10/26/1440 - On a Wednesday morning, the terribly troubled life of 35-year-old French knight and lord, Gilles de Rais, a leader of the French army during the Hundred Years' War and a companion-in-arms to Joan of France, comes to a gruesome halt in Nantes, Brittany, when along with two of his servants, de Rais is hung and burnt on the island of Grand Biesse along the shores of the River Loire in the city of Nantes for murdering over 140 children. But was he actually guilty of the killings? Or was he set-up by the secular and ecclesiastical courts of Brittany and against a threat of torture, confesses to crimes he didn't commit as found by the "not guilty" ruling of Judge Henri Juramy in November of 1992 during a mock retrial of de Rais at Luxembourg Palace in which evidence is presented by a team of lawyers, writers, former French ministers, parliament members, a medical doctor, and a biologist (the team is led by writer, film director, and poet, Gilbert Prouteau).
Gilles de Rais
The eldest son of Marie de Craon and Guy de Laval-Rais, Gilles de Rais is born in the "Black Tower" room of Anjou's Champtoce Castle sometime around 1404. Extremely well connected, on his mother's side of the family Gilles is linked to the wealthy House of Craon in western France, and on his father's side, he is descended from the Barons of Retz (the oldest Duchy of Brittany at the time) and the prestigious House of Montmorency. In 1414, Gilles gets a younger brother that the family names Rene. An extremely intelligent youth, de Rais writes illuminated manuscripts, learns military tactics, and becomes fluent in speaking and reading Latin, compliments of tutoring received from two priest teachers. Wealth and connections though prove powerless to prevent tragedy from entering the brother's lives when both their mother and then their father pass away by October 1415 (as Gilles watches, his father is gored to death while on a wild boar hunt), and the duo is turned over to their maternal grandfather, Jean de Craon, the lord of La Suze and Champtoce for raising (despite Guy de Laval-Rais leaving a will making their cousin, Jean II Tournemine de la Hunaudaye, the boys "guardian, tutor, protector, defender, and legitimate administrator"). At roughly the same time, on St. Crispin's Day of 1415 (October 25th), English King Henry V defeats a numerically superior force of French knights and soldiers at the famous Battle of Agincourt (where Henry V according to Shakespeare will give his famous "Band of Brothers" speech as his men prepare for their upcoming battle), a clash in which Jean de Craon will lose his heir, Amaury, and several members of his household ... opening the door to Gilles and Rene becoming the old man's new heirs. The lessons the boys learn from de Craon, one of the richest men in all of France, is that power and wealth can be gained and maintained through conscienceless manipulations and machinations using whatever means are necessary for success, and that as two of France's highest of the high, the de Rais boys are above the law.
Agincourt
Champtoce Castle Ruins
And so it is that Gilles' grandfather promises the 13-year-old boy's hand in marriage to Jeanne Peynel, the orphaned Norman daughter of Foulques Peynel, Lord of Hambye and Bricquebec ... a union that would have made de Craon's house the most powerful in France, the reason the Parliament of Paris forbids the marriage until Jeanne comes of age. The grandfather unwilling to wait for Peynel to become an adult, ten months later de Craon then betroths Gilles to Beatrice de Rohan, the wealthy niece of the Duke of Burgundy (the death of Beatrice ends these plans). At 16, under directions from his grandfather, de Rais abducts from her home and marries his third cousin, Catherine de Thouars in 1420 (an uncle and two other men will be thrown in a dungeon trying to rescue the girl), a union that is annulled and declared incestuous by the Church ... but not for long. After negotiations (and secret payments) with family members and Hardouin de Bueil, the Bishop of Angers, in 1422, the bride and groom will have a penance imposed on them that allows them to be absolved of the crime of incest and remarry again, and just like that, Gilles becomes related to the heir to the French throne as a relative of the future French King Charles VII). On their second marriage no kidnapping is necessary and the union produces a baby girl in 1433 named Marie. Under the direction of his grandfather, Gilles also receives hours of schooling in the ways of a knight, becoming adept in sword-fighting, jousting, archery, and hand-to-hand combat so that at only 14, the young squire, clad in the finest Spanish armor from Milan, rides out to test his mettle as a warrior.
