Ireland "with the


ROBERT EMMET


last drop of his blood." Like Barrister Curran, he had re-nounced
his former sympathies and, to prove his loyalty
to the Crown, had prepared a long speech of rebuttal to
Emmet's defense. Though Emmet had made no defense,
he insisted on delivering his speech anyway.

Much of it consisted of lofty praise of English rule.
"God and Nature have made the two countries essential
to each other," he said at one point, referring to Ireland
and Great Brkain, "let them cling to each other to the
end of time." In a dramatic finale, he pointed his finger at
Emmet and shouted, "His followers are a bloodthirsty
crew, incapable of listening to the voice of reason, and
equally incapable of obtaining rational freedom, if it were
wanting in this country, as they are of enjoying it."
Throughout, Emmet listened with a disdainful expres-sion.

"A masterly performance," Secretary Wickham
termed Plunket's address. Two months afterward he was
granted the coveted appointment of solicitor general,
and, much later, in 83o, he became Lord Chancellor of
Ireland.

It was nine o'clock; the court had convened for
twelve hours. Lord Norbury,.the presiding judge, did
the summation. The jury did not even leave the box.
After a few minutes of whispered consultation, the fore-man
addressed the court.

"My lords, I have consulted with my brother jurors,
and we are all of the opinion that the prisoner is guilty."

According to custom, the clerk asked whether the
prisoner had anything to say regarding why a judgment
of death should not be pronounced against him.

No, Emmet said, he had nothing to say on that point.
"But as to why my character should not be relieved


[x98] Seven Famous Trials in History


from the imputations and calumnies thrown out against
it I have much to say."

He had been standing for more than twelve hours in
chains without rest or refreshment, but his voice, when
he began speaking, was, according to witnesses, clear and
distinct, "perfect in its modulation and exquiske in its
cadences." What he said has become a classic, reprinted
everywhere. It was read by Abraham Lincoln by fire-light
in his Kentucky cabin, and it has served as an ex-ample
of oratory for innumerable young lawyers.*

"My Lords," he began, "I have no hopes that I can
anchor my character in the breast of this court. I only
wish your lordships will suffer it to float down your
memories until it has found some hospitable harbor to
shelter it from the storms with which it is at present buf-feted.
Were I to suffer only death after being adjudged
guilty I should bow in silence to the fate which awaits
me; but the sentence of the law which delivers my body
over to the executioner consigns my character to oblo-quy.

"A man in my situation has not only to encounter the
difficulties of fortune and the force of power over minds
which it has corrupted or subjected, but the difficulties
of established prejudice. The man dies, but his memry
lives, and that mine may not forfeit all claim to the re-spect
of my countrymen I seize upon this opportunity to


* There exist many versions of Emmet's speech. The government dis-totted
it for their own purposes and even Emmet's friends were guilty
of inserting their own thoughts in their own words. The version lcre
is given with the permission of Helen Landreth, author of The
mit of Robert Emmet, who thoroughly examined and analyzed
temporary documents to produce as accurately as anyone can deter-mine
Emmet's language and opinions.


IOS:T :T [99]


vindicate myself from some of the charges alleged against

me'I am charged with being an emissary of France. It is
alleged that I wished to sell the independence of my
country. No, I am no emissary, and my ambition was to
hold a place among the deliverers of my country, not in
profit, nor in power, but in the glory of the achieve-ment.
Never did I entertain the remotest idea of estab-lishing
French power in Ireland.

"Connection with France was indeed intended, but
only as far as mutual interest would sanction and require.
Were they to assume any authority inconsistent with the
purest independence it would be the signal for their de-struction.
We sought aid, and we sought it--as we had
assurances we should obtain it--as auxiliaries in war and
allies in peace.

"Were the French to come as invaders or enemies,
uninvited by the wishes of the people, I should oppose
them to the utmost of my strength. Yes, my country-men,
I should advise you to meet them upon the beach,
with a sword in one hand and a torch in the other. I
would meet them with all the destructive fury of war. I
would afftmate my countrymen to immolate them in
their boats before they had contaminated the soil of my
country. If they succeeded in landing, and if forced to
retire before superior discipline, I would dispute every
inch of ground, burn every blade of grass, and the last
entrenchment of liberty should be my grave. What I
could not do myself, if I should fall, I should leave as a
last charge to my countrymen to accomplish because I
should feel conscious that life, even more than death,
would be unprofitable when a foreign nation held my
country in subjection." (This latter statement applied,


[2oo] Seven Famous Trials in History


of course, as much to the English as to the French.)

"But it was not as an enemy that the succors of France
were to land. I looked, indeed, for the assistance of
France, but I wished to prove to France and to the
world that Irishmen deserved to be assisted, that they
were indignant to slavery, and ready to assist the inde-pendence
and liberty of their country!

"I wished to procure for my country the guarantee
which Washington procured for America! To procure
an aid which, by its example, would be as important as
its valor--disciplined, gallant, pregnant with science and
with experience, which would perceive the good, and
polish the rough points of our character. They would
come to us as strangers, and leave us as friends, after
sharing our perils, and elevating our destiny. These were
my objects, not to receive new taskmasters, but to expel
old tyrants!

"My object, and that of the Provisional Government,
was to effect a total separation between Great Britain
and Ireland--to make Ireland totally independent of
Great Britain, but not to let her become a dependent of
France."

Here the presiding judge, Lord Norbury, interrupted,
saying that the court was not there to listen to treason.
Emmet resumed mildly:

"When my spirit shall have joined those bands of
martyred heroes who have shed their blood on the scaf-fold
and in the field in defense of their country and of
virtue, this is my hope, that my memory may serve to
animate those who survive me.

"While the destruction of that government which up-holds
its dominion by impiety against the Most High,
which displays its power over man as over the beasts of


ROBERT EMMET [2OI]


the fields, which sets man upon his brother, and. lifts his
hand, in religion's name, against the throat of his brother
who believes a little more or less than the gOW-ernment
standard, which reigns amidst the cries of orphnans and
the widows it has made . . ."

Lord Norbury broke in at this point to comnent sar-castically
on "the massacres and murders comrraitted in
one night" by the men under Emmet's commaand. His
objection gave Emmet an opportunity to elabaorate on
the plight of his people.

"I swear by the throne of Heaven before which I
must shortly appear, by the blood of those nurdered
patriots who have gone before me, that my con,duct has
been governed only by the convictions I have uttered,
and by no other view than that of their cure, and the
emancipation of my country from the inhumar oppres-sion
under which it has so long and too patien-tly trav-ailed,
and that I confidently and assuredly h,,ope that
(wild and chimerical as it may appear) ther-e is still
strength and union enough in Ireland to accomLplish this
noble enterprise. Of this I speak with confidtence, of
intimate knowledge, and with the consolation that ap-pertains
to that confidence. Think not, my lortls, that I
say this for the petty gratification of giving you a transi-tory
uneasiness. A man who has never yet r'.aised his
voice to assert a lie will not hazard his character with
posterity by asserting a falsehood on a subject o impor-tant
to his country, and on an occasion like this.,. Yes, my
lords, a man who does not wish to have his epittph writ-ten
until his country is liberated will not leave it in the
power of envy to inpeach the probity which ! he means
to preserve even in the grave, to which tyra-nny here
Consigns him.


[202] Seven Famous Trials in History


"Again I say, that what I have spoken was not
tended for your lordships, whose situation I commiserate
rather than envy; my expressions were for my country-men.
If there be a true Irishman present, let my last
words cheer him in the hour of affliction .... "

Angrily, Lord Norbury said that the court could not
listen to a discourse of this kind. Emmet insisted quietly
on the right to say what he deemed to be important:

"I have always understood it to be the duty of a
judge, when a prisoner has been convicted, to pronounce
the sentence of the law. I have also understood that
judges sometimes think it their duty to hear with pa-tience
and to speak with humanity--to exhort the victim
of the law, and to offer with tender benignity his opin-ions
of the motives by which he was actuated in the
crime of which he was adjudged guilty. That a judge has
thought it his duty so to have done I have no doubt; but
where is the boasted freedom of your institutions, where
is the vaunted impartiality, clemency and mildness of
your courts of justice, if an unfortunate prisoner whom
your policy, and not justice, is about to deliver to the
hands of the executioner is not suffered to explain his
motives sincerely and truly, and to vindicate the prin-ciples
by which he was actuated?"

As he spoke on he moved about the prisoner's dock as
well as his chains would permit him. His body swayed
slightly and his gestures were eloquent.

"My lords, it may be a part of the system of angry
iustice to bow a man's mind by humiliation to the pur-posed
ignominy of the scaffold; but worse to me than
the purposed shame or the scaffold's terrors would be
the tame endurance of such foul and unfounded
tions as have been laid against me in this court.


"You, my lord, are a judge. I am the supposed culprit.
I am a man. You are a man also. By a revolution of
power we might change places, though we never could
change character. If I stand at the bar of this court and
dare not vindicate my character, 'what a arce is your
justice! If I stand at this bar and dare not vindicate my
character, ho-a, dare you calumniate it! Does the sen-tence
of death which your unhallowed policy inflicts
upon my body condemn my tongue to silence, and my
reputation to reproach? Your executioner may abridge
the period of my existence, but while I exist I shall not
forbear to vindicate my character and my motives from
aspersions; and as a man to whom fame is dearer than
life, I will make the last use of that life in doing justice
to that reputation which is to live after me, and which is
the only legacy I can leave to those I honor and love,
and for whom I am proud to perish. As men, my lords,
we must appear on the great day at one common tri-bunal,
and it will then remain for the Searcher of all
hearts to show a collective universe, who was engaged
in the most virtuous actions, or actuated by the purest
motives, my country's oppressors

Again Lord Norbury tried to silence him. He had had
a patient trial, the judge told him, but it was an insult to
the court to expect them to sit and listen to expressions
of treason. Robert Emmet, however, was not ready to
stop yet.

"My lords, will a dying man be denied the legal privi-lege
of exculpating himself in the eyes of the community
from a reproach thrown upon him during his trial, by
charging him with ambition, and attempting to cast away
for a paltry consideration the liberties of his country?
Why then insult me, or rather why insult justice by de

[2o4] Seven Famous Trials in History


manding of me why sentence of death should not be
pronounced against me. I know, my lords, that the form
prescribes that you should put the question; the form
also confers the answering. This, no doubt, may be dis-pensed
with and so might the whole ceremony of the
trial, since sentence was already pronounced at the
Castle before your jury was impaneled. Your lordships
are but the priests of the oracle, and I submit, but I insist
on the whole of the forms."

He paused, overcome with weariness. The court
urged him to proceed.

"I have been charged with that importance in the
efforts to emancipate my country as to be considered as
the keystone of the combination of Irishmen, or as it has
been expressed, 'the lifeblood and soul of this con-spiracy.'
You do me honor overmuch; you have given to
the subaltern all the credit of the superior. There are men
concerned in this conspiracy who are not only superior
to me, but even to your own conception of yourself, my
lord; men, before the splendor of whose genius and vir-tues
I should bow with respectful deference, and who
would not deign to call you friend--who would not dis-grace
themselves by shaking your bloodstained
hand .... "

This personal attack was more than Lord Norbury
could endure and he glared at Emmet, saying that it was
he who was responsible for the bloodshed.

"What, my lord," said Emmet in an incredulous tonc,
"shall you tell me on my passage to the scaffold, which
that tyranny of which you are only the intermediatc
minister has erected for my death--that I am account-able
for all the blood that has and will be shed in this
struggle of the oppressed and the oppressor? Shall you


ROBERT EMMET [2051


tell me this, and must I be so very a slave as not to repel
it?

"I do not fear to approach the Omnipotent Judge, to
answer for the conduct of my short life; and am I to
stand appalled here before a mere remnant of mortality?
Let no man dare, when I am dead, to charge me with dis-honor;
let no man taint my memory by believing that I
could be engaged in any cause but my country's liberty
and independence. The Proclamation of the Provisional
Government speaks my views. No inference can be tor-tured
from k to countenance barbarity or debasement. I
would not have submkted to a foreign oppression for
the same reason that I would have resisted tyranny at
home."

Lord Norbury interrupted again in a long discourse
intended to show how foolish Emmet had been to desert
his own high and safe social station.

"You, sir, had the honor to be a gentleman by birth,"
Norbury said in part, "and your father filled a respect-able
situation under the government. You had an eldest
brother whom death snatched away, and who when liv-ing
was one of the greatest ornaments of the bar. But
you have conspired with the profligate and abandoned,
and associated yourself with hostlers, bakers, butchers,
and such persons, whom you invited ro council when
you erected your provisional government. Your senti-ments
and your language are a disgrace to your friends,
your education, bur more particularly to your father,
who if alive would not countenance such opinions."

Emmet indignantly came to the defense of his father's


"If the spirits of the illustrious dead participate in the

of those who were dear to them in this transi

[206] Seven Famous Trials in History


tory scene, dear shade of my venerated father, look
down on your suffering son, and see has he for one mo-ment
deviated from those moral and patriotic principles
which you so early instilled into his youthful mind, and

for which he has now to offer up his life."

And now he had nearly finished.

"My lord, you are impatient for the sacrifice. The
blood you seek is not congealed by the artificial terrors
which surround your victim; it circulates warmly and
unruffled through its channels, and in a little time it will
cry to heaven. Be yet patient! I have but a few more
words to say. My ministry is ended. I am going to my
cold and silent grave; my lamp of life is nearly extin-guished.
I have parted from everything that vas dear to
me in this life for my country's cause, and abandoned
another idol I adored in my heart, the object of my af-fections.
My race is run. The grave opens to receive me,
and I sink into its bosom. I am ready to die. I have not
been allowed to vindicate my character. I have but one
request to make at my departure from this world. It is
the charity oJ' its silence.

"Let no man write my epitaph; for as no man who
knows my motives now dares vindicate them, let not
prejudice or ignorance asperse them. Let them rest in
obscurity and peace. Let my memory be left in oblivion,
and my tomb remain uninscribed, until other times nd
other men can do justice to my character. When my
country takes her place among the nations of the earth,

then, and not till then, let my epitaph be written.

"I have done."

It was over. Lord Norbury pronounced the expected
death sentence. The prisoner was taken to Newgate
prison and given a meal, but immediately afterward was


ROBERT EMMET [207]


transferred to Kilmainham under heavy guard. Ex-hausted
as he was, he spent part of the night writing let-ters,
one to Sarah, which was never delivered, and an-other
to Secretary Wi&ham, thanking him in veiled
terms for not having Sarah's name mentioned at the trial.
Then he slept.

The next morning Leonard McNally was allowed to
visit him.

"How is my mother?" he asked his lawyer.

When McNally evaded his question, Robert Emmet
repeated it, adding, "What would I not give to see her!"

The lawyer who had so constantly betrayed him
pointed heavenward. "You will see her this day."

Emmet was staggered for a moment but then gained
control of himself. "It is better so," he said.

A few hours later the sheriff came to get him. Emmet
told him he had one last request, that he might die in his
green and white uniform. It was impossible, the sheriff
said. Shrugging, Emmet admitted he had not expected
the request to be granted but that he still wanted it re-membered
that he had wished it.

To his }ailer, George Dunn, and the prison governor,
Edward Trevor, he said good-by politely, entrusting to
them two more letters, one to his brother, Thomas
Addis, and the other to young Richard Curran, Sarah's
brother. Both were filled with his great love for her.
Then he walked out with the sheriff and his guard to the
waiting carriage.

It moved slowly between rows of silent spectators and
stopped at St. Catherine's Church on Thomas Street.

In front of the church a crude gallows had been
erected. From a high transverse beam a noose dangled
about five feet above a single narrow plank. Emmet, his


[2o8] Seven Famous Trials in History


hands tied behind his back, was helped up a ladder to the
plank. He looked down at the thousands who stood
neath him and he spoke his last words:

"My friends, I die in peace, and with sentiments of
universal love and kindness toward all men."

They pulled a black cap over his head and placed the
noose around his neck. Then the executioner kicked the
plank off its ledge. When the body finally hung linp and
lifeless, he cut it down, laid it on the platform, and with
a blow of a butcher's knife severed the head. "This is the
head of Robert Emmet, a traitor," he shouted over and
over in a monotonous tone as he held it high.

The assembled crowd slowly dispersed. Some stray
dogs slipped up to lick the pools of blood. A sergeant
beat them away with his gun butt. He pretended not to
notice when some women timidly crept forth to dip
their handkerchiefs in the blood.

Robert Emmet, the young man who hoped to make
Ireland free, was dead. The memory of Robert Emmet
and his love, Sarah Curran, lives on, forever dear, in the
hearts of his Irish countrymen.


THE
	D REYFUS
	AFFAIR


On the mornin of October x S, x894, Captain Alfred
Dreyfus, probavion staff officer of the French General
Staff, left his home on the Avenue du Trocadero and
walked along thc wharves of the Seine the short distance
to the Ministry-- of War headquarters on Rue Saint-Dominique.
He was a slender man of thirty-five, with
light brown hai already thinning across his high fore-head
and blue, nearsighted eyes that peered straight
ahead through imless glasses. Though he was not a



rawny, athletic type of man, even in civilian clothes his
earing and carr':iage were proof enough of his military
training.

The sun had not yet dissipated the soft gray haze
.hanging over th river. There was an autumn crispness
m the air. The clhestnut trees along the boulevards were
discarding their rmaany-pronged leaves. It was a morning


[2 2 ] Seven Famous Trials in History


to make a man count his blessings, and Captain Dreyfus
had many to count.

He was happily married to a loving and loyal wife. He
had two charming children, three-year-old Pierre and the
baby, Jeanne. Unlike many of his fellow officers, he had
no financial worries. A sizable private income supple-mented
his modest army pay. He was well launched on
the military career he had desired since childhood.

Now he was headed for an inspection at the Ministry
where he had been summoned to appear in mufti (civil-ian
dress) at nine o'clock. The summons was unusual but
he did not think of questioning it. The first lesson in the
army is to obey without asking why. He was on time at
the Ministry office.

A fellow officer, the handsome and intelligent young
Major Georges Picquart, was waiting for him. Picquart
had passed his probation period and was a regular Staff
member. He had never been very friendly wkh Dreyfus,
but then, neither had any of the other officers. Dreyfus
kept to himself and did not invite intimacy. That he was
Jewish, at a time when the poison of anti-Semitism was
being widely disseminated, also set him apart.

After a brief and formal greeting, Picquart escorted
Dreyfus into the office of General le Mouton de Bois-deffre,
chief of the General Staff.

To Dreyfus' disappointment, the general was not
there. He liked De Boisdeffre and felt indebted to him.
Several years before, the general had paid a visit to thc
Ecole de Guerre, where Dreyfus was then studying to
be an officer, and had listened to the students discuss
artillery positions. The views expressed by young Drcv-fus
had so impressed De Boisdeffre that, to the astonish

THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [2I3]


rnent of the other students and instructors, he had taken
lirn out for a walk and urged him to elaborate his ideas.
Dreyfus firmly believed that his later appointment to the
select General Staff was due only to the general's rec-ommendation.

There were three civilians in his office and one officer,
the Iarquis, Major du Paty de Clam, a tall, baldish fussy
man who wore a monocle and sported a tiny mustache.
The major was a member of the Third Bureau of the
General Staff. (It should be explained that the General
Staff, which was France's central military organization,
had four bureaus in all. The first dealt with army maneu-vers;
the second, with espionage; the third, that of Major
du Paty, with military operations and training; the
fourth, with military transportation. The probation of-ricers,
who were still learning the routine of the Gen-eral
Staff, usually served on each bureau in turn.)

