Real Crime Stories/Paranormal Hauntings/Conspiracy Theories Book II

Assassination of Gaston Calmette

Gaston Calmette (30 July 1858 inMontpellier – 16 March 1914, Paris) was a French journalist andnewspaper editor.

Biography

He was educated at Nice, Bordeaux,Clermont-Ferrand and Mâcon, and afterwards entered journalism. In1884 he joined the staff of Le Figaro, and in 1894 became its editor.In January 1914, Calmette launched a campaign against Minister ofFinance Joseph Caillaux, who had introduced progressive taxation andwas known for his pacifist stance towards Germany during the SecondMoroccan Crisis, in 1911. Almost every day Le Figaro producedevidence of a damaging sort against the minister with the object ofproving that he used his official position to facilitate speculationon the Paris Bourse. The attitude of Caillaux in the Rochette case of1911, in which it was alleged by Le Figaro that the director ofpublic prosecutions had been influenced by the ministry to delay thecourse of justice, was brought forward, and a newspaper campaign ofextraordinary violence was the result. Caillaux was urged by some ofhis colleagues to take legal proceedings against his accusers, butdeclined.

Assassination

At 6pm on 16 March 1914, he entered theoffices of Le Figaro in the company of his friend, the novelist PaulBourget. Caillaux's second wife Henriette was waiting for him,wearing a fur coat and with her hands in a fur muff. To Bourget'ssurprise, Calmette agreed to see her in his office.

There, Madame Caillaux exchanged a fewwords with him, then pulled out a .32 Browning automatic pistol shehad been concealing within the muff and fired six shots. Calmette washit four times and was critically wounded, dying six hours later.Caillaux made no attempt to escape and newspaper workers in adjoiningoffices quickly summoned a doctor and the police. She refused to betransported to the police headquarters in a police van, insisting onbeing driven there by her chauffeur in her own car, which was stillparked outside. The police agreed to this and she was formallycharged upon reaching the headquarters.

During the campaign against JosephCaillaux, which was orchestrated by Louis Barthou and RaymondPoincaré, Le Figaro published several letters from the Minister'sprivate correspondence. Madame Caillaux's motive was fear that thenewspaper would also make public a love letter that showed how herhusband was already having a relationship with her during his firstmarriage.

Joseph Caillaux had to resign his postthe next day, but during a spectacular trial later that year his wifewas acquitted.

Other interests

Calmette was well known for hisinterest in art, and possessed a fine collection of caricatures andengravings of the First Empire.

Popular culture

Robert Delaunay used an illustration ofthe assassination as the basis for his 1914 painting Political Drama.

Marcel Proust dedicated Swann's Way,the first volume of his novel In Search of Lost Time, to Calmette 'asa testimony of deep and affectionate recognition'.

Calmette was the brother of thebacteriologist Albert Calmette.