de Rais Coat Of Arms
Gilles first battles take place supporting the dukes of House of Montfort against the machinations of the House of Penthievre during yet another civil war for control of the Duchy of Brittany (the previous clash is known as the War of Breton Succession and lasts from 1341 to 1365). In the clashes that take place, de Rais will help rescue Duke John V (also known as "John the Wise') of Brittany from being made a captive of the Penthievres after he visits a festival in Chatonceaux and is kidnapped, fights off Penthievre attempts to take his castle, one by one puts the castles of the Penthievres under siege, and helps make Joanna, the Countess of Penthievre, a hostage for ransom. Rewarded for his "good and noble services" helping the Montfort faction to triumph with generous land grants that are then sold off for money, de Rais and his grandfather then jump into participating in Europe's Hundred Years' War (the clash of nations will actually last for 116 years, 4 months, 3 weeks and 4 days) pitting the forces of England and France against each other for the French throne after French King Charles IV dies in 1328 without having any sons or brothers to bequeath his kingdom. Beset by the civil war in Burgundy and the military successes of the Lancastrian monarchy, the tide slower begins to turn against the English when King Henry V dies of dysentery in the castle of Vincennes at the age of 35 in 1822, and in the same year, Charles Dauphin, becomes the French King, Charles "The Victorious" VII ... and wanting back the French lands seized by the English, the war starts up again.
Duke John V
King Henry V
Supporting King Charles VII's efforts, de Rais is believed to take part in the 1423 Battle of la Gravelle, a crushing defeat for the English who lose 1,400 soldiers on the field of combat, along with an additional 300 men fleeing the battlefield, while the French lose but a single knight, John Le Roux, along with a handful of infantrymen. He is also thought to have participated in the French defeat at the 1424 Battle of Verneuil, in which a French and Scottish army, assisted by Milanese heavy cavalry loses over 6,000 men (out of an army of 16,000) to an English force of 9,000 led by John of Lancaster, the Duke of Bedford. Despite the defeat, the war goes on, and in 1425, when King Charles VII seeks new allies to fight for his throne, de Rais becomes a member of the king's court and as such, quickly becomes involved in royal politics and the war against the English. In 1426, de Rais survives the disastrous French defeat that takes place at the Battle of St. James in which a force of 600 Englishmen under the command of Sir Thomas Rempston rout a French force of 16,000 commanded by the ill-prepared Arthur de Richemont, Constable of France, but gains increased political currency with the king when he doesn't defect to the side of the English as many French do like de Rais' former patron, John V. Instead, appointed Captain of Sable on behalf of Duke Louis III of Anjou, de Rais helps lead a series of guerilla attacks against the English garrisons along the borders of the county of Maine, beginning a turnaround in the military fortunes of France.