"The General will be here shortly," Du Paty in-formed
Dreyfus curtly, "I have a bad thumb and will
appreciate your writing a letter for me while we are
waiting."

The general never did appear.

Dreyfus took a chair at a small desk and wrote down
the maior's dictation, a series of disconnected phrases.
The maior came to the words, "A note on the hydraulic
brake of the zomm. gun," then stopped and glared at
the captain.

"You are trembling."

"Am I?" Dreyfus looked up and shrugged. "Perhaps
nay fingers are cold."

"Watch yourself, this is a serious matter." Du Paty
scowled at him and continued: "Some modifications will


[2 4] Seven Famous Trials in History


be introduced by the new plan .... A note concern.
ing Madagascar . . . The provisional Firing Manual for
Field Artillery . . . I am off to maneuvers . . ."

What was it all about? Dreyfus understood nothing.
Suddenly the major rose, assumed a theatrical pose,
and shouted, "Captain Dreyfus, I arrest you in the name
of the law. You are accused of high treason!"

Had he gone mad? The captain sprang to his feet, so
shocked he could only stammer incoherently. The three
civilians, who were really policemen, gathered around
him. All were making incredible accusations, insisting
that he must confess.

Confess to what? "Show me the proof of the infamy
you pretend I have committed," Dreyfus said, when he
finally gained control of his voice.

"The proofs are overwhelming." The major drew out
his revolver and placed it on the table before Dreyfus.
The gesture meant that for the honor of the army that
he was being accused of betraying, he should shoot
himself.

Dreyfus refused to touch it. "But I am innocent .... "
Another officer came in--Major Hubert Joseph
Henry of the Second, or Intelligence, Bureau. He was a
huge man with a broad red face, a low forehead, and
small, sly, closely-set eyes. The snobbish officers avoided
Henry because of his peasant background. Inordi-nately
ambitious, Henry was willing to grovel for the
crumbs of social recognition.

The questioning was over. Du Paty dismissed Dreyfts
with a vindictive glance and ordered Henry to acco-pany
the "prisoner" to Cherche~Midi prison. In the cab
Dreyfus, still bewildered, asked Major Henry what it
was all about.


THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [2IsI


"! haven't the slightest idea," Henry lied.

A cell had been prepared for him at the prison. A
guard left him alone there with the nightmare that had
become a reality. In the space of a few hours the world
he had known and loved had vanished, leaving him only
walls of stone and bars of iron. He had never been an
emotional person, but the shock was too much for him.
He screamed his rage at the top of his lungs and
smashed himself against the walls.

His cries evoked the sympathy of the prison governor,
Major Forzinetti, who could not believe that such a man
was a desperate spy. But he had been ordered to keep the
imprisonment a secret and there was nothing he could
do.

For three days the captain was left in solitude, unable
to connunicate with his wife or anyone at all from the
outside world. It was the beginning of a fearful ordeal
that was to last twelve years.


Alfred Dreyfus, the youngest of seven children, three
girls and four boys, was born in the textile town of Mul-house,
in Alsace, on October 9, x859' His father was the
head of a prosperous cotton spinning mill. When he was
eleven, the Franco-Prussian War of 87o broke out.
From his window the boy watched the thrilling sight of
the French cavalry riding to battle on their fine steeds.
Later he suffered the torment of the Prussian occupa-tion.
It was then that he resolved he would become a
soldier and help restore France to her glory.

At the end of the war Alsace was ceded to Germany.
Dreyfus senior, a patriot, preferred exile to German
rule and moved to Switzerland, leaving his oldest son,
Jacques, to manage the Mulhouse factory. Eventually


[26]


Seven Famous Trials in History


Jacques was joined by the other two older brothers,
Mathieu and Lon. Alfred, with no taste for business,
persuaded his father to sponsor his training as a French
army officer.

His choice meant many years away from home, first
at the Collge Sainte Barbe in Paris, and then on to the
military school, Ecole Polytechnique. He proved a bril-liant
scholar and won a reputation as a daring horseman
and a skilled fencer.

His studies absorbed him completely. The gay life of
Paris had no appeal for him. A mask of cold reserve
concealed his timidity and lack of social graces. His more
frivolous fellow students thought him a bore. That his
father died and left him an income amounting to about
five thousand dollars a year increased their resentment,
particularly because of his Jewish birth. Many of the
cadets belonged to the impoverished aristocracy who
found it convenient to blame the Jews for their finan-cial
difficulties. Happily for Dreyfus, he was too im-mersed
in his work to be aware of the antagonism he
inspired.

Following his graduation in 88o, he spent two
years in the Fontainebleau artillery school as a secod
lieutenant, and a year in a regiment at Mans as first lieu-tenant,
following which he was transferred back to
Paris. By 889, when he was thirty, he was a captai
serving in the Central School of Explosives at Bourges.

His brother Mathieu visited him there. He was dis-tressed
to find that Alfred was still a bachelor, so single-minded
he took no time to enjoy himself. In an effort to
expand his younger brother's horizons, he introduced
him to some friends, among them the Hademards, a


THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [217]


Jewish family of Bourges with a distinguished and schol-arly
background. They had an attractive daughter
named Lucie, a small, quiet girl with great dark eyes.
She proved an excellent listener for a young man who
had never before found anyone in whom to confide.
Soon Alfred was calling on her regularly. Sympathy
and friendship ripened into love and they were married
on April 2 , x 890.

On that same day he was notified of his admission to
the Ecole de Guerre, a top military school restricted to
candidates for the French General Staff. The honor was
a good omen for a marriage that was just starting.

The school was in Paris and after their honeymoon he
and Lucie went there to live. They were sublimely happy
together, finding no need for companionship other than
their own. Dreyfus was now competing with the most
brilliant young officers of France, working as he never
had before. Lucie, gentle and unobtrusive, never ob-jected
to his long hours.

During his second year at the Ecole de Guerre, a
newspaper was launched, La Libre Parole (The Free
Word), edited by Edouard Drumont, a fanatical anti-Semite
who used the paper as a means of expounding his
theories of race hatred. Drumont had mastered a tech-nique
that would later be adapted by Adolf Hitler: If
you tell a big enough lie often enough, you will pass it
as the truth.

La Libre Parole spewed out its poison on all "non-Christians"
but was especially vicious in its attacks on
Jewish army officers, whom it claimed were all poten-tial
traitors. Overnight it had an enormous circulation.
Dreyfus often saw his fellow officers reading, and ap

[2 8] Seven Famous Trials in History


parently enjoying, this wretched sheet. He lived too
much in his own private world to consider the possibility
that its contents might ever affect him personally.

It was in his third year at the Ecole de Guerre that
General de Boisdeffre, head of the General Staff, singled
him out. In I893, just after the birth of his second child,
Jeanne, Captain Dreyfus was appointed to the General
Staff as a probationer. It was a magnificent triumph--a
triumph of which all French officers dream and which
few achieve. As soon as his probation period was over,
Dreyfus would be a regular General Staff member!
Nothing could alter that, or so he trustingly believed
until that hideous day he was arrested and charged with
betraying his own country.

How had it come about? Why had such a terrible
charge been made against a man who loved France more
than life itself?

The corrosive evil of La Libre Parole had seeped into
the General Staff headquarters; some of the officers
were furious at the admission of a Jew to their inner
circle. Colonel Jean Sandherr, head of the Second Bu-reau,
was so infected with the disease of anti-Semitism
that he labeled Dreyfus a "security risk," with the result
that he was not assigned to Sandherr's department but to
the First Bureau, dealing with maneuvers. In spite of this
discriminatory attitude, no one had anything definite
against this eager and ambitious young officer.

Ever since the Franco-Prussian War, espionage had
been a touchy matter with the top military echelon.
Relations with Germany were still uneasy, nor was
Italy trusted. Certain information had leaked out th:t
indicated an informer in a confidential post. There was
espionage going on, and there was also counterespionage


THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [29]


and counter-counterespionage. The situation had become
so complicated that even the Second Bureau sometimes
had difficulty figuring out who was in the pay of whom.

A German Embassy charwoman regularly turned
over to the Second Bureau the contents of the Embassy
wastebaskets, which were duly studied by Colonel Sand-herr
and his assistant, Major Henry. Once they inter-cepted
a message between the German Military Attache,
Colonel yon Schwarzkoppen, and the Italian Military
Attache, Lieutenant Colonel Pannizzardi, that read:

"Enclosed are twelve detail maps of Nice that the
Scoundred D left with me for you."

It was suspicious, but that was all. "Scoundrel
D "might not be a spy at all. If he was, it was a fair
certainty that his name did not begin with "D"-- secret
agents were not usually so stupid as to use their own
initials. Nonetheless, the message was filed for future
consideration.

Then one day came a thunderbolt. An officer named
Bruecker produced a sheet of lightweight graph paper,
handwritten on both sides, that he had rifled from the
incoming mail of German attache, Von Schwarzkoppen.
Written in French, it read:

"I have no news to indicate that you wish to see me;
however, I am sending you some interesting informa-tion.

". A note on the hydraulic brake of the 2omm. gun
and on the way it was found to work.

"2. A note on the supporting troops. Some modifica-tions
will be introduced by the new plan.

"3. A note on the modification of artillery forma-tions.

"4. A note concerning Madagascar.


[220] Seven Famous Trials in History


"5. The provisional Firing Manual for Field Artillery
(March 4, 894).

"This last document is extraordinarily difficult to pro-cure,
and I have it at my disposal only for a very few
days. The Minister of War has issued a limited number
to the corps, and the corps are responsible for them.
Each officer who has a copy has to send it back after the
maneuvers. If, therefore, you will take notes of what-ever
is of interest to you, and hold it at my disposal, I
shall take it back. That is, unless you want me to have
it copied in full and send you the copy. I am just off to
the maneuvers."

This document, called a bordereau, or schedule, was
to become world famous.

Here was proof that there was a spy within French
army circles, and it was written obviously in the spy's
own handwriting. Major Henry was away at the time.
Colonel Sandherr discussed the matter with a few of
his fellow officers. In the general excitement, they over-looked
the obvious fact that the information contained
in the bordereau was worthless to the Germans or any-one
else. For the honor of the army the spy had to be
identified.

Colonel D'Aboville of the Fourth Bureau suggested
that the informer might be a probationer--someone
who moved from bureau to bureau. The others accepted
his suggestion readily. Why not? The search .was nar-rowed.

A file of probation officers was brought forth. Thc?
went down the names until they reached the "D's," and
stopped short and looked at each other. Alfred Dreyfuss.
The Jew. But of course .... "The Scoundrel D. '

The matter of handwriting had to be considered next.


THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [2xI]


They took samples of Dreyfus' handwriting from his
personal file and compared them hopefully wkh the
writing of the bordereau. It was not difficult for them
to convince themselves there were similarities.

General de Boisdeffre, the Chief of the General Staff,
General Gonse, his deputy chief, and General Auguste
Mercier, the French Minister of War, were duly in-formed
of the existence of the bordereau and the due
as to its possible author. Major du Paty de Clam, who
seems to have relished melodramatic spy stories, made
himself part of the investigation. A handwriting expert,
a precise and careful banker named Monsieur Alfred
Gobert, was summoned and presented with the bor-dereau
along with samples of the handwriting of Cap-tain
Alfred Dreyfus.

His verdict was: "The bordereau could have been
written by a person other than the writer of the samples
submitted."

An evasive opinion that meant nothing, the Staff of-ricers
decided in annoyance. They dismissed Gobert and
sent for the celebrated Monsieur Alphonse Bertillon.
Bertillon is known for his system of identifying crimi-nals
according to the bone structure of their skulls,--a
system then being used by police departments all over
the world. Because of this weird "anthropometric"
method of criminal detection, fingerprinting was denied
official acceptance for some twenty years. Bertillon also
considered himself an authority on handwriting, on the
basis of a system of numbers and symbols so complex
that no one could grasp what it was all about.

When they instructed Bertillon to compare the two
handwritings, the General Staff officers took the pre-caution
of assuring him they had overwhelming proof


[2 2 2 ] Seven Famous Trials in History


that the same person was the author of both. Bertillon
did not take it on himself to contradict military opinion.
He worded his conclusion:

"If the hypothesis is discarded that the author of the
bordereau forged another's handwriting while prepar-ing
it, it appears to be manifest that the identical person
wrote both the samples and the incriminating docu-ment.''

General Mercier, the Minister of War, and the Gen-eral
Staff officers decided that Bertillon's ambiguous
statement implicated Dreyfus sufficiently to warrant his
arrest. For reasons of their own, they ignored evidence
that indicated he could not have been involved. Drey-fus
had not been "off to maneuvers," as the bordereau
stated. Also, the bordereau had certain Germanic twists
of phrasing, whereas Dreyfus wrote flawless French.
When Major Henry returned from his leave, he was
brought up to date about what had happened. It is pos-sible
he knew at once the true author of the' bordereau.
No one was ever sure on this point. But from then on,
no one on the Staff was more vehement against Dreyfus
than he.

Dreyfus was summoned to the Ministry, accused, ar-rested,
taken to prison. On the same day .Major du Paty
de Clam paid a call on Lucie Dreyfus.

"Madame, I have a very sad mission to fulfill," he told

her.

	Her dark eyes widened in fear. "My husband is dead?"

	"No, worse than that . . . he is in prison 	You

must
tell no one."
She
assured him calmly it must be a mistake, her hus.-band could
not have done anything wrong. She pleaded

THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [223]


to see him, but the major flatly refused. He ordered her
apartment searched, hoping to find graph paper like
that on which the bordereau had been written, or other
incriminating material. There was nothing.

After Dreyfus had been in prison three days, Major
du Paty began visiting him in his cell, behaving in the
most peculiar manner. He ordered Dreyfus to write let-ters,
standing, sitting down, lying down, and with his
gloves on. Once he arrived at night, flashing his lantern
in the prisoner's face, as though to surprise an expression
of guilt. Another time he brought a photostat of the
bordereau, tore it in pieces, mixed the pieces with photo-stats
of the captain's own handwriting, and demanded
that he separate the two. Dreyfus did as he was told
without a mistake. Human company, even that as un-pleasant
as the snobbish marquis, had brought him back
to his senses. Now he saw his arrest as merely a case of
mistaken identity. Soon his name would be cleared ....

On October 29, when he had been in prison two
weeks, an item appeared in La Libre Parole: "Is it a fact
that on orders from the military a very important arrest
has been made? The prisoner is accused of high treason.
If this news is true, why the silence?"

It was Major Henry who had sent the query to the
editor, Edouard Drumont, through a mutual friend, one
Major Esterhazy, about whom there will be more later.
Soon all the rabid elements in Paris were proclaiming
that a Jewish officer was guilty of treason, that he had
confessed, that absolute proofs were held against him.
Drumont, with his usual neglect of truth, blasted Gen-eral
Mercier, the Minister of War, as "irresponsible" for
trying to hush up the matter.


[224] Seven Famous Trials in ttistory


Under this pressure, Mercier, who had previously
been lukewarm about Dreyfus, promised an immediate
trial.

Lucie, released of her promise of silence to Du Pat-y,
wired her husband's brothers in Alsace. llathieu, who
was closer to Alfred than the others, took the next train
to Paris. Like Lucie, he knew that his younger brother
could not be guilty of the slightest indiscretion. They
went together to see an elderly Catholic lavyer of great
integrity named Edgar Demange. Demange first refused
to take the case because the army was involved, but
changed his mind when he learned the flinsy evidence
on which the charge was based and the role of racial
hatred in prejudging the accused.

The trial began on December x9, x895, in a gloomy
courtroom at the H&el du Cherche-Midi, not far from
the prison. Seven officers served as both judges and jury.
Colonel Maurel, who had the highest rank, was the
.presiding judge. Major du Paty was there, as were Ma-jor
Henry and General Gonse. The handsome Major
Georges Picquart represented General Mercier. Picquart
took it for granted, like the others, that Dreyfus was
guilty. Demange represented Dreyfus, and the prosecut-ing
attorney was a Captain Brisset. There were three
handwriting experts, including Bertillon. The press was
there and a scattering of the general public.

Dreyfus, in his full-dress uniform, held himself at at-tention
as a soldier should. When he was asked to give
his name, rank, and address, his naturally high-pitched
voice cracked, creating an unfavorable impression. This
weakening of his voice happened sometimes when he
was upset.


Demange took the floor, intending to point out to the
press that the bordereau was the only official evidence
against the prisoner. Before he could complete his state-ment,
the trial was declared secret and the press and pub-lic
dismissed. Demange guessed then what the decision
would be, but Dreyfus himself was only puzzled. The
newspapers had unjustly condemned him in advance of
his trial. Why should journalists be forbidden to hear
the testimony that would clear his reputation?

His nervousness left him when the questioning be-gan.
He explained why he could not have known about
the x2omm, gun and the other items on the borderecru,
and that the statement, "I am off to maneuvers" could
not have applied to him since General Staff proba-tioners
did not go to maneuvers. He said he had re-nounced
wealth and comfort for a military career and
that he was happy in his family life; it would have been
folly to risk all he had to betray his country.

Major du Paty de Clam was called to the witness
stand. He stressed that Dreyfus had trembled when the
bordereau was dictated to him. At what phrase had the
witness trembled? Demange asked. The major, fearing a
trap, glared and refused to answer. Later on he popped
up again to say he had figured out a motive for Dreyfus'
treachery. The Dreyfus factory in Mulhouse had burned
down. A German company had insured it. Could it be
that the payment given Dreyfus as compensation was in
excess of the damage? Even the prejudiced judges looked
skeptical at this far-fetched theory.

The questioning of Dreyfus resumed. He made his an-swers
as complete as possible, and he spoke without
hesitating. The court's first session ended with his tesfi

[226] Seven Famous Trials in History


mony. All in all, things looked hopeful for him, too
hopeful to suit the already deeply committed Ministry of
War.

That night General Mercier and Colonel Sandherr
prepared a brief from material furnished by Major du
Paty de Clam, aimed to raise doubts about Dreyfus' char-acter.
It included the "Scoundrel D ." letter and even
scraps retrieved by the charwoman from the German
Embassy wastebasket that might, by a long stretch of
the imagination, indicate a spy was at work. The brief
was sealed in an envelope, along with a note to the court
that it be given to the judges ater the testimony was
concluded. In so doing, the military had placed itself
above the law, since it is contrary to legal procedure to
introduce evidence without the knowledge of the de-fendant
and his lawyer.

The next day several fellow officers of Captain Drey-fus
were brought to the stand. Few had anything good
to say about him. Some claimed they had been suspi-cious
of him because he wanted to know too much.
Others suggested he had used his money to win the favors
of young women. Their testimony showed that he was
unpopular with them, but not that he had betrayed his
country.

The testimony of the three handwriting experts was
divided. Bertillon confused everyone with an involved
dissertation on how certain differences between the hand-writing
of Dreyfus and that of the bordereau might indi-cate
that Dreyfus had disguised his handwriting.

Major Henry was summoned as a witness. The huge
peasant had planned a dramatic stratagem. The previous
March, he declared loudly, an unimpeachable personage
had informed him there was a traitor in the War Minis

THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [227]


try. In June, the same person had repeated his warning.
He paused, stood up, turned, pointed to Dreyfus, and
shouted, "There is the traitor!"

