Marie Lafarge
Marie-Fortunée Lafarge was a French woman who was convicted of murdering her husband by arsenic poisoning in 1840. Her case became notable because it was one of the early trials to be followed by the public through daily newspaper reports, and because she was the first person convicted largely on direct forensic toxicological evidence. Nonetheless, questions about Lafarge's guilt divided French society to the extent that it is often compared to the better-known Dreyfus affair.
Early life
Marie Lafarge was born in Paris in 1816, the daughter of an artillery officer. She is said to descend through her grandmother, Hermine, Baroness Collard, from a liaison between Stéphanie Félicité, comtesse de Genlis and Louis Philippe II, Duke of Orléans. Marie lost her father to a hunting accident when she was age 12; her mother, who remarried soon after, died seven years later.At age 18, Marie was adopted by her maternal aunt, who was married to the secretary-general of the Bank of France. The two women did not get along. Despite that her foster parents treated her well and sent her to the best schools, Marie was kept aware of her status as a poor relative. Because she attended an elite school, Marie interacted with daughters of the moneyed aristocracy. She used every means to persuade them that she too came from a wealthy family and became envious when she saw her friends marrying rich noblemen. Marie had little say in the matter of matrimony. Her marriage dowry of 90,000 francs, while considerable, was not impressive considering her family's status, and Marie was left with feelings of inadequacy that fueled her pride and ambition.
As Marie remained unmarried when she turned 23, one of her uncles took responsibility for finding her a husband. Unknown to Marie, he engaged the services of a marriage broker. This transaction produced just one candidate who fit the advice of her father that "no marriage contract should be made with a man whose only income is his salary as a subprefect."
Charles Lafarge
Charles Pouch-Lafarge was a big, coarse man, aged 28. He was the son of Jean-Baptiste Lafarge, justice of the peace in Vigeois. In 1817, Charles's father bought the former charterhouse, or Carthusian monastery, in the hamlet of Le Glandier, Corrèze, which had been run by Carthusian monks since the 13th century but fallen into disrepair after its suppression in the French Revolution. In an effort to make it profitable, Charles turned part of the estate into a foundry, a venture that plunged him into debt and bankruptcy.In 1839, Charles saw a good marriage as the only way to pay his creditors. He engaged the same marriage broker who was hired to find a husband for Marie, advertising himself as a wealthy iron master with property worth more than 200,000 francs with an annual income of 30,000 from the foundry alone. He also carried letters of recommendation from his priest and local deputy. To hide that a marriage broker was involved in facilitating their relationship, Marie's uncle passed Charles as a friend and arranged a fortuitous meeting with Marie at the opera. Marie found Charles common and repulsive, but because he advertised himself as the owner of a palatial estate she agreed to marry him. Thus, four days after the meeting, her aunt announced their engagement, and they were married on 10 August 1839. The couple then left Paris for Le Glandier to live at the estate.
Disillusionment
As it could be expected, when they arrived on 13 August, Marie was disillusioned. The house, contained within the ruins of the former monastery, was damp and rat-infested. Her in-laws were peasants who disgusted her and regarded her with deep distrust. Instead of the wealth she expected, she was faced with considerable debt. In her despondency, Marie locked herself in her room the first night and wrote a letter to her husband, imploring him to release her from their marriage, while threatening to take her life with arsenic. Charles, whose affairs were desperate, agreed to make concessions except to release her from the marriage. He promised not to assert his marital privileges until he restored the estate to its original condition. She appeared to become calm, and their relationship appeared to have improved in the ensuing weeks.Despite her situation, Marie wrote letters to her school friends pretending that she was having a happy domestic life. She also tried to help her husband by writing letters of recommendation for Charles to Paris, where he hoped to raise money. In December 1839, before he left on a business trip, Marie made a will bequeathing to her husband her entire inheritance with the proviso that he would do the same for her. He did, but made another will without Marie's knowledge, leaving the Le Glandier property to his mother.
Parisian illness
While Charles was in Paris, Marie wrote to him passionate love letters and sent him her picture, as well as a Christmas cake in the spirit of the season. He ate a piece of it and suddenly became violently ill soon after. As cholera-like symptoms were common in those days, he did not think about consulting with a physician but threw the cake away, thinking that it became spoiled in transit. When he returned to Le Glandier, having raised some money, he still felt ill. Marie put him to bed and fed him venison and truffles. Almost immediately, Charles again was afflicted with la maladie parisienne. The family physician, Dr. Bardon, agreed with its cholera-like symptoms and was not suspicious when Marie asked him for a prescription for arsenic in order to kill the rats that disturbed her husband during the evening.The next day, Charles experienced leg cramps, dehydration and nausea. He was so ill that his relatives kept watch on him at all times, including a young cousin named Emma Pontier and a young woman who stayed with them by the name of Anna Brun. Marie treated him with various medicaments, especially gum arabic, which, according to her, always did her good, and which she always kept a ready supply of in her small malachite box, but to no avail. Charles deteriorated so rapidly that another physician, Dr. Massénat, was called in for consultation. He also diagnosed cholera and prescribed eggnog to strengthen him.
Anna noticed Marie taking white powder from her malachite box and stirring it into the eggnog. When asked, Marie said it was "orange-blossom sugar". Anna's suspicions were increased when she noticed a few white flakes floating on the surface of the eggnog after the patient took a few sips. She showed the glass to Dr. Massénat; he tasted the eggnog and experienced a burning sensation, but attributed the flakes to some ceiling plaster that may have fallen in the glass. Anna was not convinced; she put the rest of the eggnog in a cupboard and kept a close eye on Marie. She witnessed Marie stir more white powder into some soup for Charles. Again, Charles felt violently ill after a few sips. Anna took the cup of soup away and mustered courage to tell Charles's relatives of her suspicions.
Suspicions of murder
On 12 January 1840, while the family gathered in the sickroom fearing the worst, Emma Pontier, who had such high regard for Marie, told her of Anna's suspicions. Charles's mother implored him not to take another morsel of food from his wife. Panic ensued when it was learned that Charles's servant and gardener had bought arsenic for Marie "for the rats". Marie admitted this request, but she made the gardener confirm that she gave him the arsenic to make rat-poison paste out of it. Their fears were momentarily allayed, but the next day, white residue was found at the bottom of a glass of sugar water that Marie had administered to Charles. A third doctor, René de Lespinasse, was called on 13 January. He suspected poison, but by then it was too late: Charles died a few hours later.Already, suspicions ran high that Marie had poisoned her husband, but she seemed unfazed. While word went about regarding this suspicion, Marie went to her notary with the will, not knowing that it was invalid. Only Emma would go near her, and already torn by doubts, told Marie that Lafarge's brother-in-law was going to the police at Brive. Anna then took possession of Marie's malachite box.
The justice of the peace from Brive, Moran, arrived at Le Glandier on 15 January. Impressed by Marie, he listened with uncertainty to the family's accusations but took possession of the soup, the sugar water and the eggnog that Anna had put aside. Then the gardener revealed that Marie had given him arsenic with which to make rat-poison paste in December as well as January. Strangely, the paste could be found all over the house, untouched by the rats. Moran had the paste collected, his suspicions aroused. He questioned the apothecary who sold the arsenic to Marie and asked Charles's doctors to perform a post-mortem examination. He also learned of a new test for the presence of arsenic that pathologists in Paris were using and asked Lafarge's doctors if they could apply the same test in this case. Dr. Lespinasse hastily replied that they could, hiding their ignorance of the test and the intricacies of its procedure.