Dreyfus jumped to his feet in protest. His lawyer,
Demange, demanded to know the name of the "unim-peachable
personage," pointing out that under Article
ioi of French law, the accused had the right to be faced
with his accuser. Henry refused. "There are secrets in an
officer's head that even his kepi [his officer's cap] must
not know," he said mysteriously.

The presiding judge, Colonel Maurel, intervened.
They would not insist on the name of his informant, he
stated blandly, if Major Henry would swear on his
honor that this person had told him the traitor was Cap-tain
Dreyfus.

Henry raised his hand toward the crucifix and said, "I
swear it."

Only Dreyfus himself knew positively that he was
lying.

Henry's statement, plus the nebulous material in the
sealed envelope that Maurel had read to his fellow
judges, produced the desired effect. On December 22,
the third day of the trial, Dreyfus was pronounced
guilty. He was condemned to dishonorable discharge
from the army and deportation for the rest of his life.

"At last I am approaching the end of my sufferings,"
Dreyfus had written Lucie the day before the trial. The
day after the decision, his letter was concerned only

with her: "I pity you more than myself 	Your

heart
must bleed."
The
dreadful ceremony for the dishonorable discharge took
place on January 5, in the courtyard of the Ecole Militaire.
A mob gathered in front of the school. They

[8]


Seven Famous Trials in HistOry


were so disorderly that a double line of guards lad to be
stationed in the quadrangle. Soldiers from every regi-ment
of the Paris garrison were assembled in military
precision around the courtyard. A trumpet sounded and
a sergeant of the guard marched in, leading four soldiers
with drawn swords. Dreyfus walked between them. His
face was drawn and he marched rigidly, like a marlo~
nette. The group came to a halt before General Paul
Darras, who was waiting on horseback.

The general pronounced the fearful words: "Alfred
Dreyfus, you are unworthy of carrying arms."

Choking, Dreyfus called out with all his strength, "An
innocent is dishonored. Long live France!"

An adjutant sergeant tore the epaulets from his shoul-ders
and wrenched from his trousers the red stripes that
marked him as a General Staff officer. Then he took
Dreyfus' sword and broke it in two. Shorn of his cher-ished
insignia, Dreyfus was marched between two lines
of officers, his face distorted by his mighty effort to con-ceal
his suffering. As he passed, a fanatic young officer
stepped forward and struck him on the cheek with the
hilt of his sword, leaving a bloody gash.

"I am innocent," Dreyfus shouted at regular intervals.
"Long live France!"

The spectacle moved even the hostile spectators and
they fell silent.

A few days later he was taken to the port of La
Rochelle with a trainload of convicts. A rumor spread at
the station that the "traitor" was aboard, and a crowd
gathered, muttering threats of violence. The guards kept
him in his cramped cell until nightfall when they risked
bringing him from the train. The moment he appeared,
the mob was cursing and striking him.


THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [229]


He stood quite still, making no attempt to defend him-self.
Had he been in their place, he told himself, he would
have felt as they did. Against his wishes, his guards
sprang to his assistance. They had their orders and
could not allow him this easy escape from his misery.

On February 2x, 895, he was put on board a prison
ship bound for Devil's Island off the Coast of Guiana.
He was chained to the floor in a felon's cell in the fore-castle.
Tortured by hunger and cold he was tormented
even more by mental agony. For hours at a time he wept.

Devil's Island is a rock some two miles long and four
hundred yards wide. Its climate is so foul that even an
attempt to raise goats there failed. At one time a leper
colony had occupied the island, but now the lepers were
gone and their cabins burned. Here Dreyfus arrived on
April I3, condemned to be the island's sole prisoner for
as long as he lived.

His lodging was a stone hut some thirteen feet square,
specially built for him. It had a small room at one end
where a guard was constantly on duty. The guards had
orders never to speak to him and never to let him out of
their sight. In his first months he was permitted to walk
beneath the blistering tropical sun in the bleak, treeless
area beyond his hut. He prepared his own meager meals,
using tin cans as dishes, washed and mended his clothes,
cleaned his quarters.

Whatever he did, he was never beyond the shadow of
his armed and silent guards. He was cut off from his fel-low
men, and yet he was never alone. Of all his hard-ships,
the lack of privacy was the worst. Eyes were al-ways
watching him.

His one solace came from Lucie's letters, which ar-rived
regularly on the fortnightly ship. "Let us hope that


[230] Seven Famous Trials in Histor:y


we have finally surmounted the most arduous Stage of
our calvary, and that the future holds only happiness." "I
am convinced that with a will of iron.., untiring
perseverance, we can overcome every difficulty." "I have
ever before my eyes your beloved face." Only her words
gave him the courage to live.

After an eternity of eighteen months, he was abruptly
confined solely to his hut and at night placed in double
irons attached to his bed in such a way that it was im-possible
for him to move. Night after night he lay sleep-less
in the sweltering heat, harassed by vermin, his ankles
chafed and bleeding from the fetters. Bitterly he told
himself that he had reached the limit of human suffering.

The double irons were the inspiration of the Colonial
minister, Andr LeBron, who had taken literally an ad-ministrative
order to employ every "measure of safety"
to prevent his important prisoner from escaping. In later
years Dreyfus forgave nearly everyone connected with
his misfortunes but he could never forgive LeBron. This
cruel torture lasted forty-four consecutive nights.

Other "measures of safety" were instituted. A double
wall was built around his cabin. The nearest one was
eight feet high and five feet from his windows, cutting
out both light and air. The other, of thick planks of
wapa trees, enclosed a space about 30 feet long and 55
feet wide. At infrequent intervals he was allowed to
exercise on this narrow walk that did not even give him
the comfort of a glimpse of the sea.

The packages of books and periodicals from his
brother Matthieu ceased coming. Lucie's letters came
less frequently; sometimes he received only cut and man-gled
copies. Often he was ill with dysentery or with at-tacks
of cerebral congestion. He suffered from bites of


TH] DI]YFUS AFFAIR


enormous mosquitoes, from the enervating heat, from
insomnia. A prison physician who visted him in April,
897, reported his poor health and also that the long un-broken
silence had made it difficult for him to speak.
,'Sentences no longer come readily ··· he is obliged to
repeat himself to convey a thought."

To keep his sanity he studied English by translating
passages from Shakespeare, or reconstructed from mem-ory
problems in integral and differential calculus.

From France had come rumors of a plot to rescue the
prisoner Dreyfus. Unfounded and fantastic as these ru-mors
were, his captors increased the number of his guards
from five to thirteen. Guards were placed on his roof
and along the palisade, and as a further precaution were
encouraged to inform on one another. An observation
tower was built, topped with a Hotchkiss gun, kept
loaded and pointed toward the sea. No ship was allowed
nearer than three miles {rom shore. The men on night
duty marched back and forth constantly, and the meas-ured
tread of their wooden shoes was an added torment
to the sleepless prisoner. Triangular panels were placed
over the iron grating of his windows. Half-suffocated in
his darkened cell, Dreyfus choked and coughed, unable
to breathe the fetid and noisome air.

While the French Government was spending enor-mous
sums to guard one heartsick, weakened man, it
seemed to Alfred Dreyfus that the whole world had for-gotten
him. The very opposite was true. His first trial
was only the prologue to a mighty drama, involving
other trials, duels, upsets in government, suicides, and
even murder.

About a year after Dreyfus had been sent to his earthly
hell, Colonel Sandherr, chief of the Second Bureau, suf

[z32] Seven Famous Trials in History


fered a paralytic stroke. Major Henry was sure that in
reward for his loyalty he would be promoted to Sand-herr's
place. The appointment went instead to Georges
Piequart, now a lieutenant colonel. This efficient and
intelligent man gradually began to make order out of
the disorder of the colossal files on spies and counter-spies.

Before Sandherr left his post, he had shown Picquart
the safe in which the secret file on Dreyfus was kept--the
material shown to the seven judges but to no one
else--advising him not to touch it, that it was best "to
let sleeping dogs lie." Later, General de Boisdeffre ad-vised
Picquart to study the Dreyfus file. De Boisdeffre
had not forgotten his first favorable impression of Drey-fus.
If Picquart could figure out why such a man had
committed treason, he said, it would help him in his other
Intelligence work. Picquart, looking over the secret file,
was shocked at the meagerness of the evidence against
the condemned man.

Fifteen months after the Dreyfus case had been marked
officially closed, a member of the Second Bureau brought
Picquart the latest result of its espionage--a special de-livery
letter of the type known in Paris as a petit bleu
(literally, a "little blue thing") because of its color. It
was written by a woman friend of the German Military
Attache, Von Schwarzkoppen, but not mailed, and was
addressed to a French artillery officer--Major Count
Ferdinand Walsin-Esterhazy.

Who was this Major Esterhazy? Picquart was curious
and did a little investigating. What he learned set him
wondering further. Then, by an odd coincidence, he re-ceived
an application for service on the General Staff
from this same Major Esterhazy.


THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [z33]


As he read it over it occurred to him that he had seen
this spidery handwriting before. He looked up the bor-dereau.
Unable to accept the evidence of his own eyes,
he summoned Berrillon and asked his opinion. For once
this handwrking "expert" made no long speeches. "This
is the man who wrote the bordereau," he said simply.

Picquart went immediately to General de Boisdeffre
to report that Esterhazy, not Dreyfus, had written the
bordereau. "Well, we were wrong, weren't we?" the
general conceded. He advised Picquart to take the matter
up wkh General Gonse.

It was then that Lieutenant Colonel Picquart had the
greatest shock of his hkherto uncomplicated life. "You
should have kept the two cases separated," General
Gonse snapped. "The Dreyfus case is closed."

The Dreyfus family did not think it was closed, Pic-quart
reminded him. They were still trying to have it
reopened.

"What do you care for this Jew anyhow?" Gonse de-manded.

Picquart stared at him in amazement. "But he is in-nocent!"

"If you keep silent, no one need find out anything,"
Gonse said.

"General," cried Picquart, "what you say is abomina-ble.
I do not yet know what I am going to do. But I will
not carry this secret to my grave." He must have guessed
that he was signing a death warrant to his own military


Maior Esterhazy was not arrested. He was not even
questioned.

A few months later, the government released a state-ment
to the Paris newspaper, L'Eclair, saying that now


[234] Seven Famous Trials in History


that the need for secrecy was past, the real proof of the
guilt of Alfred Dreyfus could be revealed: a letter from
the German Military Attach to his Italian counterpart
that included the words, "Decidedly, this beast of a
Dreyfus has been demanding." So confidential was this
letter, the statement continued, that it had been handed
secretly to the judges of the Dreyfus trial. Not even
Dreyfus' defense attorney had known about it.

Edgar Demange, Dreyfus' lawyer, read the newspa-per
story with excitement. He had no idea that the letter

referred to mentioned only "Scoundrel D 	,"
not
"this
beast of a Dreyfus." No one knew that except a
few
Staff officers. But as a lawyer he recognized at once
what Georges
?icquart did not realizemthat the trial had
been illegal
since evidence had been introduced without
informing the
accused or his lawyer. At last he had a
basis on
which to ask for a new trial.
Lucie and Mathieu
Dreyfus were overjoyed at this
hopeful news. Lucie
appealed to the Pope and to the
French Chamber of
Deputies for support. There was no
response from either.
Then Mathieu persuaded a young
literary critic named
Bernard Lazare to write a pamphlet
about his brother's
case, so far as the facts were known.
Called A Judicial
Error, it was published in Belgium to
avoid persecution. Copies
were sent to the press and to
important people. There
was no evidence it did any
good. It was
suspect in any case, since it was sponsored
by the family
of the accused.
The one man
who knew the truth--and wanted to
tell it--was removed
beyond temptation, or so his superiors
believed. Lieutenant
Colonel Georges Picquart
had been sent
on an inspection tour of the eastern fron-

',
	TH] DREYFUS AFFAIR [23S]


fier by General Gonse. From there he was ordered to

Ite Italian frontier, and then on to Algiers and Tunisia.

! In Picquart's absence, Major Henry was acting head

of the Second Bureau. Henry took it on himself to start

a "Picquart file," which he filled with a mass of material

intended to compromise his missing chief. Since Pic
quart's
record was impeccable, this required considera
ble
invention on Henry's part, including steaming open

Picquart's mail and pasting and dipping excerpts in an

ittempt to distort the truth. The monocled Major du

Paty helped him in this game. On his own, Henry also

began making additions to the Dreyfus file, for which he

enlisted the aid of a skilled forger, Lemercier-Picard.

In his exile, Piequart became annoyed at the irregulari
ity
with which he received his mail and wrote to find

out what had happened. In reply he received an inco
herent
blast from Major Henry, accusing him of incom
petency,
of willful wrongdoing, of opening letters to

Major Esterhazy without authorization, and of making

public the secret Dreyfus file. The hysterical letter made

clear to the exile the depths of the plot in which he had

become involved. He could no longer doubt the real

reason why he had been sent away, or that his enemies

would stop at nothing.

Shortly after this Picquart fell from his horse. He was

not hurt, but the fall struck him as a warning. He had

told General Gonse he would not carry the secret to his

grave. The long fight between his conscience and his

duty as an officer was almost over.

That night he wrote out a statement in which he said

that Major Esterhazy was a German agent, that acts

charged to Dreyfus had been committed by Esterhazy,


[236] Seven Famous Trials in History


and that Dreyfus had been tried with a preconceived
judgment of his guilt. Two months later, when he
finally obtained leave and could return briefly to Paris,
he gave the statement to his lawyer and friend, Louis
Leblois, with instructions that in case of his death it
should go to the President of the French Republic.

Leblois, an upright and honorable man, could not rest
knowing the horrible secret that an innocent man had
been condemned as guilty. Before Picquart left, he won
his consent to reveal as much of the story as possible
without mentioning Picquart's name. As his confidant,
Leblois chose the esteemed and venerable senator from
Alsace, Vice President of the Senate, Auguste Scheurer-Kestner.

Scheurer knew the fine reputation of the Dreyfus
family in Alsace and had already suspected that the
charge against Dreyfus might be based on anti,Semitism.
Without the name of the officer who had supplied the
information about Esterhazy he could do nothing offi-cially,
but he did hint to the President of the Senate that
there was new evidence of Dreyfus' innocence. His in-discretion
boomeranged. The press heard about it, called
Scheurer a "dummy of a syndicate of Jews," suggested
he ought to take a seat in the Prussian Parliament, and
attacked his private life.

In the meantime, the Paris newspaper, Le Matin, had
a scoop. From one of the handwriting experts, they got
hold of a photostat of the bordereau, which they re-produced
under the headline "The Proof." Mathieu Drey-fus
and Bernard Lazare promptly prepared a second edi-tion
of A Judicial Error, including this famous document
as it had appeared in Le Matin, along with testimony


from their own handwriting expert as to why i- could
not have been written by Alfred Dreyfus.

Shortly after its publication, a stockbroker named
Castro called on Mathieu Dreyfus, saying that Be rec-ognized
the handwriting of the bordereau. In t3act, he
had had some rather unfortunate business dealings with
the man who had written it. He produced som letters
signed by Major Count Ferdinand Walsin-Esterhazy.

It was a glorious moment for Mathieu and Luci Drey-fus.
Now, at last, the name of the true criminal c )uld be
brought forth and the name of their loved one leared.
Or so they thought, little guessing that the War 12)epart-ment
already knew about Esterhazy. By the French
criminal code, a private citizen with knowledge of a
crime can bring a charge and the charge must:: be in-vestigated.
Accordingly, on November 15, 897, i'Mathieu
Dreyfus charged Esterhazy with being the autho-r of the
bordereau.

Major Count Ferdinand Walsin-Esterhazy--w,.,ho was
he? His full story was not pieced together unil later.
Born in France of an aristocratic Hungarian fawnily, he
had been orphaned at an early age and had SlOent his
childhood and youth at Austrian military schoaols. He
had served in the Austrian army and the Papal army be-fore
becoming a French officer. There he accluired a
reputation for extravagance, gambling, drinkiag, and
Women. He married into the French aristocracy and
Soon squandered his wife's dowry. From then or-4 he was
always in debt, always engaging in more or le.s shady
business deals.

Somehow he became acquainted with Major' Henry
and, on learning he belonged to the Second Bureau,


[238] Seven Famous Trials in History


went out of his way to be friendly with the dull and
plodding fellow, inviting him to dinner, introducing him
to his friends (such as the anti-Semitic editor, Drumont),
and doing other favors for him, including translating
certain foreign documents that came into the Second
Bureau. Henry, scorned by his fellow General Staff offi-cers,
was flattered and dazzled by the attention of this
tall, lean count with wolflike visage and great yellow
mustaches. At last he had achieved social recognition!

Esterhazy's motives in cultivating Henry, who must
have bored him exceedingly, were quite obvious. He
wanted to become a member of the General Staff and,
unaware of the contempt with which Henry was re-garded
by his fellow officers, believed the major would
help him. He also hoped to pick up some information
from Henry about the activities of the Second Bureau--information
that might help pay his debts.

On July 20, x894, four months before the arrest of
Dreyfus, Esterhazy paid a call on Colonel yon Schwarz-koppen
at the German Embassy, saying he was a good
friend of the head of the French Second Bureau and in a
position to render valuable services to Germany. Von
Schwarzkoppen was so shocked at this brazen offer of a
French officer to betray his country that he ordered
him out, but as a matter of routine he reported the visit
to his superiors in Berlin. Orders came back immediately
for him to negotiate with the French officer. When the
count showed up two days later, the German Military
Attach took him into his office. Tentatively he was puc
on the German payroll but was dropped a few months
later, since the information he turned over proved use-less.
But before this happened, Esterhazy had left the
bordereau in the German attach's mail box.


Several times in the course of the Dreyfus affair, Von
Schwarzkoppen was asked whether Dreyfus was a spy,
and invariably he said he was not. The full account of
his relations with Esterhazy was not produced until the
publication of Von Schwarzkoppen's memoirs, after his
death.

In due time, as the result of the charge of Mathieu
Dreyfus, an investigation of Esterhazy was set in mo-tion.
General de Pellieux, who was in charge of it, called
on Mathieu to present his proof. Mathieu had only the
bordereau and Esterhazy's letters to the stockbroker,
Castro. The general ruled that the bordereau could not
be used as evidence, since to do so would mean to re-open
the Dreyfus case, which was closed!

The general next summoned Senator Scheurer, de-manding
if he had any pertinent documents. Scheurer
told him he did not, but suggested he talk to the lawyer,
Louis Leblois. On the witness stand, Leblois felt he could
keep his secret no longer. He named Georges Picquart
as the source of his information about Esterhazy.

By so doing, he succeeded only in getting Picquart in
trouble. In his final report on the investigation, General
de Pellieux announced there was no real evidence against
Maior Esterhazy--but that Picquart had committed a
grave fault by disclosing confidential material to his
lawyer. The investigation was ended. At this point,
Esterhazy, made bold by the general's verdict, did a
stupid thing. Declaring that his honor had been injured,
he insisted on a public trial to vindicate himself.

Shortly before this new trial, a widow named Madame
de Boulancy turned over to her lawyer some letters she
had received from Esterhazy, telling him to do with
them as he saw fit. The lawyer gave them to Senator


[24o] Seven Famous Trials in History


Scheurer. They provided damning evidence of Maior
Esterhazy's disloyalty to the country he was engagedto

serve.

"I would not harm a puppy, but I would kill ten
thousand Frenchmen with pleasure," Esterhazy had writ-ten.
"These people aren't worth the cartridges it would
take to kill them." There were other passages in the
same vindictive vein.

Scheurer made sure General de Pellieux had these let-ters
in time for the Esterhazy trial, but Major Henry in-sisted
they must be forgeries and they were not used as
evidence. Georges Piequart was summoned back from
North Africa as a witness for the prosecution, but hi
testimony was given behind closed doors. The verdict
of the judges was unanimous for Esterhazy's exonera-tion.
The next morning Picquart was arrested, charged
with betraying his post, and taken to the fortress of
Mont Valerien.

Although so far in this long fight, injustice had tri-umphed
regularly over justice, the Dreyfus affair had be-come
headline news everywhere. Dreyfus supporters,
who called themselves Dreyl'usards, were increasing by
the hundreds and thousands. Dreyfus had become the
symbol of the oppressed all over the world. Everywhere
people heard with sorrow of the release of Esterhazy
and of Picquart's imprisonment. In France, a minority
group of intellectuals dared speak out.

Senator Scheurer was one of them. Another was the
French deputy and historian, Joseph Reinach, a veteran
of many battles in defense of the Jewish people. There
was also Georges Clemenceau, who was later to become
France's Prime Minister.

"Every man has two countries, his own and France,"


Clemenceau wrote in his newspaper, L'Aurore. "A coun-try
is made up not only of its soil, its rocks, its waters,
forests and fields . . . but also of the ideas that knit the

soils together 	When
it will be perceived that right
	and
iustice in our country are words deprived of signifi	cance

·· . we may still sit on French soil. But we shall
	have
ceased to bfi the France our fathers desired to cre~
	ate
and left to us to make a reality." In all, Clemenceau
	wrote
some eight hundred articles demanding the re	lease

of Alfred Dreyfus.
	It
remained for one man to crystallize public sympa	thy.

This was Emile Zola, the great French novelist.
	"What
a poignant drama, what superb characters," Zola
	wrote
of the Dreyfus affair on November 25, x895.
	Little
by little he found himself becoming deeply in~
	volved.
Toward the end of the Esterhazy trial, he shut
	himself
in his study and worked "in a fever of anger and
	inspiration."

	The
result of Zola's labors was an open letter of appeal
	to
Fdlix Faure, President of the French Republic, pub	lished

in Clemenceau's L'Aurore on January 13, 898, and
	called
I'Accuse (1 Accuse). It has long since taken its
	place
among the greatest political documents of all times.
	"Mr.
President," he began, "Permit me, I beg you, in
	return
for the gracious favors you once accorded me,
	to
be concerned with regard to your just glory and to
	.tell
you that your record, so fair and fortunate thus far,

s now threatened with the most shameful, the most

	ineffaceable blot ....

	"A court-martial had but recently, by order, dared to

	.acquit one Esterhazy--a supreme slap at all truth, all

	tustice! And it is done; France has this brand upon her

	visage; history will relate that it was during your ad

Seven Famous Trials in History


ministration that such a social crime could be committed.

"Since they have dared, I too shall dare. I shall tell the

truth because I pledged myself to tell it if justice, reg
ularly
empowered, did not do so, fully, unmitigatedly.

My duty is to speak; I have no wish to be an accomplice.

My nights would be haunted by the specter of the in
nocent
being, expiating, under the most frightful torture,

a crime he never committed ....

"The truth, first, on the trial and condemnation of

Dreyfus. One pernicious individual arranged, planned,

concocted everything--Lieutenant Colonel du Paty de

Clam, then only Major. He is the whole Dreyfus Affair;

we shall only understand it after an honest inquiry shall

have definitely established all his acts and responsibilkies.

... I declare simply that Major du Paty de Clam,

designated as prosecuting officer, is the one who is first

and most of all guilty of the fearful miscarriage of

justice.

"The bordereau had been for some time previously in

the hands of the late Colonel Sandherr, head of the

Secret Service. 'Leaks' had been discovered, papers had

disappeared, as they still do today: when a perfectly

arbitrary guess suggested that the author of the docu
ment
could only be an artillery officer, attached to the

General Staff; manifestly a double error, which reveals

in what a superficial manner the bordereau had been

studied, for a reasonable examination shows that it could

only have emanated from a line officer.

	"A search was made then; handwritings were ex
amined,
at home; it was all a family affair; a traitor was

to be found right under their noses, and to be expelled.

· . . And Major du Paty de Clam enters as the first

	suspicion falls on Dreyfus 	There
is also the Min-

ister of War, General Mercier, at work, whose intellect
seems but mediocre; there is also the chief of staff,
General Boisdeffre, who seems to yield to his clerical
passions; and there is the under-chief of the General
Staff, General Gonse, whose conscience adjusts itself
readily to many things. But at bottom, there is at first
no one so busily involved as Major du Paty de Clam,
who leads them all, who hypnotizes them, for he is also
interested in spiritism, occultism, he talks with spirits.
The experiments to which he had the unfortunate Drey-fus
submitted, the traps he laid, seem incredible; the mad
investigations, the monstrous hoax, a whole harrowing
dementia.

"Ah, that first affair is a nightmare for whoever knows
it in its true details! . . .

"But here is Dreyfus before that court-martial. The
most rigorous secrecy is preserved. A traitor might
have opened the frontier to the enemy and led the
German emperor clear to the Notre Dame cathedral and
no more extreme measures of silence and mystery would
have been taken. The nation is horror-stricken, the most
terrible details are whispered of monstrous treasons that
make all history cry out; obviously, the whole nation
bows to the court. No punishment is severe enough for
the criminal; the country will applaud the public deg-radation,
she will want the guilty man to stay eternally
on his rock of infamy, devoured by remorse. Is there any
truth in those whispered unmentionable things, capable
of setting all Europe aflame, that they must needs be
buried in the deep secrecy of star-chamber proceedings?

No ....

"Ah! the inanity of that accusation! That a man could
have been condemned on such a charge is a prodigy of


[244] Seven Famous Trials in History


iniquity. I challenge honest people to read it and not be
overcome with indignation, and not cry out their revul-sion
at the superhuman expiation of the man on Devil's
Island.

"Dreyfus, it is shown, knows several languages: crime;
he works hard: crime; no compromising papers are

found in his home: crime; he goes occasionally tO the

country of his origin: crime; he endeavors to learn every-thing:
crime; he is not easily worried: crime; he is wor-ried:
crime .... "

Zola continued, giving the details of Picquart's dis-covery
of Esterhazy's authorship of the bordereau, of
Picquart's subsequent exile, of the treatment given
Scheurer-Kestner.

"Dreyfus cannot be vindicted unless the whole Gen-eral
Staff is indicted," he prophesied. "How pitiful that
this truth, this justice we have so passionately desired,
seems now more mutilated, punished, cast off than ever
before!"

And then Zola's conclusion:

"I accuse Colonel du Paty de Clam of having been
the diabolical agent of the judicial error ....

"I accuse General Mercier of having made himself an
accomplice in one of the greatest crimes in history,
probably through weak-mindedness .... "

He accused other officers, including Generals de Bois-deffre,
Gonse, and de Pellieux, as well as three hand-writing
experts for "having made lying and fraudulent
reports, unless a medical examination will certify them to
be deficient in sight and judgment."

Next: "I accuse the War Office of having led a vile
campaign in the press . . . in order to misdirect public
opinion and cover up its sins."


THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [24-5]


Finally: "I accuse, lastly, the first court-martial of
having violated all human rights in condemning a pris-oner
on testimony kept secret from him, and I accuse the
second court-martial of having covered up this illegality
by order, committing in turn the judicial crime of ac-quitting
a guilty man [Esterhazy] with full knowledge
of his guilt.

"In making these accusations I am aware that I render
myself liable to articles 3°and 31 of Libel Laws ofJuly
29, 188 I, which punish acts of defamation. I expose my-self
voluntarily ....

"I have one passion only, for light, in the name of
humanity which has borne so much and has a right to
happiness. My burning protest is only the cry of my

soul ....

"I am waiting."

The day J'Jcce was published, L','lurore sold out an
edition of 300,000. Thirty thousand letters and tele-grams
flooded the newspaper offices. Up until now, the
villains of the Dreyfus drama had been nebulous. Bur Zola
had named names--missing only Major Henry, whose
role no one as yet suspected--and most of those he had
named were high-ranking French officers. As he had
expected, he was indicted for libel.

The trial of Emile Zola opened on February 7, I898,
four years and eight months after the arrest of Dreyfus.
It was held in the Palace of Justice jury room and was
as crowded with spectators as a first-night opera. Zola,
bearded and serene, had the look of an unworldly pro-fessor.
His attorney was Fernand Labori, a younger
version of the good Edgar Demange, and known as
"Lungs of Steel" because of his thundering voice.

Zola had given Labori instructions to defend Dreyfus


[246] Seven Famous Trials in History


rather than himself. It was not he and not Dreyfus who
were on trial, Zola told the jury in his eloquent plea,
but France. The question to be decided was whether
France was still true to her character as the guardian of
justice and humanity. "Dreyfus is innocent, I swear," he
concluded. "By my forty years of work, by the respect
earned by the work of my life, I swear that Dreyfus is
innocent."

For the prosecution, General de Pellieux took the
stand. The army had been subject to a base attack, he
said, his commanding personality overflowing with hon-est
indignation. He mentioned a letter that gave absolute
proof of the guilt of Dreyfus--one that had not come to
public attention before--and quoted a part of it from
memory. But neither then nor later was this letter pro-duced,
and for good reason.

Lieutenant Colonel Georges Picquart had been brought
from Mont Valerien to testify. The army was giving him
a chance to redeem himself. But Picquart, who had
wavered so long between conflicting loyalties, had now
made up his mind. Poised and tranquil, he answered all
questions truthfully. He said that he too would like to
comment on the document of which General de Pel-lieux
had spoken: "That document is a forgery."

There was dead silence in the court. Major Henry,
responsible for this forgery as for others, must have
writhed uncomfortably.

The trial continued for fifteen days. It was the talk of
Paris, better than the theater, more exciting than any-thing
found in books. In the end, Emile Zola was pro-nounced
guilty and sentenced to a year in prison. Lieu-tenant
Colonel Picquart was returned to Mont Valerien.

Zola's lawyer and.Clemenceau persuaded the novelist he


THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [:47]


would be of more use if he did not go to jail. On their
insistence, he left reluctantly for London. He was out of
the country when Major Esterhazy was arrested, not as
a traitor, but for "moral conduct unbecoming an officer."
A new Minister of War had been appointed, Godefroy
Cavaignac, an avowed critic of the government's awk-xvard
handling of the Dreyfus case. Cavaignac assigned a
Captain Cuignet to examine the Dreyfus file and all the
secret documents that allegedly substantiated his guilt.
Cuignet was studying this material when he noticed a
letter with lines at the top of the page of a different
shade from those of the lower part. He held it up to the
light. There was 'no doubt about it--two sheets had been
glued together. He showed the letter to Cavaignac who
summoned Generals de Boisdeffre and Gonse and de-manded
an explanation. They knew at once whom to
blame.

Major Hubert Henry was called in and accused of
having taken an innocent missive and inserting incrimi-nating
statements about Dreyfus into it. Henry first
denied the accusation, but after an hour of questioning,
he admitted it was true. He was taken to the Mont
Valerien fortress. The next day he committed suicide.

Other forgeries for which Major Henry was respon-sible
came to light. Henry's accomplice in forgery,
Lemercier-Picard, was found hanged in his room. Gen-eral
de Pellieux offered his resignation, on the grounds
that, because of Major Henry, he had been put in the
position of giving false evidence at Zola's trial. Major
Esterhazy heard about Henry's suicide and confession
and promptly fled to England, where he spent the rest
of his life.

On October 27, x898, the High Court of Appeal con

[248] Seven Famous Trials in History


sidered the petition of Mathieu Dreyfus for a revision of
the Dreyfus verdict. In their investigation they studied
some 373 documents from the "secret Dreyfus file."
About fifty of these were obvious forgeries. The rest had
nothing to do with Dreyfus. Eventually the High Court
of Appeal reached a decision. The sentence of Dreyfus
was null and void and he should be tried anew. In June,
899, a telegram was dispatched to Devil's Island to re-turn
the prisoner to France.

Zola came back to Paris after eleven months' exile in
England, elated at the good news. Georges Picquart,
after 324 days in prison, was released. A reunion was
held of the Dreyfusards. Only the aging Senator
Scheurer was missing. He was near death and would not
live to see the triumph of justice. In the streets of Paris a
hundred thousand workers, artisans, and students
paraded, singing the Marseillaise in a celebration that was
still premature.

The new trial, held at Rennes, Brittany, opened on
August 7, x899. The central character of the case that
had shaken the world was brought in by a sergeant. The
spectators gasped in sympathy. At the age of thirty-nine,
Alfred Dreyfus was an emaciated old man, blink-ing
incredulously at the crowds through his glasses, his
hair thin and white, his yellow skin drawn tautly over
his cheekbones. But he had not forgotten his military
training. He wore his uniform and held himself stiffly at
attention. Once or twice he fumbled and asked to have a
question repeated. Otherwise his memory did not fail
him and he was specific in all his answers.

Both his own lawyer, Demange, and Zola's lawyer,
Labori, served as defense attorneys. The conservatism of
the older man complimented Labori's fiery defense. A


r t)uwYVtas .vv.u [249]


week after the trial started, Labori was shot in the back.
A passerby, who knelt by him supposedly to give his
assistance, fled with his briefcase and papers. Fortunately,
the wound was not serious and Labori could return to
the trial the next week.

The dominant figure at the trial was the thin-lipped
General Mercier, who had lived with the Dreyfus case
for five years. Neither the forgeries of Major Henry nor
the proof of Esterhazy's guilt had changed his opinion
about Dreyfus. He had become "hallucinated" on the
subject, people said. The trouble was that he was able to
"hallucinate" others.

Demange finished, his summing up of the retrial at
noon of September 9. The seven judges retired, returning
with their verdict shortly before five in the afternoon.
By a majority of five to two, they again found that
Alfred Dreyfus was guilty of treason. Labori and De-mange
wept. Demange could not bear to face the pris-oner,
waiting in an adjoining room, and it was Labori
who told him the terrible news. "Console my wife,"
Dreyfus said gently.

In view of "extenuating circumstances," his prison
sentence was reduced from life to ten years. No one
explained what "extenuating circumstances" might be in
a case of treason.

The decision of the Rennes trial swept the world like
an evil tidal wave. Mass meetings, held as far away as
Chicago and Washington, urged a boycott of everything
French. Dreyfus received thousands of letters and tele-grams
of support. Largely to appease world public opin-ion,
on September x9, x899, came a formal announce-ment
that Dreyfus was pardoned. At long last he was
free.


[:5o] Seven Famous Trials in History


On September 2o, a carriage took him to a small rail-road
station outside of Rennes; unobserved, he boarded a
train to Carpentras in the south of France, where his
married sister, Henriette, lived. Mathieu met him at
Nantes, and the evening of his arrival at his sister's he
was joined by Lucie. She had come direct from Paris
to avoid publicity.

Except for their brief meetings in the Rennes prison,
this was their first reunion since Alfred Dreyfus had left
his home so unsuspectingly that morning of October

x894. The next day, his wife's family arrived with his
children, Pierre and Jeanne. Dreyfus had been worried
lest they be afraid of him, but they threw themselves in
his arms and embraced him affectionately.

The next summer, on the advice of his physician, Drey-fus
went to Switzerland with his family. They stayed
in a villa looking out on Lake Geneva and the lovely
snow-covered mountains of the Jura. Health came back
to Dreyfus and his mind cleared, but one torment re-mained.

He had accepted a pardon only after making k clear
that this was not enough. Why should a man be par-doned
for a crime he had not committed? So asked all
those who had given their time and their fortunes and
their talent, and, in the case of Picquart, liberty itself,
that justice might be done. The fight went on for six
more years.

At last, on July 12, x9o6, the Rennes sentence was set
aside. Dreyfus was proclaimed innocent of the charge
against him. Ten days later a military parade took place
in the courtyard of the Ecole Militaire. George Picquart
watched from one window and Lucie Dreyfus from an-other.
Dreyfus, in full-dress uniform, was brought in by


THE DREYFUS AFFAIR [25I]


a captain. He was trembling. The ceremony brought
back all too vividly the shameful one of his degradation.
As he was led in front of Brigadier General Gillain, a
trumpet blew four calls.

"In the name of the President of the Republic . . .
Commander Dreyfus, I make you a Knight of the Le-gion
of Honor," the general said. He touched his sword
thrice to the shoulders of the man before him, pinned a
cross on him, and kissed him on both cheeks. Pierre,
Dreyfus's son, ran up and embraced him too.

As he left the parade grounds with his brother Math-leu,
they were surrounded by a crowd of several hun-dred
thousand, this dine without hostility.

"Long live Dreyfus!" they called out. "Long live jus-rice!"

After twelve long years, the Dreyfus Affair was finally
dosed.


THE NUREMBERG

TRIAL


"The trial which is now about to begin is unique in the
history of the jurisprudence of the world and it is of
supreme importance to millions of people all over the
globe."

With these words Lord Justice Geoffrey Lawrence of
Great Britain opened the First International Military Tri-bunal,
on November 2, x945, in the brightly neon-lighted
courtroom of the Palace of Justice, Nurem-berg,
Germany. In Europe, World War II had been over
just six and a half months.

Lord Justice Lawrence was both president of the tri-bunal
and tribunal member representing Great Britain.
He was one of eight men, clad in judges' robes, seated
along the high bench of the courtroom: Francis Biddle
for the United States, Henri Donnedieu de Vabres for
France, Major General I. T. Nitikcheno for the Soviet


Union, and four alternate judges, one from each coun-try.
Behind them hung the flags of their nations.

At the tables below them were the tribunal personnel,
prosecuting attorneys, court reporters, translators. In the
prisoners' dock, with a row of solemn-faced young
American soldiers in white helmets behind them, sat the
defendants, twenty-one men who had once occupied
high positions in the government of Nazi Germany.

This international court, the first in history, was try-ing
them as major criminals. The proceedings would last
2 6 days, with testimony amounting to seventeen thou-sand
pages.

That leaders of nations engaging in unjustified war-fare
should be brought to justice like other criminals
was not a new idea. After the First World War, the Allies
had turned over to the new German Weimar Republic
a list of some nine hundred German war criminals. Only
twelve of these were ever brought to trial, of whom six
were pronounced guilty, given light sentences, and soon
freed--several to fight for Adolf Hitler, the instigator of
World War II. In 943, in the midst of the fighting, the
Allies had sent a warning to Germany that this time
their leaders would not escape so easily, that they would
be tried for their crimes not by their own country, but
by the countries against which they had waged war.

Beginning on June 22, z945, one month and fifteen
days after Germany's surrender, representatives from
the United States, England, France, and the Soviet
Union held a series of meetings in London to complete
plans for an International Military Tribunal. Its char-ter,
signed on August 8, represented the joint efforts of
these four major powers, wkh the approval of seventeen
smaller'nations.


[256] Seven Famous Trials in History


No trial in history had ever required such extensive
preparations as the International Military Tribunal.

Nuremberg was chosen as site of the tribunal, in part
because this ancient city had once been the setting for
enormous Nazi rallies and it seemed fitting that the true
nature of the Nazis should be exposed here. Allied rep-resentatives
arrived on July 2 to make preliminary ar-rangements.
They found the city in almost total ruin as
a result of Allied bombardments. A good part of the
population was living in shanties built from rubble. No
street cars were running and there was no electricity or
potable water. Consumer goods were scarce and expen-sive
and the only stores were wooden shacks.

A mighty rebuilding project was undertaken, with
German civilians and prisoners-of-war employed for the
construction work. The Grand Hotel and the Guest
House, Nuremberg's two leading hostelries, which had
both suffered direct bomb hits, were among the first
buildings to be made habitable. The tribunal's working
personnel were lodged mainly in the Guest House. The
Grand Hotel was retained for official visitors from Eu-rope
and the United States.

The Courthouse, where the trial was to be held, and
the adjoining Palace of Justice, which housed the tri-bunal's
many offices, had both been severely damaged by
bombs and needed extensive alterations. For this work,
from July to December, 945, 1357 soldiers put in 83,396
man-hours and German civilians gave x43,ooo man-hours;
7 7 German prisoners-of-war were employed on
an average day. Repainting the buildings took 5,200 gal-lons
of paint. More than a million feet of wire and cable
were needed to install electricity and modern electrical
equipment. In a city bereft of everything, all materials


had to be imported, many of them flown from the
United States.

The courtroom was remodeled completely. To pro-vide
room for the 25o seats for the press, a back wall
was torn out. A gallery to accommodate some one hun-dred
visitors was built by cutting an opening into the
attic. A glass booth was specially constructed for pho-tographers,
and on one side of the room was a large
screen on which films could be shown.

Even water was a problem. Army Lister bags served
as a substitute for drinking fountains. These water can-teens
held some fifteen gallons; the water was purified
by dropping halazone tablets in the bag and letting it
stand for thirty minutes.

Everyone present at the sessions was provided with
headsets, a unique feature of the trial. Each set had a
small dial, like that on a telephone, that enabled the
wearer to listen to verbatim proceedings in English, Rus-sian,
French, or German. Some 55o of these earphones
were purchased, mostly from the United States.

Three batteries of interpreters of twelve members
each provided the translations. Each group worked from
one to two hours and was then relieved by another
group. The Allies pooled their interpreting personnel
before the trial. They were of many nationalities and
backgrounds and included college instructors, radio
broadcasters, lawyers, professional interpreters, a French
medical student, and one French newspaperwoman.

Whereas Socrates had only Plato to write down his
defense--and that, long after the event--the trial at
Nuremberg was the most carefully recorded of all time.
Expert court reporters, stenotypists, and stenographers
took careful notes. In addition, all proceedings were re

[258] Seven Famous Trials in History


corded on disks and film. In case these methods failed,
wire recordings could be made. Two sets of records
were kept, one as a permanent official record and the
other for use in checking the accuracy of the transla-tions.

The prosecution counsel for the four participating
countries was composed of a total of fifty-two leading
jurists. Twenty-four of these were Americans, with Jus-tice
Robert H. Jackson as chief of counsel. Great Britain
had seven, headed by Sir Hartley Shawcross, chief pros-ecutor.
General R. A. Rudenko was chief Prosecutor
for the Soviet Union, which had a staff of nine prosecut-ing
attorneys in all. The chief prosecutor for France was
Fransois de Menthon, a former member of the French
Resistance; France had a total of twelve prosecuting at-torneys.

The prosecution called a minimum of witnesses to the
stand. The reason was that, althouglx such witnesses
would add drama, their testimony might always be sub-ject
to doubt on the grounds of bias or faulty memory.

Many witnesses, however, both Nazis and victims of
Nazi persecutions, were interviewed in private interro-gations.
Some nine hundred of these interrogations were
made, mostly before the trials started. They took place
in eight separate rooms of the palace, sometimes as many
as twelve interrogators working at a time. Each interro-gation
was attended by a court reporter, an interpreter,
and one or more attorneys and technical assistants. The
interrogator, court reporter, and interpreter were under
oath, and made a triple check of the transcript to prevent
errors. These interrogations gave valuable background
data for the prosecution.

The main foundation for the case of the prosecution


was not the interrogations or the individual witnesses but
Nazi documents captured after the war---confidential
archives of the German government and its branches,
private diaries, secret meetings, conference reports and
correspondence, even transcripts of telephone conversa-tions
of the Nazi leaders tapped by a special office set up
by defendant Herman Goering. In the search for evi-dence,
nearly three thousand tons of these documents
were reviewed. Never had a nation supplied its conquer-ors
with such a complete account of its activities.

From this mountain of material, tribunal researchers
culled pertinent documents or parts of documents, to be
translated and mimeographed. Before they had finished,
the mimeographed translations mounted to around half
a million, requiring five million sheets of paper. In addi-tion,
ninety thousand original documents were photo-stated.
Of these, some four thousand were exhibited at
the trial.

Nazi documents were supplemented by Nazi photog-raphers.
Heinrich Hoffman, Hitler's ex-photographer,
was employed to classify five hundred thousand captured
German negatives. Hoffman was chosen because of his
intimate knowledge of pictures taken during Hitler's
rule, and he was closely guarded. When defendant Her-man
Goering learned of Hoffman's assignment, he said,
"The swine made a million marks on my pictures and
now he's sorting photographs to hang me."

One of the photographic exhibits was a Nazi report
called "The Warsaw Ghetto is No More," which told in
pictures and text the tragic story of the ghetto's resist-ance.
According to the report, the ghetto housed four
hundred thousand Jews when it was established in No-vember,
z94o. Prior to its destruction, some 3 6,ooo had


[260] Seven Famous Trials in History


been deported. One photograph was of a small boy, his
face contorted with fear, his hands held high in surren-der.
A burly Nazi soldier was pointing his rifle at him.
Another photographic masterpiece showed a man in mid-air
as he leaped from the upper story of a blazing build-ing
set on fire by the Nazis. "Masses of them--entire
familiesm" read the text, "were already aflame and
jumped from the windows or endeavored to let them-selves
down by means of sheets tied together or the like.
Steps have been taken so that these Jews, as well as the
remaining ones, were liquidated at once."

These examples, among countless others, indicate why
the prosecution was able to base ks case almost entirely
on evidence of the defendants' own making.

As in any trial, the defendants were allowed their own
counsel. They employed forty-nine in all, forty of their
own choosing and the remaining nine appointed by the
court. Every facility the defense counsel needed was
placed at their disposal. They had their own room in the
palace and their own document library. They conferred
with their clients through a screened partition. A small
slot on the left side of the petition enabled them to pass
papers back and forth, after they had been inspected by
a guard. All the defense counsel were searched before
they entered the conference room by a guard. In the
course of the trial the defendants and their lawyers
called a total of sixty-one witnesses and used interroga-tories
answered by i43 witnesses.

An essential part of the tribunal was news coverage.
This was a public trial. It was not enough to bring the
defendants to justice--in any case, they could never be
punished to match in any measure the suffering they
had caused others. What was even more important was


THE


NUREMBERG TRIAL [261]


that everyone should know the extent of their crimes, so
that the world would never again allow such crimes to
be repeated.

Allied correspondents from twenty-three nations at-tended
the sessions, as many as two hundred and fifty at
a time. They provided information to major networks,
press associations, newsreels, newspapers, and magazines.
Some wrote books about the trial. News staffs for the
United States, Great Britain, France, and Russia cov-ered
the proceedings for licensed German newspapers in
their various zones, to give German citizens the truth of
how their country had been brought to disaster.

The castle of Baron Faber, "the pencil king," was req-uisitioned
for the press lodgings. Some seven miles from
Nuremberg, it was set in a vast park "where bronze
lions slept" and was replete with marble stairways, crys-tal
chandeliers, and impressive, if mediocre, nineteenth-century
paintings. Meals were served in the grand ball-room
by liberated German concentration camp inmates,
and American Army officers acted as host.

Elaborate facilities for the press were set up. Corres-pondents
could listen to the trial proceedings either in
reserved seats in the courtroom or over loudspeakers in
a separate room. Telephone and wire facilities were ad-jacent
to working pressrooms, so stories could be filed
in a minimum of time. In the trial's first week, 1,224,895
words were transmitted. Radio commentators broadcast
from five soundproof booths equipped with earphones,
also carrying the court proceedings.

All pictures taken in the courtroom by commercial
photographers were placed in a common pool and made
available to wire services and newspapers. In the court-room
special lighting made the use of flash bulbs unneces

[262] Seven Famous Trials in History


sary. As documents were introduced into the evidence,
former German war prisoners carried mimeographed
copies to the newsmen in the pressrooms.

Only television coverage was lacking. That would
have to wait until the trial of Adolf Eichmann some
fifteen years later.

While the trial lasted--more than ten months--there
was no busier place in Europe. Nearly three thousand
persons, including some four hundred visitors, passed
through the portals of the Palace of Justice on a normal
day. A six-position switchboard, manned by GI's, was
installed to take care of the vast number of ph, one calls.
On busy days, the GI's handled as many as six hundred
long-distance calls.

Since this was a trial of German nationals by Ger-many's
conquerors and held in Germany, the fullest
safety precautions were warranted. No one could enter
the Palace of Justice or the courthouse without the blue
pass issued through the security office, bearing the pho-tograph
of the person who carried it. There was regular
inspection of handbags and parcels of the five-hundred-odd
German civilians employed in the buildings, and no
women visitors were allowed to carry handbags.

The surrounding area was one of the most heavily
defended in the occupied zone. While the court was in
session, five Sherman tanks armed with 76mm. guns, all
equipped with radios tuned to the main security office,
guarded the two buildings. A roadblock could have
been set up in a matter of minutes. In February, 946,
sandbag barricades were built in key spots around the
courthouse and soldiers armed with machine guns were
stationed behind them. In the jail an air-raid siren was
installed. Nine guards armed with clubs guarded the


prisoners while they sat in the dock. When a defendant
was on the stand, twelve guards were on duty. Guards
were a minimum height of five feet, ten inches, and were
always taller than the man they guarded.

Perhaps because of these precautions, or perhaps be-cause
the German people no longer cared about what
happened to their former bosses, no attempt was made to
engineer an escape.

Beginning in August, I945, the defendants were
lodged in individual cells in the Nuremberg jail, near the
courthouse. The cell block was three tiers high. As a
security measure, eight thousand feet of wire mesh were
fastened along the tiers. After defendant Robert Ley
committed suicide, guards were stationed outside each
cell, night and day.

Defendants were permitted to walk in the dreary jail
yard forty minutes daily. Only defendant Rudolf Hess
insisted on goose-stepping in the Nazi manner. A cov-ered
passageway was built the short distance from the
jail to the courthouse basement. Each day of the trial
the prisoners were escorted along this passageway by
guards, then brought up to the courtroom in the ele-vator,
two at a time.

The prison cells had a minimum of furniture and none
of it was allowed within four feet of the window wall.
The cot was fastened to the floor. At night the single
chair was removed. Meals, plain but adequate, were
served from GI mess kits and had to be eaten with a
spoon, since knives and forks were forbidden. Prisoners
could write their families one letter and two cards each
week. They were permitted to have books and a few
personal belongings.

The twenty-one defendants were not spoiled; neither


[,64] Seven Famous Trials in History


were they mistreated as the Nazis had mistreated their
own countless prisoners. Who were the defendants, and
why had the International Milkary Tribunal decided
they should be held responsible and brought to trial for
the crimes of a nation? Before proceeding further with
the story of their trial, k is time to stop and briefly
identify them.


HEMar OEtNC. Former President of the Reichstag
(the German parliament); minister for air forces, com-mander
in chief of the air force, president of the coun-cil
of ministers for the defense of the Reich (the German
Government); field marshal and general in fire SS (Hit-let's
elite guard, known as "Blackshirts"). In the heyday
of his power, Goering had strutted grandly, a stout,
bellicose figure in his splendid uniform decorated with
the medals of his rank. Since his arrest he had lost
weight. His moon-shaped face was wrinkled, there were
pouches under his eyes, and his uniform, shorn of in-signia,
hung on him loosely. His gestures were still regal
and his expression was as mocking and cynical as ever.
"Corrupt and a drug addict," Hitler had called Goering
when he turned against him the last days of the war.


JOACmM vor aIBBrZOX,. He had been Reich Minis-ter
of Foreign Affairs, member of the secret cabinet
council and of Hitler's political staff, and general in the
SS, but at Nuremberg he seemed a frightened and
weary man. His sparse gray hair crowned a thin drawn
face, with narrow lips, sharp nose, and receding chin.
His co-defendant, Von Schirach, dubbed him a "social
upstart"; since Ribbentrop was not of noble birth, Von


Schirach pointed out, he had no right to use "yon" as
part of his name.


WILHELM KEITEL. Between i938 and 945, he had been
chief of the high command of the German armed forces,
a field marshal, member of the secret cabinet council
and the council of ministers for the defense of the Reich.
Like Goering, he still wore his uniform, without insig-nia.
This former rigid German militarist, now that his
authority was gone, gave the impression of an obsequi-ous,
cringing character.


ERNST KALTENBRUNNER. Under Hitler, he had been
chief of the security police and head of the RSHA
(Reich central security office), which included the Ges-tapo,
the SD (securky service) and the Einsatzgruppen
(the task forces assigned to follow the army and murder
civilians). He was a gaunt man with a lantern jaw and a
flat, expressionless face. The scar across his cheek was
the result of a saber duel in his youth. Perhaps more
than any of the others, he looked the part of a villain.


ARTHUR ROSENBERG. He had joined the Nazi party at
its inception in z92o, and supervised Nazi secret agents
sent to all parts of the world. Hitler had rewarded him
by making him Reich leader for ideology and foreign
policy, head of the Nazi Foreign Political Office, Reich
Minister for Eastern Occupied Territories. As editor of
the Nazi newspaper Vglkischer Beobachter, he spouted
a muddled philosophy designed to justify anti-Semitism.
This "philosopher of the Nazis" was ponderous, boring,
and vicious.


[z66] Seven Famous Trials in History


XANS VV,rK. AS "Hitler's lawyer," he was given the
titles of Reich commissar for the coordination of justice;
president of the International Chamber of Law and
Academy of German Law; Reich Minister Without
Portfolio, and eventually, Governor General of the Oc-cupied
Polish Terrkories. A reporter at the trial summed
him up as a "dark, dapper, bouncy fellow."


WILHELM FRICK. At the trial he wore a loud sports
jacket of brown and green. His hair was cropped short
and there was a childlike smirk on his aging features.
Like Hans Frank, he was a lawyer and his titles under
Hitler included general in the SS, Reich minister of the
interior, Reich director of elections, general plenipoten-tiary
for the administration of the Reich; head of the
central office for the reunification of Austria and the
German Reich, and director of the central office for the
incorporation of Sudetenland, Memel, and Danzig.


JULIUS STREICHER. For more than twenty-five years,
Streicher spoke, wrote, and preached hatred of the Jews.
His weekly paper, Der Stuermer, thrived on lurid tales
of alleged Jewish crimes and his obscenity revolted even
his Nazi comades. When Hitler was in power, Streicher
was a member of the Reichstag and a general of the SA
(Hitler's storm troopers or "Brownshirts"), and rarely
appeared in public without a whip in his hand or in his
belt. He liked to boast about how many times he had
used it on "Jewish infidels." At the trial, the court at
Nuremberg saw only a bald, withered old man who
muttered insanely and inanely that the judges were all

Jews.


THZ UR .MS RG TRiaL [267]


FRITZ SAUCKEL. Former general in the SS and the SA,

and, as plenipotentiary general for the allocation of la-bor,
in charge of the vast Nazi program of importing
forced labor from occupied countries. A sneering httle
man wkh round pig-eyes and tiny mustache whom Goe-ring,
not noted for loyalty to his codefendants, called
"the dullest of the dull." The testimony of the court
would bring forth a more apropos designation: "most
evil of the evil."


ALFRED JODL. Once he had been chief of operations for

the High Command of the German armed forces, and
chief of staff under Keitel. A native of Bavaria, with an
apoplectic complexion and receding hairline, he still had
more of the air of a Prussian officer than his superior,
Keitel.


ARTHUR SE¥SS-INQUART. This former Viennese lawyer

had been a secret Nazi parry member before the out-break
of the war, when he was serving in the cabinet of
the Austrian Chancellor, Schuschnigg. His intrigues
against his own countrymen won him the dubious honor
of being "the first Quisling." (Quisling was the Nor-wegian
Nazi who betrayed his country). Hitler rewarded
him by making him Nazi Chancellor of Austria after
Austria capitulated. Later, as Reich Commissioner for
Occupied Netherlands, he became better known as
"the butcher Governor of Holland." During the trial he
chewed gum incessantly; otherwise his manners were
impeccable.


RUDOLPH HESS. Hess was one of Hitler's first support-ers,
an active member of the Nazi party from 92x to


[z68] Seven Famous Trials in History


94 , personal deputy to Hitler, Reich Minister Without
Portfolio, general in the SS and the SA. In May, 94I,
without authorization, he set off alone for Scotland in a
fighter plane, under the delusion that he could arrange
a peace settlement with England on Hitler's terms
through the Duke of Hamilton, whom he had met at the
Olympic Games. During most of his trial he claimed
amnesia (loss of memory). Obviously mentally dis-turbed,
he was frightening in appearance, with grayish
skin drawn taut, sunken cheeks, and wide eyes stating
out beneath his bushy black eyebrows.


WALTEU rUNiC. This fat, bald, shifty-eyed man was the
financial genius who negotiated a deal between, the
Nazis and the leading German industrialists that brought
millions into the Nazi party coffersl Hitler appointed
him his economic adviser and press chief of the Reich
government. Funk's ruthless treatment of Russian
prisoners-of-war made him a special target for the So-viet
representatives at Nuremberg.


ERXC RAE)ER. From 928 to 945 he was commander
in chief of the German navy. His other tides included
general-admiral, grand admiral, admiral inspector of the
German navy, and secret cabinet council member. He
was a swashbuckling figure at one time, never without
his ornate gold-handled dagger and a heavily padded
uniform with wide lapels that made him look like a
broad-shouldered athlete. The slight, mild-mannered
man in the dark blue suit sitting in the prisoners' dock at
Nuremberg would have looked more comfortable be-hind
the counter of a country grocery store.


THE NUREMBERG TRIAL [269]


kLBERT SPEER. A former architect, he had served Hider
as Reich minister for armament and munitions and com-mander
in chief of labor organiza,tjon: Together with
defendant Fritz Sauckel, in defianc of international law
he had enlisted prisoner-of-war and slave labor in the
millions to work in armament plants. A dark-haired,
powerfully built man, six feet, three inches tall, whose
haughty bearing had survived the humiliation of prison.


BALDUR VON SCHIRACH. This blond-haired blue-eyed
Teuton, whose voice was gendy persuasive, had, as
Reich Youth leader, the job of warping with race ha-tred
the minds of some ten million German children. As
Reich Governor and Gauleker of Vienna, he author-ized
the deportation of Viennese Jews to the wretched
ghettos of Eastern Europe. At thirty-eight, Von Schir-ach
was the youngest of the defendants.


CON'STANTIN VON IIEURATI-I. The aristocratic Baron von
Neurath, now a white-haired old man, had been Am-bassador
in London at the time of Queen Mary and
George V. He claimed to despise the Nazis, but he had
given his diplomatic skills to the New Germany and
served Hitler as general in the SS, Reich Minister of
Foreign Affairs, president of the secret cabinet council,
and Reich Protector for Bohemia and Moravia.


KARL DOEIqlTZ. "Kill and keep on killing," the thin-lipped
Doenitz had told his submarine commanders back
in the days when he was commander in chief of the
U-boat arm of the German navy. "Remember, no sur-vivors.
Humanity is a weakness." Hitler thought so


[270] Seven Famous Trials in History


highly of Doenitz' lack of "humanity" that he made him
his successor--just a few days before Germany's col
lapse. In his cheap store suit, without uniform or medals,
he appeared a very ordinary figure, as unimpressive as
his former commander in chief, Eric Raeder.


IJALaa VO>* SCXACIT. The former Reich Minister of
Economics and president of the German Reichsbank
was a tall man, stiff as a plank. His considerable con-tribution
to Nazi Germany was a financing system
known as "Mefo bills," by which huge sums were raised
to pay for the secret rearming of Nazi Germany. Sev-eral
years later he turned against Hitler; for his part.in a
conspiracy to overthrow him, he was confined in the
concentration camp of Dachau.


rvaz vor VAVV. N. This fastidious German nobleman
had preceded Hitler as Chancellor of Germany and
served under him first as Vice Chancellor and later as
Ambassador to Turkey and Austria. No one was more
expert at diplomatic intrigue than he; at seventy, he gave
the impression of a wily old fox.


HANS FRITSCHE. He had headed the radio division of
the Propaganda Ministry under Josef Goebbels, with the
title of Plenipotentiary of the Political Organization of
the Great German Radio. This youngish broadcaster of
Nazi propaganda was generally regarded the least im-portant
of the major Nazi war criminals.


All twenty-one of these men had known high position
and honors in an evil state with a twisted morality and
under a fanatical leader. Now they would be tried for


THE NUR]MBERG TRIAL [271]


crimes so hideous they surpassed human understanding.
Rather to the surprise of many of the trial's spectators,
who knew of their deeds but not of the men who had
done them, they did not look like monsters. No more did
they look like members of what Adolf Hitler liked to
call the "master race." As time went on, they seemed to
shrink in stature and take on a similar aspect, as though
all had been molded from the same gray clay.

There were some Nazis whose rank and responsibility
in Nazi Germany would warrant their presence at the
trial, but who were missing. Their leader, Adolf Hitler,
according to very substantial evidence, had shot himself
on April 3o, I945, as Berlin was being surrounded. So
had Josef Goebbels, his sinister Minister of Propaganda.
Heinrich Hirnmler, chief of the Reich political police,
was captured by the British at the end of the war but
had escaped being brought to trial by swallowing a vial
of potassium cyanide, said to have been hidden in his
gums. Reinhard Heydrich, deputy chief of the Gestapo,
whom the people of Czechoslovakia had named "Hang-man
Heydrich," was assassinated by two Czechs on
May 29, I942.

Another absentee, frequently mentioned in the trial's
testimony, was Adolf Eichmann, chief of the Jewish
Office of the Gestapo, who once boasted of sending five
million Jews to their death. He escaped from an Amer-ican
internment camp and fled to Argentina. It would be
fifteen years before he, too, would be tried--and con-demned
to death--in Israel, the new country of the peo-ple
he had persecuted so mercilessly.

Twenty-three defendants had been named in the orig-inal
indictment, two more than were brought to trial.
Robert Ley, who, as chief of the German Labor Front,


[272 ] Seven Famous Trials in History


had reduced German workers to the status of medieval
serfs, had been arrested and taken to Nuremberg but,
like Himmler, had found a way out. A month before the
trial's opening he hanged himself in his cell with an
army towel torn in strips. Also indicted was Martin Bor-mann,
Hitler's personal secretary. He was thought to
have been killed by Russian fire the last days of the war
and was tried in absentia. There is some doubt about
Bormann's fate. He is still being sought as these pages
are written.

The trial that had taken such long and thorough plan-ning,
the First International Military Tribunal for major
Nazi war criminals, opened on November 20, 945, with
an address by Lord Justice Lawrence, the tribunal presi-dent.
The defendants were charged on four counts:

. Conspiracy to seize power, establish a totalitarian
regime, and prepare and wage a war of aggression.

2. Crimes against peace--the actual waging of aggres-sive
wars.

3. Violation of the laws of war--of international con-ventions,
internal penal laws, and of general principles of
criminal law.

4. Crimes against humanity, including imprisonment
in concentration camps, use of torture, deliberate ex-termination
of noncombatants.

The formal indictment of the defendants, a long doc-ument
of more than twenty-eight thousand words, was
read aloud. To clarify the nature of the "four counts,"
it traced the "Nazi conspiracy" from irs inception. The
defendants stirred resdessly during the reading. The in-dictment
had been served on them in their cells before
they came to trial and they were familiar with its con-tents.
The rise of a nobody to the position of dictator


THE NUREMBERG TRIAL [273]


in his own country and a threat to the well-being of the
world was an old and boring story to them. Others could
rot take so lightly this strange and terrible drama.

It was in Munich, on July 29, t92I, that Austrian-born
and unemployed Adolf Hider became chairman of
a shabby group of misfits who called themselves the
National Socialist German Workers Party, Nationalso-zialistische
Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, abbreviated to Nazi.
Hitler, a frustrated artist, designed their flag--red with a
white disk, a black swastika in the center. Allegedly to
'keep hecklers away but in reality to terrorize other po-Etical
parties, the Nazis recruited a gang of tough ex-servicemen,
who were outfitted in brown uniforms and
called the SA, or storm troopers.

In 923, the Nazis risked an abortive insurrection,
known as the "Beer Hall Putsch," since it started in a
beer hall. Goering, Hess, Streicher, Frank, and Rosen-berg
were with Hitler in this ill-planned attempt to seize
power. Hider was subsequently tried for treason and
sentenced to five years at Landsberg fortress, of which
he served only five months.

During his imprisonment Hitler dictated Mein Kampf
to his fellow prisoner, Rudolf Hess. The book, a blueprint
of Hider's plan for world conquest, was widely read
but few took its warning seriously.

The Nazi party quickly recuperated from its setback,
due largely to Hitler's driving ambition. In 925, he cre-ated
the SS known as "Blackshirts" because of their
black uniforms, an elite guard that soon rivaled the
storm troopers in acts of violence. By x928 the Nazis
succeeded in electing twelve deputies to the Reichstag
and polled two per cent of the total vote. In x932, they
elected 96 deputies and had 33 ½ per cent of the vote.


[274] Seven Famous Trials in History


On January 30, I933, through a series of shrewd in-trigue,
Hitler became German Chancellor. He selected
Von Papen as Vice Chancellor and a cabinet that in-cluded
Von Neurath, Goering, and Wilhelm Frick. The
Nazi party still did not have a majority vote.

Less than a month later, on February 27, a fire broke
out in the Reichstag (the German parliament). The
Nazis falsely blamed the Communists, and Hitler used
the fire as an excuse to suspend the basic civil rights
granted by the constitution and to throw Communist
deputies in prison. The Reichstag was shorn of its pow-ers
by an "emergency" edict of March 5; henceforth its
member deputies had little to say in Hitler's government.
The next day Schacht was appointed president of the
National Bank (Reichsbank).

New edicts followed in rapid succession. A death pen-alty
was evoked for "crimes against public security." A
boycott against Jewish doctors, lawyers, and business
houses was the first step toward sweeping anti-Semitic
laws that eventually deprived Jewish citizens of their
right to existence. Christian leaders who criticized Nazi
brutality were thrown in prison. Trade unions were
banished and, with them, all rights of organized labor.
Books not in agreement with Nazi ideology were pub-licly
burned. Hitler appointed Hess as deputy leader of
the party.

Under Goering, the first concentration camps were
built to hold the increasing masses of prisoners--Jews,
Communists, Christians, men and women denounced as
"enemies of the State," and even those suspected of
harboring unfavorable thoughts toward the state. Hein-rich
Himmler, a plump-faced, monocled former chicken


TI-IE NUREMBERG TRIAL [27S]


farmer, was made chief of the Prussian Gestapo and be-gan
to build up a Nazi secret police empire.

The weak had no place in the New Germany. Men-tally
ill persons were taken from sanitariums, escorted
to specified centers, and killed by injections. This was
Hitler's first experiment in mass murder.

When the aged German President, Paul von Hinden-burg,
died on July 25, x 933, Hitler declared himself head
of the German State. Henceforth he was absolute dic-tator.
He alone made the laws that ruled Germany.

To formulate and carry out his edicts and plans Hitler
enlisted his own staff--masters of propaganda like Rosen-berg,
Streicher, and Fritsche; the lawyers Frank and
Frick; financiers such as Schacht and Funk; military
men: Keitel, Jodl, Doenkz, and Raeder; experts on for-eign
intrigue: Ribbentrop, Von Neurath, Von Papen;
others . . .

In a Germany impoverished by World War I, Hider
won popular support by preaching rearmament. On
March 9, 935, the government announced the existence
of its Luftwaffe (Air Force) in violation of the Ver-sailles
Treaty, which marked Germany's surrender at the
end of World War I in i918. In i936 German troops
marched into the demilitarized Rhineland, in defiance of
the Locarno Pact. In April, 1937, the Luftwaffe, fighting
for Franco in the Spanish Civil War, destroyed the un-defended
Spanish town of Guernica, slaughtering thou-sands
of civilians. Spain was a testing ground for Ger-man
might. Brazenly, rearmament continued. In Octo-ber,
the Italian-German Axis Pact was announced.

In March of i938, Germany took over Austria. "Case
Otto" was the code name given to the Austrian con

[276] Seven Famous Trials in History


quest. On October , troops entered the Sudeten terri-tory,
ceded to Germany by the Munich Pact, an agree-ment
made with the Italian leader, Mussolini, England's
Chamberlain, and France's Daladier. Germans occupied
Czechoslovakia (Case Green) in March of t939. In Au-gust,
a Soviet-German Non-Aggression Pact was signed
by the Russian foreign minister Molotov and German
foreign minister Von Ribbentrop, an uneasy areement
of brief duration. On September x, the Nazis crossed the
Polish border (Case White). Warsaw, Poland's capital,
fell into German hands eleven days later.

Germans invaded Norway and Denmark in April of
x94o. ("Weser Exercise" was the Nazi code name for
these two conquests.) Holland capitulated on May x4.
Two weeks later, King Leopold of Belgium surrendered
the Belgian army. ("Case Yellow" covered the inva-sion
of the Netherlands, Belgium, and little Luxem-bourg.)
Paris fell on June x4, and when, six days later
Germany and France signed an armistice at Compigne,
Adolf Hitler danced a jig of triumph. Britain was next
on the list, but after heavy air losses, the Nazi decided to
postpone an invasion attempt.

In September, Germany, Italy, and Japan signed a
three-power agreement known as the Tripartite Pact.
On October 6, German troops entered Rumania. Hitler's
wars of aggression continued in 94, with an invasion
of Yugoslavia and Greece (Case Marita) on April 6,
and an invasion of the Soviet Union (Case Barbarossa)

on June 22, in breach of the Soviet-German pact. On

December 7, Japanese planes attacked Pearl Harbor and
Japan was at war with the United States and Great
Britain. Four days later, Germany and Italy declared
war on the United States.


THE NUREVBERG TRIAL [277]


The small group that only twenty years before had
named itself the Nazis and taken the swastika as its sym-bol
had set half the world on fire. But they never in-vaded
England. Nor did they reach Moscow, stopped by
winter snows and the fortitude they did not expect of
the Soviet armies. And the United States, like a slow-to-anger
lion, rallied its forces and charged into the fight so
that mankind could be free again. The bombs stopped
falling at midnight May 8, z945. At a little red school-house
at Reims, France, General Jodl had, the previous
day, signed Germany's surrender.

The Nazi had violated all existing treaties, the rules
of the. HagueC6¥cention, and internationa! law. Their
barbarities, which had commenced with dissenters and
those of Jewish heritage among their own people, had
extended to all the countries they had captured. Public
and private property had been plundered on a mass scale.
Occupied countries had been forced to pay exorbitantly
for their own enemy occupation. They had been stripped
of food, coal, raw materials, art treasures, people. The
Nazis had committed piracy at sea and wanton devasta-tions
of cities, towns, and villages.

The indictment listed instances of these barbarities,
dryly and factually.

Regarding treatment of prisoners-of-war:

"Frequently prisoners captured in the Western Front
were obliged .to march until they completely collapsed.
· . . Many ill-treatments were submitted without mo-tives..,
stabbing with bayonets, striking with rifle
butts, and whipping; in Stalag XXB the sick themselves
were beaten many times by sentries .... In May, 942,
one loaf of bread only was distributed in Rava-Rusha to
each group of 35 men .... "American prisoners were


I1'11


[278] Seven Famous Trials n Hstory


starved, beaten and otherwise mistreated in numerous
Stalags in Germany and in the occupied countries . . .
in x943, x944, I945 ···Soviet prisoners were mur-dered
en masse ....

About treatment of civilians and inmates in the three
hundred-odd concentration camps:

"Out of a convoy of 23o French women deported
from Compigne to Auschwitz in January x943, i8o
died of exhaustion by the end of four months . . . 43
Frenchmen died of exhaustion between 23 March and
6 May x943 in Block 8 at Dachau . . . z2,761 deportees
died of exhaustion at Buchenwald between x January

943 and 15 April 945 - ·· 780 priests died of ex-haustion
at Mauthausen . . . of 228,000 French politi-cal
and racial deportees in concentration camps only
28,ooo survived . . ."

A new word sprang up in the i94o's--"genocide,''
meaning the deliberate killing of nationalities or ethnic
groups. The Nazis made this word a reality:

"About x,5oo,ooo persons were exterminated in Maid-anek
and about 4,000,000 in Auschwitz... In the
Lwow region, the Germans exterminated about 700,000
Soviet people, including 7°persons in the fields of the
arts, science, and technology, and also citizens of the
United States of America, Great Britain, Czechoslovakia,
Yugoslavia, and Holland, brought to the region from
other concentration camps.

"... in the Ganov camp 2oo,ooo peaceful citizens
were exterminated. The most refined methods of cruelty
were employed in this extermination, such as disembow-eling
and freezing of human beings in tubs of water.
Mass shootings took place to the accompaniment of the
music of an orchestra recruited from the persons in

THE NURF,VBERG TRIAL [279]


terned .... They brought many persons to those
camps from typhus hospitals intentionally, for the pur
pose
of infecting the other persons interred 	In
the
Latvian
SSR, 577,000 persons were murdered 	In
the
Leningrad
region there were shot and tortured over i72,ooo persons
.... After the Germans were expelled from Stalingrad
more than a thousand mutilated bodies of local
inhabitants were found with marks of torture. · .
. In the Crimea over 44,ooo peaceful citizens were gathered
on barges, taken out to the sea and drowned. ·
. . In Babi Yar, near Kiev, they shot over mo,ooo men,
women, children and old people .... "
The
indictment, wkh its fearful statistics, contin-ued
....
On
November z , the second day of the trial, Otto
Stahmer, lawyer to defendant Goering, rose to carry
through the formality of contesting the legality of a
trial of war crimes and asked that the tribunal be de-dared
incompetent. Lord Justice Lawrence ruled that
the conclusions of the defense were contrary to the tri-bunal
charter and that the court reject them.

All the defendants pleaded "not guilty" or "not guilty
in the sense of the indictment."

Justice Robert Jackson, chief counsel for the United
States, opened the Anglo-American part of the prosecu
tiorl:

"May
it please Your Honors," he began, "The privi-lege
of opening the first trial in history for crimes against
the peace of the world tmposes a grave responsibility.
The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have
been so calculated, so malignant and so devastating, that
civilization cannot tolerate their being ignored because
it cannot survive their being repeated. That four great


[280] Seven Famous Trials in History


nations, flushed with victory and stung with injury,
stay the hand of vengeance and voluntarily submit their
captive enemies to the judgment of the law is one of the
most significant tributes that Power ever had paid to
Reason .... "

On November 22, the American counsel Colonel G.
Storey began the case of the prosecution by describing
how the Nazi documents on which the trial was based
were traced down--some found in a salt mine, some hid-den
behind a false wall in a Bavarian castle. Counsel
Frank R. Wallis, reviewing the growth of the Nazi
party, quoted Hitler as saying in a secret cabinet meet-ing,
"We can suppress the Communists and eliminate
the Reichstag," just three days before the Reichstag fire,
used as an excuse to accomplish both aims. A secret

der to send all German Communists to concentration
camps was signed by defendants Von Papen, Von Neu-rath,
Frick, Goering, and Frank, a first step toward
eliminating all opposition. Another order read by Wallis
was signed by absent defendant Martin Bormann: "The
Nazi party can be assured of absolute control of Ger-many
only if the people are separated from the Church.
. . . If the young are raised in complete ignorance of
Christianity it will disappear of itself."

Day after day the prosecution built up its massive
case involving each defendant in turn. For instance,
on November z3, United States prosecutor Thomas
Dodd described defendant Schacht's intensive efforts to
raise money for Hitler's war and Counsel Wallis elabo-rated
on how Von Shirach, leader of German youth,
supported the dismissal of all professors who did not
follow the Nazi line. On November 27, United States
Counsel Sidney Alderman read from a secret book pub

lished in x937, The German Fight against the Treaty of
Versailles, which described the resurrection of the Ger-man
navy under defendant Raeder.

On November 29, the prosecution introduced a
unique type of evidence--a transcript of actual tele-phone
calls made by defendant Goering to various per-sonages
in Vienna on March x x, x938. In these calls,
made from two o'clock in the afternoon until ten at
night, Goering arranged the resignation of Austrian
Chancellor Schuschnigg (later deported to Dachau)
and appointed defendant Seyss-Inquart, the Austrian
Quisling, in his place, with an all-Nazi cabinet--all be-fore
the German army marched triumphantly into Aus-tria.
(Austria was really conquered by telephone, it was
said later.)

In the prisoners' dock, Goering, Ribbentrop, and Hess
found the show extremely amusing. Their smiles and
smirks stopped when American Commander Donovan
presented a documentary film on Nazi concentration
camps, as they were found by American troops: piles of
dead in a slave labor camp . . . a Buchenwald crema-torium
. . . Dachau . . . men in striped suits more like
skeletons than human beings . . . a female doctor de-scribing
the agonizing "medical" experiments on female
prisoners at Belsen . . . women's corpses being thrown
tnto a pit ....

During the showing of the atrocity film, Herman Goe-ring
covered his eyes with both hands. Keitel played
with his earphone cord and turned away several times.
Doenitz clenched his fists, looking at the picture only

occasionally Von Papen would not look at all. Sauckel

--'

kept shaking his head. Funk broke down and cried.
Rosenberg fidgeted continually. Fritsche became tense


[282] Seven Famous Trials in History


and pale. Only Streicher and Von Neurath watched,
seemingly without emotion.

The first witness for the prosecution was questioned
on November 3o. He was General Erwin Lahousen,
ranking surviving member of Abwehr (counterintelli-gence),
who had been part of an underground move-ment
against Hitler led by Admiral Canaris. Lahousen
testified that defendants Goering, Keitel, and Jodl
worked closely with Hitler in planning the bombard-ment
of Warsaw, and that, after Poland was invaded on
a trivial excuse, they ordered the extermination of Polish
Jews as well as of Polish nobility, clergy, and intelli-gentsia.
("Poland shall be treated as a colony," wrote
defendant Frank, as Governor General of Occupied
Poland. "The Poles shall be the slaves of the Greater
German World Empire.")

On November 3°, defendant Hess rose and made the
dramatic announcement that his memory had returned,
adding that he had simulated amnesia as a strategy, even
deceiving his own lawyer. Within a few minutes radio
broadcasters had his statement on the air all over the
world. Psychiatrists were dubious of his claim to mental
clarity.

The hearing of December 3 was devoted to the five
defendants, Goering, Keitel, Raeder, Jodl, and Ribben-trop
and the part each had played in Nazi aggression
against Czechoslovakia. This marked the end of the
strictly American part of the prosecution proceedings.

The next day, British Counsel Sir Harley Shawcross
opened the English prosecution with a speech on the
criminal nature of aggressive war as the Nazis had
waged it. On December 5, British Counsel Sir David
Maxwell-Fyfe listed violations by the Reich of interna

THE NUREMBERG TRIAL [283]


tional law and of existing treaties between x933 and
94x, and Counsel G. D. Roberts, also a Britisher, pro-duced
evidence to show that defendant Keitel had or-dered
the invasions of Belgium, Holland, and Luxem-bourg.
On December , a captured Nazi film showed
some of the defendants in their days of glory. One of
the scenes in this film was the Luftwaffe bombardment
of the fjord of Oslo.

Later, Counsel Wallis read from a remarkable diary
written by defendant Frank: "That we sentence
ooo Jews to die of hunger should be noted only mar-ginally.
It is a matter of course that should the Jews not
starve to death it would, we hope, result in a speeding
up of anti-Jewish measures." And from a Polish docu-ment
describing the gassing of Jews at Treblinka and
Auschwitz: "All victims had to strip off their clothes '
and shoes, which were collected afterwards, whereupon

all victims, women and children first, were driven into

the death chambers 	Small
children were simply
thrown
in."
To
Captain Gilbert, the prison psychiatrist, defendant Sauckel
said later, wringing his hands: "I want to tell you
that I know absolutely nothing of these things, and I
certainly had absolutely nothing to do with them!" His protest
of ignorance and innocence was a clue to the de-fense
of all the defendants.
The
next days unfolded the tragic story of the im-portation
of foreign workers who, while technically not prisoners,
were in fact slaves. In January, x945, these foreign
workers in Germany totaled 6,500,000, includ-ing
2,500,000 Russians; over x,5oo,ooo French; x5o,ooo from
Belgium; 43 :,ooo from Holland. It was shown that the
men largely responsible for the "continuance and

[284] Seven Famous Trials in History


upkeep" of the supply of human beings were defendants

Sauckel and Speer, and that Ley, Frank, Goering, Ro
senberg,
Seyss-Inquart, and Keitel had a share in this

assignment. From Heinrich Himmler: "Whether ten

'thousand females fall down from exhaustion while dig
ging
an anti-tank ditch or not interests me only insofar

as the anti-tank ditch for Germany is finished."

The two "prime materials" of occupied countries

were "agricultural products and human labor," wrote

Sauckel--who throughout the trial insisted he knew noth
ing
of concentration camp exterminations--in a letter

to defendant Rosenberg. Also quoted was a missive

from RoSenberg to Sauckel, dated December 2, I942;

"We are now in the grotesque situation of having to

recruit millions of workers from occupied Russia after

war prisoners have died like flies, in order to fill the gaps

that have formed within Germany."

A secret report enclosed with Rosenberg's letter de
scribed
how forced labor was "recruited": "In order to

secure the required number for the labor transport, men

and women, including youngsters from fifteen years on

up, are taken from the street, from the market place and

village festivals . . . inhabitants hide themselves in fear.

· . . After public beatings . . . came the burning down

of homesteads and of whole villages as retributions for

failure to comply wkh the demand for the appropriation

of labor forces 	"

	A
German doctor's report portrayed all too vividly
	the
conditions under which the foreign workers lived:
	"In
some camps there were twice as many people in
barracks
as health conditions permitted 	The
diet
prescribed
for eastern workers was altogether insuffi-

cient .... Sanitary conditions were exceedingly bad.
· . . Tuberculosis was widespread .... As a result of
the filthy conditions nearly all eastern workers were af-flicted
with skin disease .... With the onset of heavy
air raids in March, 943, conditions greatly deteriorated.
· . . At times the water supply was completely shut off
for periods of eight to fourteen days . . ."

On December 4, documents were presented to show
the horrors of the concentration camp of Flessenburg.
It was there that on Christmas of. 944, the camp com-manders
devised the ingenious cruelty of hanging pris-oners
from lighted Christmas trees. The entire camp was
summoned to witness the spectacle.

The prosecution on this day presented the most ma-cabre
exhibit of the trial: a shrunken human head and a
piece of tattooed human skin. They were souvenirs of
Buchenwald, though these indignities were practiced at
other camps as well. "It is dangerous to have a good skin
at Dachau," inmates there claimed. Franz Blaha, a Czech
physician imprisoned at Dachau, later testified that he
had been forced to remove skin from the dead, and that
this skin was used for women's handbags, lampshades,
and other gruesome mementos.

On December 7, Colonel Storey, showing how the
Nazi party had tried to suppress Christianity, quoted a
secret decree of Martin Bormann: "National Socialist
and Christian concepts are irreconcilable"--a statement
with which millions would agree. During the next days,
Storey gave concrete evidence of the persecution of the
Catholic Church. He also described the Nazi pillage of
great art treasures of occupied Europe, giving stagger-ing
statistics of this pillage and naming Rosenberg, Kei

[286] Seven Famous Trials in History


tel, Frank, and Goering as responsible for a mass rob-bery
that could not in any way be excused as a "military
necessity."

The tribunal was adjourned for the Christmas recess.
The defendants spent the holidays in their cells. The
correspondents, most of them, took off for brief vaca-tions
to Nice or Cannes or some other festive resort.
The American soldiers stationed in Nuremberg gave a
party for children from the nearby displaced persons
camp--for some of them the first party they had ever
celebrated. A Mickey Mouse film was shown, refresh-ments
were served. The children devoured the sand-wiches
but many stared in bewilderment at the ice cream
and cake.

On January 3, the prosecution resumed, still basing its
charges on Nazi documents. Colonel Storey named de-fendant
Kaltenbrunner as author of an inhuman order to
annihilate certain concentration camps before the Allies
arrived .... Witness Otto Ohlendorf, Hitler police chief,
testified he had personally ordered the massacre of ninety
thousand Russian Jews. When asked if he had scruples,
he said that, being only a subordinate, he had to obey.
· . . Next, factual evidence was produced of the mur-der
of prisoners-of-war, including British parachutists.
· . . Frank's terrible diary was quoted again: "I have not
hesitated to announce that for each German killed, we
will shoot a hundred Poles." It was Frank who, in
August, 942, when forty per cent of the Polish popu-lation
was sick as a result of malnutrition, ordered that
their rations must be cut in half so that more food could
be sent to Germany .... British prosecutor Colonel
Griffith-Jones quoted defendant Streicher, after he had


THE NUREMBERG TRIAL [287]


beaten the Jewish Professor Steinruch in his cell until the
blood flowed: "Now I feel better."

The French prosecution began on January I7 with an
opening address by Frangois de Menthon:

"France, who was systematically plundered and
ruined; France, so many of whose sons were tortured
and murdered in the jails of the Gestapo or in their con-centration
camps; France, who was subjected to the still
more horrible grip of demoralization and return to bar-barism
diabolically imposed by Nazi Germany, asks you,
above all in the name of the heroic martyrs of the Re-sistance,
who are among the greatest heroes of our leg-end,
that justice be done . . ."

Heroes of the Resistance, of whom M. de Menthon
was one, had sprung up in all the occupied countries,
men and women who risked their own lives and those of
their loved ones to carry on an underground war against
the Nazi invaders. When captured, as many of them
were, the Gestapo had almost invariably tortured them
to force them to reveal the names of their leaders and
comrades.

Gestapo "third degree" methods were endorsed offi-cially
by Heydrich, not only for members of resistance
groups but for "Communists, Marxists, Jehovah's Wit-nesses,
saboteurs, terrorists . .. parachute agents, aso-cial
elements, Polish or Soviet Russian loafers, or tramps."
"Third degree can, according to the circumstances,"
continued this same endorsement, "consist among other
methods of: very simple diet (bread and water); hard
bunk; dark cell; deprivation of sleep; exhaustive drilling;
also in flogging (for more than twenty strokes a doctor
must be consulted)." The "other methods" included


[288] Seven Famous Trials in History


hanging up the victims by the hands until their shoulders
were dislocated, cutting soles of their feet with razor
blades and then making them walk on salt; forcing vic-tims
to watch torture of husband or wife; squeezing
their heads with an iron band.

Justice Robert Jackson, examining a former Gestapo
official: "I am asking you as to the crimes committed by
the Gestapo . . . if it included the torturing of thou-sands
of persons?"

The witness: "Yes."

The French prosecution included Counsel Charles
Gerthofer's account of the German economic exploita-tion
of France that had brought financial ruin to the
country and near-starvation to its people. It ended with
a condemnation by Pierre Mounier of defendant Rosen-berg,
who justified the stealing of art treasures from the
Rothschild family on the grounds that the Rothschilds
were Jewish.

The Soviet Union prosecution began on February 8.
General Rudenko, in his opening address, described in
all its horrors the Nazis' massive devastation of the east-ern
countries:

"When entire regions of flourishing countryside were
turned into desert areas, and the soil was drenched with
the blood of those executed, it was the work of their
hands, of their organization, their instigation, their lead-ership.
And iust because the masses of the German peo-ple
were made to participate in these outrages, because
· . . the defendants for years had poisoned the consci-ence
and the mind of an entire generation of Germans
by developing in them the conceit of 'the chosen,' the
morals of cannibals and the greed of burglars, can it be
said that the guilt of the Hitlerite conspirators is any less


THE NURE/vBERG TRIAL [z89]


great or grave?... The populations of... Slav
countries first of all, were subjected to merciless persecu-tions
and mass extermination. Russians, Ukranians, Belo-Russians,
Poles, Czechs, Serbians, Slovenes suffered more
than others ....

"In the name of the sacred memory of millions of in-nocent
victims of the fascist terror," he concluded, "for
the sake of the consolidation of peace throughout the
world, for the sake of the future security of nations, we
are presenting the defendants a just and complete bill
that must be paid. This is a bill on behalf of all mankind,
a bill backed by the will and the conscience of all free-dom-loving
nations. May justice be done."

For ten days the Russians, who had lost twenty-five
million lives in the holocaust, hammered out the Nazi
crimes. On February 19 they presented their atrocity
film, a document of mass murder even more frightful
than the American film: acres of corpses of Russian
prisoners-of-war murdered or left to starve in the fields
where they had been captured . . . guillotines and in-struments
of torture ... bodies hanging from lamp--posts
as they were found when their towns were recap-tured
. . . baskets of human heads . . . children who
had been beaten to death ... women weeping overi
their dead . . . bales of women's hair, taken from the'
living and the dead alike . . . the ruins of Lidice. This
Czechoslovakian town was razed to the ground in re-prisal
for the assassination of Reinhard "Hangman" Hey-drich;
its male population executed; its women sent to
concentration camps and its children transported to Ger-many
to be brought up in the Nazi manner. The name
of Lidice has become synonymous with horror through-out
the world.


[290] Seven Famous Trials in History


The defendants were unaffected. Throughout the film,
the paunchy Goering pretended to read a book, yawned
in boredom, and occasionally turned to make a sarcastic
remark to Hess or Von Ribbentrop.

The Soviet documentation of Nazi crimes proceeded
relentlessly. A surviving Jewish resident of the Russian
town of Vilna described the slaying of all but six hun-dred
of the town's eighty thousand Jewish population.
A woman survivor of Auschwitz testified she had seen
Jewish children thrown alive into the crematorium fur-naces.
Russian prosecutor Colonel Smirnov read a Nazi
document authorizin the wholesale murder of the sick
at concentration camps.

At this point in the testimony, Herman Goering re-moved
his earphones.

The counsels for the prosecution from four nations--Great
Britain, United States, France, and the Soviet
Union--had now spent more than three months present-ing
their case against the Nazi war criminals. They had
gone into great detail, of which there has been space in
these pages to give only a few examples, and they could,
from the material at hand, have gone on endlessly. It
would only have been more of the same--mass murder,
torture, robbery, slavery, the breaking of treaties, and
the cynical disregard of international law. There had to
be a halt to this nightmare. On March 7, x946, the case
of the prosecution was completed. On March 8, the de-fense
of the defendants began.

Herman Goering, former President of the Reichstag
and commander in chief of the Nazi air force, was the
first of them given the opportunity, in accordance with
legal practice, to proclaim his innocence or deny the
charges against him.


TH NURI.MBERG TRIAL


He called as one of his witnesses his former adjutant,
Bodenschatz, who testified that Goering was a good-hearted
man, since he had secured the release of his per-sonal
friends from concentration camps. On March 3,
Goering took the witness stand himself. His hands trem-bled
and his face twitched, and with little of his usual
bravado, he gave his version of the growth of the Nazi
party, minimizing his own part in it.

Justice Robert Jackson began the cross-examining of
Goering on March 20. As specific accusations of specific
crimes bombarded him, Goering repeated over and over
that his intentions had been good, that it was his duty to
be loyal to Adolf Hitler, no matter what that loyalty in-volved.
But he could not deny that he had more influ-ence
on Hider than any other man up until x943, that
he had supported the anti-Semitic decrees within Ger-many,
including the levying of a fine of a billion marks
on the Jewish population, and that he had said to Rein-hard
Heydrich, after the pogroms of November 9 and
o, x938, "I wish you had killed two hundred Jews and
not destroyed such valuable property." He had made
this statement, Goering contended, in "spontaneous ex-citement.''

Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe took over Goering's cross-examination
on March 2 , facing him with proof of the
murder of imprisoned British RAF officers who had
tried to escape, and with handing Russian prisoners-of-war
over to the Gestapo. Goering denied all responsibil-ity.

In the course of the cross-examination, Goering be-came
increasingly arrogant. "That is irrelevant," he said
on several occasions, and, "Do not distort my words."
When Lord Justice Lawrence stepped in to cross-exam

[292] Seven Famous Trials in History


ine him, Goering went too far. "I did everything to
avoid this war," he declared piously. "But after it had
started it was my duty to do everything to win it."

"We have heard you say that before and we do not
wish to hear it again," Lawrence snapped at him.

Goering's test!mony, the longest of any of the de-fendants,
lasted until March 22, on which day General
Rudenko made a brief cross-examination for the Soviet
Union, and the French prosecutor stated there was noth-ing
to add.

"Well, I didn't cut a petty figure, did I?" Goering
boasted to Captain Gilbert, the prison psychiatrist, when
it was over.

The defense of Rudolf Hess, Hitler's dose comrade
for more than twenty years, came next. Hess did not
take the stand himself. His excuse was another spell of
amnesia; he was afraid of embarrassment in case he
could not remember the answers to the questions of the
prosecution. Two witnesses called to testify in his favor
did him little good. His defense was concluded within
three days.

He was followed by Joachim yon Ribbentrop, the
tired old man who had once been Hitler's powerful for-eign
minister. He testified with the air of believing what
he said, that he and Hitler did not like war, that they
had broken pacts only with the greatest regret, and that
he had lost two nights' sleep when the Low Countries
were invaded. Like all the other defendants, he insisted
he knew nothing of Nazi atroekies.

Sir?id Maxwell-Fyfe cross-examined him:

Q. Are you saying that you did not know that
concentration camps were being conducted on an enor-mous
scale?


THE NUREMBERG TRIAL [293]


A. No, I knew nothing of that . . . I can say that
I had heard of only two concentration camps before I
came here--no, it was three, Dachau, Oranienburg, and
Theresienstadt.

Q. Are you telling the tribunal that.., you
never heard of the camp at Mauthausen, where a hun-dred
thousand people were shut up?

A. That was entirely unknown to me, and I can
produce dozens of witnesses who can testify to that.

Q. I do not care how many witnesses you produce.
. . . Are you telling the tribunal that anyone could be a
responsible minister in that country where hundreds of
concentration camps existed and not know anything
about them but two?

It may be amazing but it is absolutely true.
Did you know that at Auschwitz alone . . .

I heard the name Auschwitz here for the first


The German official at Auschwitz has sworn
in an affidavit that four million people were put to death
in the camp. Are you telling the tribunal that happened
without your knowing anything about it?

.4. That was entirely unknown to me. I can state
that here on my oath.

all the defendants, only one, Hans Frank, author
of the diary that served again and again to prove Nazi
callousness toward human life, made a partial confession.
He was asked if he had participated in the destruction of
the Jews.

"I say yes .... We have fought against Jewry; we
have fought against them for years .... A thousand
years will pass and the guilt of Germany will not be
erased."


[294] Seven Famous Trials in History


As for the others, they knew nothing, had seen noth-ing,
had done nothing but follow the orders of their
superiors. Keitel said he had only done his duty as a
soldier. Arthur Rosenberg, the "philosopher of the Na-zis,''
claimed he had always been in favor of "a chival-rous
solution of the Jewish problem." The filthy old
man, Julius Streicher, described himself as an "apostle
of anti-Semitism," but blandly denied all knowledge of
atrocities against the Jews. Hjalmar von Schacht, the
former Reich Minister of Economics, claimed he had
supported Hitler in the beginning only because his pro-gram
had not sounded so bad, emphasizing that later he
had plotted to overthrow him, which was true. (Cross-examination
forced his admission that in spite of his al-leged
disapproval of Nazism he had assumed control for
Hitler of Austrian and Czechoslovakian banks, and that
he had made speeches glorifying the "Fuehrer.")

Eric Raeder, former grand admiral and commander
in chief of the German navy, insisted he believed Hitler
had peaceful intentions and had attacked Czechoslovakia
and Poland only for "security reasons." Baldur von
Schirach described his Hitler Youth as a mild Boy
Scout-type of organization, interested mainly in sports.
Alfred Jodl spoke of himself as a professional soldier,
not interested in politics. The wily Franz von Papen said
he had been astounded when he heard of the outbreak of
war in x939. ("You were prepared to serve these mur-derers
as long as your dignity was put right!" Sir David
Maxwell-Fyfe pointed out.)

Albert Speer admitted that he had employed some
prisoners-of-war in his armament factories but denied
knowledge that this was against the rules of the Hague
Convention. He contended he had been against bringing


,


forced labor into Germany, and ended his testimony
with an anguished lament against Hitler for "betraying"
him.

Karl Doenitz, the U-Boat commander, also said he
had never heard of concentration camps, and in cow-ardly
fashion blamed his subordinates for all the crimes
of his command. He grew flustered, however, when
asked for an explanation of his order: "Do not pick up

survivors and take them with you 	We
must be
harsh
in war."
Walter
Funk, the lkde banker, knew nothing at all about
his verified agreement with Heinrich Himmler to store
in the state banks or send to pawn shops the per-sonal
belongings of concentration camp victims, a weird loot
that included coins, bank notes, jewels, watches, and
even gold from eyeglasses and gold fillings from teeth.

All
the defendants lied. With one exception, all re-vealed
under cross-examination that they were far more deeply
involved than they wanted to admit. The excep-tion
was defendant Ernst Kaltenbrunner, Nazi chief of the
security police, who proved the most blatant per-jurer
of them all. According to his testimony, during his two
years in office he never signed a "protective custody order"
or a death sentence. He established no concentra-tion camps,
or so he said. He was confronted with a sworn and
detailed statement by former Mauthausen prisoners
that they had seen him there and that he had witnessed
executions and visited the crematorium. "I can refute
this document in every point," he announced. His signature
on various significant orders did not faze him. He
simply denied the signature was his.
By
the third o pounds July the prisoners had completed their


[296] Seven Famous Trials in History


defense and their lawyers began their summations.

Dr. Stahmer made his plea for Goering, spending most

of his allotted time analyzing his client as "psychologi
cally
interesting." (A dodge to hide Goering's lack of

moral sense, Speer said to his fellow prisoners.) Dr.

Horn, speaking for Ribbentrop, explained that it was

Hitler who determined foreign policy, not his client.

Dr. Nelte, Keitel's lawyer, based his defense on the

Fuebrerprinzip, the "leader principle"; that is, he held

that Keitel should be exonerated because he was only a

soldier, obliged to obey orders.

Dr. Marx, Streicher's lawyer, characterized his client

as a fanatic anti-Semite who had never been taken seri
ously
by either Hitler or the German people, thus ironi
cally
dealing a severe blow to Streicher's vanity. Dr.

Sauter, for Von Schirach, pleaded leniency on the

ground that the former Hitler Youth leader had re
pented
and denounced Nazism and anti-Semitism.

The lawyers for the other defendants continued their

summations along similar lines.

Justice Robert Jackson gave the summation speech for

the American prosecution on July 2 6. There had been a

great deal of eloquence in this long trial, but nothing that

had been said was more moving or more damning to the

defendants than when..[ackson pointed to each in turn,

summing up the charges against him.

.. . we have now before us the tested evidences of

I criminality and have heard the flimsy excuses and paltry

/evasions of the defendants. The suspended judgment

I with which we opened this case is no longer appropriate.

I The time has come for final judgment and if the case I:

present seems hard and uncompromising, it is because/

	the evidence makes it so


[297]


"The large and varied role of oEaIN was half mili-tarist
and half gangster. He stuck a pudgy finger in
every pie .... He used his SA musclemen to help bring
the gang into power. In order to entrench that power he
contrived to have the Reichstag burned, established the
Gestapo, and created the concentration camps .... He
built up the Luftwaffe and hurled it at his defenseless
neighbors. He was among the foremost in harrying the
Jews out of the land. By mobilizing the total economic
resources of Germany he made possible the waging of
the war which he had taken a large part in planning. He
was, next to Hitler, the man who tied the activities of
all the defendants together in a common effort ....

"The zealot uEss, before succumbing to wanderlust,
was the engineer tending the party machinery, passing
orders and propaganda down to the leadership corps,
supervising every aspect of party activkies, and main-taining
the organization as a loyal and ready instrument
of power. When apprehensions abroad threatened the
success of the Nazi scheme for conquest, it was the
duplieitous umu:'raov, the salesman of deception, who
was detailed to pour wine on the troubled waters of
suspicion by preaching the gospel of limited and peaceful
intentions. cEITL, weak and willing tool, delivered the
armed forces, the instrument of aggression, over to the
party and directed them in executing its felonious de-signs.

";ArTerButv,u, the grand inquisitor, took up the
bloody mantle of Heydrich to stifle opposition and ter-rorize
compliance, and buttressed the power of National
Socialism on a foundation of guiltless corpses. It was
RoSBu, the intellectual high priest of the 'master
race,' who provided the doctrine of hatred which gave


[298] Seven Famous Trials in History


the impetus for the annihilation of Jewry, and who put
his infidel theories into practice against the eastern occu-pied
territories. His woolly philosophy also added bore-dom
to the long list of Nazi atrocities. The fanatical
FRANK, who solidified Nazi control by establishing the
new order of authority without law, so that the will of
the party was the only test of legality, proceeded to ex-port
his lawlessness to Poland, which he governed with
the lash of Caesar and whose population he reduced to
sorrowing remnants. FRICK, the ruthless organizer,
helped the party to seize power, supervised the police
agencies to ansure that it stayed in power, and chained
the economy of Bohemia and Moravia to the German
war machine.

"STVmICHV. R, the venomous vulgarian, manufactured
and distributed obscene racial libels which incited the
populace to accept and assist the progressively suave
operations of 'race purification.' As Minister of Econom-ics
FUIC accelerated the pace of rearmament, and as
Reichsbank president banked for the SS the gold teeth
fillings of concentration camp victims--probably the
most ghoulish collateral in banking history. It was
SCHACHT, the facade of starched respectability, who in
the early days provided the window-dressing, the bait
for the hesitant, and whose wizardry later made it pos-sible
for Hitler to finance the colossal rearmament pro-gram,
and to do it secretly.

"DOV.ITZ, Hitler's legatee of defeat, promoted the
success of the Nazi aggressions by instructing his pack of
submarine killers to conduct warfare at sea with the il-legal
ferocity of the jungle. Wv./ER, the political admiral,
stealthily built up the German navy in defiance of the
Versailles Treaty, and then put it to use in a series of


THE NUREMBERG TRIAL [z99]


aggressions which he had taken a large part in planning.
vor sCUIUACH, poisoner of a generation, initiated the
German youth in Nazi doctrine, trained them in legions
for service in the SS and Wehrmacht, and delivered
them up to the party as fanatic, unquestioning executors
of its will.

"SAUCKEL, the greatest and cruelest slaver since the
Pharaohs of Egypt, produced desperately needed man-power
by driving foreign peoples into the land of bond-age
on a scale unknown even in the ancient days of
tyranny in the kingdom of the Nile. join., betrayer of
the traditions of his profession, led the Wehrmacht in
violating its own code of military honor in order to
carry out the barbarous aims of Nazi policy, vor VAvE,
pious agent of an infidel regime, held the stirrup while
Hitler vaulted into the saddle, lubricated the Austrian
annexation, and devoted his diplomatic cunning to the
service of Nazi objectives abroad.

"SEYSS-INQUART, spearhead of the Austrian fifth column,
took over the government of his own country only to
make a present of ir to Hitler, and then, moving north,
brought terror and oppression to the Netherlands and
pillaged its economy for the benefit of the German jug-gernaut.
VON NEURATU, the old-school diplomat, who
cast the pearls of his experience before Nazis, guided
Nazi diplomacy in the early years, soothed the fears of
prospective victims, and as Reich Protector of Bohemia
and Moravia, strengthened the German position for the
coming attack on Poland. SPEER, as Minister of Arma-ments
and War Production, joined in planning and ex-ecuting
the program to dragoon prisoners of war and
foreign workers into German war industries, which
waxed in output while the laborers waned in starvation.


[3oo] Seven Famous Trials in History


FRITSCHE, radio propaganda chief, by manipulation of
the truth goaded German public opinion into frenzied
support of the regime and anesthetized the independent
judgment of the population so that they did without
question their master's bidding."

Jackson had a word to say too of the twenty-second
defendant, Martin Bormann, whose crimes were no less
because he had died, or vanished, before they came to
light: "And UOUm. AV, who has not accepted our invita-tion
to this reunion, sat at the throttle of the vast and
powerful engine of the party, guiding it in the ruthless
execution of Nazi policies, from the scourging of the
Christian church to the lynching of captive Allied air
men
....

cw'Opening this case I ventured to predict that there

be no serious denial that the crimes charged were

itted, and that the issue would concern the respon-sibility
of particular defendants. The defendants have ful-filled
that prophecy. Generally, they do not deny that
these things happened, but it is contended that they 'just
happened,' and that they were not the result of a com-mon
plan or conspiracy ....

"These men in this dock, on the face of the record,
were not strangers to this program of crime, nor was
their connection with it remote or obscure. We find
them in the very heart of it. The positions they held
show that we have chosen defendants of self-evident re-sponsibility.
They are the very top surviving authorities
in their respective fields and in the Nazi state. No one
lives who, at least until the very last moments of the
war, outranked Goering in position, power, and influ-ence.
No soldier stood above Keitel and Jodl, and no
sailor above Raeder and Doenitz. Who can be responsi

· tx-iv. NU'V,FM,V. Wtra. [3o]


ble for the duplicitous diplomacy if not the Foreign Min-isters,
Von Neurath and Ribbentrop, and the diplomatic
handyman, Von Papen? Who should be answerable for
the oppressive administration of occupied countries if
Gauleiters, Protectors, Governors, and Commissars such
as Frank, Seyss-Inquart, Frick, Von Schirach, Von Neu-rath,
and Rosenberg are not? Where shall we look for
those who mobilized the economy for total war if we
overlook Schacht, and Speer, and Funk? Who was the
master of the great slaving enterprise if it was not Sau-ckel?
Where shall we find the hand that ran the concen-tration
camps if it is not the hand of Kaltenbrunner?
And who whipped up the hates and fears of the public,
and manipulated the party organizations to incite these
crimes, if not Hess, Von $chirach, Fritzsche, Bormann,
and the unspeakable Julius Streicher? The list of de-fendants
is made up of men who played indispensable
and reciprocal parts in this tragedy. The photographs
and the films show them again and again together on
important occasions. The documents show them agreed
on policies and on methods, and all working aggressively
for the expansion of Germany by force of arms.

"Each of these men made a real contribution to the
Nazi plan. Every man had a key part ....

"It is against such a background that these defendants
now ask this tribunal to say that they are not guilty of
planning, executing, or conspiring to commit this long
list of crimes and wrongs," Jackson concluded. "... If
you were to say of these men that they are not guilty,
t would be as true to say there has been no war, there are
no slain, there has been no crime."

The First International Military Tribunal continued
another month for the purpose of passing judgment on


[302] Seven Famous Trials in History


a number of Nazi organizations that had been indicted.
Four of these, the Leadership Corps of the Nazi party,
the Gestapo, the SD, and the SS were all judged criminal
in nature. On September 3°and October the tribunal
rendered its verdict on the defendants. Eleven were sen-tenced
to death by hanging. Three were given imprison-ment
for life. Four were sentenced to terms of ten to
twenty years, and three were acquitted on the grounds
that there was a reasonable doubt as to their guilt:


		VERDICT
	SENTENCE

GOERIIqG
	GUILTY on counts
	Death by hanging

	I, 2, 3, 4

xEss
	GUILTY on counts
	Life imprisonhaent


RmBETROV
	GUILTY on counts
	Death by hanging

	I, 2, 3' 4

raimL
	GUILTY on counts
	Death by hanging }

	i, 2, 3, 4

KALTENBRUNNER
	GUILTY on counts
	Death by hanging ·


	3, 4

ROSENBERG
	GUILTY on counts
	Death by hanging ¢

	i, 2, 3, 4

Fe.K
	GUILTY on counts
	Death by hanging

	3, 4

FRICK
	GUILTY on counts
	Death by hanging

	2, 3, 4

STREICHER
	GUILTY on count 4
	Death by hanging '..

FUNK
	GUILTY on counts
	Life imprisonment

	/2, 3, 4

SCUaCT
	lqOT GUILTY

DOV. mTZ
	GUILTY on counts
	io years imprisonment

	2, 3

RAEDER
	GUILTY on counts
	Life imprisonment

	I, 2 3

YON scmaac}
	GUILTY on count 4
	20 years i/nprisonment


THE


NUREMBERG TRIAL


[303


SAVOCV
	GUILTY on counts

	3, 4

JO1)L
	GUILTY on counts

	i, 2, 3, 4

vow va, EN
	NOT GUILTY

szYss-r(vxuT
	GUILTY on counts

	z, 3, 4

seE
	GUILTY on counts

	3, 4

YON NEVlTH
	GUILTY on counts

	I, l, 3, 4

FRITSCIE
	NOT GUILTY


Death by hanging
Death by hanging


Death by hanging '


2o years imprisonment


5 years imprisonment


Martin Bormann, who was tried in absentia, was also
found guilty and sentenced to hanging.

On October xS, the night before the executions were
scheduled, Goering asked the prison chaplain for the
Lord's Supper and the blessing of the Lutheran Church.
The chaplain refused, saying that Goering had never
shown any sign of repentance. Sometime that night or
early morning Goering chewed a capsule of cyanide of
potassium, said to have been passed to him by his wife.
No doubt he died gloating that he had played a final
trick on his captors. Ribbentrop was the first of the re-maining
condemned to be hanged in the grimy, barnlike
gymnasium inside one of the prison yards of the Nurem-berg
jail. The executions took just one and a half hours.

Two months later, in December, '945, the Allied Con-trol
Council established military tribunals in each of the
four zones into which Germany had been divided, for
the purpose of trying lesser Nazi criminals. Between

'947 and '949, the United States tribunal conducted
twelve individual trials, all at Nuremberg.

The Nuremberg "Medical Trial" charged twenty

[304] Seven Famous Trials in History


four defendants, of whom twenty were physicians, with
responsibility for dangerous, painful, and usually fatal
experiments on some hundreds of thousands of human
subjects, prisoners, allegedly for science. The "Justice
Case" charged sixteen defendants with committing war
crimes and crimes against humanity through abuse of the
judicial process. The "Pohl Case" tried Oswald Pohl
and seventeen other heads of concentration camps and
slave labor camps. The "I. G. Farben Case" charged
twenty-four defendants, officers of this international
chemical company, with spoliation of property in invaded
countries and participation in the Nazi slave labor pro-gram.
The "Krupp Case" charged twelve defendants,
including high executives of the Krupp industrial empire,
with similar crimes. The "Einsatzgruppen Case" charged
twenty-three officers of the SS Elite Guard and heads of
extermination squads for murder of some two million
persons.

In these twelve trials, x85 Nazi war criminals were
indicted, of whom more than half received prison terms,
while twenty-four were sentenced to hanging.

The Nuremberg Trial also served as a precedent for
the "Tokyo War Crimes Trial" in which certain Japa-nese
political and military leaders were charged with en-gaging
in criminal acts against the laws of nations.

From beginning to end, the various military tribunals
were the subject of debate and discussion. Some said it
would have been better to shoot the war criminals and
have it over with. Certain jurists questioned their legal-ity.
Could an international tribunal be a true court of
law, since there was no world state in existence? Their
legal aspect has been analyzed in innumerable articles
and books. That many defendants were released or given


	Dight sentences, for lack of sufficient evidence, has caused

	bitterness and some disillusionment.

	Whatever their failings, the First International Tri
	at
Nuremberg and the trials that followed marked

	milestone in legal history. Said Lieutenant Commander

	'. one of the United States prosecutio

	Harris,
	.. -:- t Nuremberg s

	"The most simcanr tmtb ou

	it happened"' r future enerations to follow or mod
	The
trials set a pattern for punishment of makers of

	aressive wars fo . -werful weapon

if. In so doing, they nave provm¢	fully

against
such wars. Just as sigcant, they created a

	documented account of the rise of Nazism and Fascism,

	with their wake of suppression of human rights, war,

	lawlessness, robberies, tortures, and murders. No in
	formed
person could ever say that perhaps thek crimes

	and atrockies had been exaggerated. They are all on the

	record for anyone to read.


BIBLIOGRAPHy

SOCRATEs

	Couch, H. N. Greece. New York: Prentice Hall, 95r.

	Durant, Will. The Life of Greece. New York: Simon & Schus~

ter, x939.

Montgomery, John, Editor. The State Versus Socrates. BOSton:

Beacon Press, x9S4.

Plato. Dialogues of Plato. Selections from

Benjamin Jowett, Edited b . . the Translation

	PI- L York: Liver/ght Pub/ishin- Y William Chase Gree, of

	urarch. Plutarch,. r :. .orp., r92 .
	--. New

	York:
	o ves./Sdted by Edu;d C Lindeman New

	New American Library,
	'

95o.

/inspear, A/ban D. and Silverberg, Tom. Who Was

	The Gordon Company, 939.
	SOcrates?


JOAN OF ARC


Michelet, Jules. The Life of loan o4rc. The Spencer Press,

		937.

	Scott, W. S. The Trial of loan of ,4rc.

		ated Booksellers, 956.
	Westport, Conn. Associ
	Shaw,
Bernard. Saint loan, Major Barbara, ,4ndrocles and the

Lion.* New York: The Modern Library, Random House,

x96.

Stolpe, Sven. The Maid of Orleans. New York: Pantheon Press,

	956.


GALILEo


Clason, Clyde B. Men, Planets and Stars. New York: G. p. Put-am
s Sons, 959.

* Wh//e Shaw's great play is fictionalized and takes liberties with the
sequence of events, the long Preface to Saint loan gives an excellent
acCOUnt of the times she lived in and an original
character.

haterpretation of her


De Harsanyi, Zsolt. The Star-Gazer. New York: G. P. Putnam's

Sons 939. (A Novel)

De Santillana, Giorgio. The Crime of Galileo. Chicago: Univer-sity
of Chicago Press, x955.

Fermi, Laura and Bernardini, Gilberto. Galileo and the Scien-tific
Revolution. New York: Basic Books, 96.

Galileo. Discoveries and Opinions of Galileo. Edited by Stillman
Drake. Garden City, New York: Anchor Books, Double-day
& Company, x957.


ETER ZENGER


ii! ':Buranelli, Vincent. The Trial of Peter Zenger. New York: New

York University Press, I957
James
Wright. Life and Times of John Peter Zenger.
New York: Editor and Publisher. March x4 through April
i, x953.

qoodwin, Maud Wilder. Dutch and English on the Hudson.

New Haven, Conn., x9x9.

Konkle, Burton Alva. Life of Andrew Hamilton. Philadelphia:

National Publishing Co., 94I.

:lutherford, Livingston. John Peter Zenger. New York: Dodd,

Mead & Company, x9o4.


.OBERT EMMET


Zmmet, Thomas Addis, M.D., LL.D. Memoir of Thomas Addis

and Robert Emmet. Two Volumes. New York: The Em-:!:
met Press, x95.

!?: Landreth, Helen. The Pursuit of Robert Emmet. New York:

Whittlesey House, x948.

Madden, R. R. The Life and Times qJRobert Emmet. New

York: Excelsior Publishing House, x9ox.

Postgate, R. W. Dear Robert Emmet. New York: Vanguard

Press, x932.


[308]


BIBLIOGRAPH'


ALFRED DREYFUS


Chapman, Guy. The Dreyfus Case. New York: Re

pany, x955.

Dreyfus, Pierre. The Dreyfus Case. New Haven,

University Press, x937.

Halasz, Nicholas. Captain Dreyfus. New York: Si:.

ter, i955.

Josephson, Matthew. Zola and His Time. Gar&

York: Garden City, New York.


THE NUREMBERG TRIAL


Bernstein, Victor H. Final Judgment. New York: 0i & Gaer,

x947.

Crouquet, Roger. Le Procds de Nuremberg. Pris Eitions

Dupuis-Charleroi, I946.

Fishman, Jack. The Seven Men of Spandau. Nexx Yrk: Rine-hart
& Company, x954.

Gibb, Andrew Dewar. Perjury Unlimited. Edinburgh: W.,

Green & Son, Ltd., x954.

Gilbert, G. M. Nuremberg Diary. New York: ?attar, Strau.,

and Cudahy, 947.

Harris, Whitney R. Tyranny on Trial. Dallas, Texas: $outher,

Methodist University Press, x954.

Jackson, Robert H. The Niirnberg Case. New York: Alfred

Knopf, x947.

Keeshan, Anne (text) and Alexander, Charles W.

graphs). Justice at Nuernberg. Marvel press, 946,
Reitlinger, Gerald. The SS--Alibi of a Nation. New York:

Viking Press, 957.

Shirer, William L. The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich.

York: Simon and Schuster, x96o.