The Constable Of France
Successful raiding the English outposts along the border of the county of Maine, de Rais is at the King's court at Chateau de Chinon in February of 1429 (he is a member of the Royal Council from 1429 to 1434 and has the title King's Counselor and holds the office of Charles VII's chamberlain) when 17-year-old Joan of Arc shows up and convinces the 26-year-old French king that she has received visions from the archangel Michael, Saint Margaret, and Saint Catherine on how to save France from English domination. All in after a private discussion between king and future saint (the King will give her a new suit of armor to wear, allows Joan to create a personal white battle standard made of linen and silk covered in lilies, depicting God holding the world between two angels and the words "Jesus Maria," and she is armed with a sword from the altar in the church of Sainte-Catherine-de-Fierbois), Charles VII gives de Rais the duty of protecting Joan in battle and appoints him, along with Jeanne de Brosse, marshal of Boussac, to lead a French force in lifting the English siege of the Loire Valley city of Orleans. Seemingly always at the spot where the fighting is most intense, during the campaign to lift the siege, Joan and de Rais participate in the taking of the fortress of Saint Loup, the capture of the Saint-Jean-le-Blanc fortress, the attack on the fortified monastery of les Augustins, and the seizure of the English stronghold les Tourelles, actions which cause the English to retreat from the area, breaking the siege on Friday, May 8, 1429. Orleans rescued, the French army then embarks on its Loire Campaign to free cities in the region taken by the English. In June of 1429, de Rais and Joan best English forces during the Battle of Jargeau and again at the Battle of Patay (in which the English will suffer 4,000 soldiers being killed or captured). The pair is also together for the official coronation of King Charles VII that takes place in the Reims Cathedral on July 17, 1429. During the consecration ceremony, Joan is given a place of honor near the king and declares that God's will has been fulfilled, while de Rais, is one of four lords that carry the Holy Ampulla (a glass vial of anointing oil used in the coronation of French kings) from the Basilica of Saint-Remi in Reims to the city's holy cathedral, and the knight is elevated to the rank of Marshal of France.
Jean de Brosse
Joan Riding Into Orleans
Coronation Of Charles VII - Joan Is
Directly Behind Holding Her Standard
Beside Joan once more, in August of 1429, de Rais is back on the campaign trail, again sharing command of the French army with Jean de Brosse as the force marches on Paris. Laying siege to the town, de Rais is beside Joan when the French launch an all-day attack on Porte Saint-Honore, the main entrance to Paris from the west, a raid that is thwarted as night arrives and Joan is wounded in the leg by a crossbow bolt. With the wounding of his lucky charm, thinking God isn't watching over her anymore, Charles VII calls off the siege of the city and will soon break up the army, much to the consternation of the "Maiden of Orleans." Without de Rais at her side because the king has not approved the operation (Charles VII will however approve de Rais adding to his coat-of-arms, a border bearing the French fleur-de-lis, the royal symbol, and an honor given only to the knight and Joan) Joan puts together a volunteer force that attacks a Burgundian camp at Margny, northeast of the town of Compiegne. The raid fails and captured by the English supporting Burgundians, Joan is given over to the English after an exchange of money, and after a sham trial, she is found guilty of heresy (for wearing men's clothing, acting on demonic visions, and refusing to submit to the church) by Bishop Pierre Cauchon and is burnt at the stake in the Normandy town of Rouen. It is believed by many that de Rais is one of the knights that unsuccessfully tries to rescue Joan before her execution on May 30, 1431. Despite Joan's removal, civil war between the French and clashes with the English continue and for awhile, de Rais is right in the middle of things again.
Execution
In the next few years, de Rais supports the royal court schemes of his cousin, Grand Chamberlain Georges de La Tremoille. August of 1432 finds the knight help lift the English siege of the town of Lagny-sur-Marne. But then the blows to his reputation begin as his grandfather, Jean de Craon, dies in November of 1432 after apologizing on his deathbed for raising his grandson to be a monster (and so his disapproval of de Rais can't be missed, de Craon bequeaths his sword and armor to Gilles' younger brother), La Tremoille being supplanted at court by Charles of Anjou, being unable to prevent the loss of the city of Grancey by forces commanded by English ally, the Duke of Burgundy, Philip the Good, that takes place in 1434, and a 1435 interdict from King Charles VII against de Rais being issued at the behest of the knight's brother and the Laval Family for selling off family properties to pay for his extravagant lifestyle. Stung by the blows after having helped France remove most of the English presence from the country, the number one military figure withdraws from court life and takes up residence at his castle at Champtoce. Left for the most part to his own devices, it is at the castle that darkness is said to take de Rais' soul.
De Rais Sculpture Sans Beard
Debauchery and decadence mixed with blood, behind the walls of his castle, de Rais spends money he doesn't have on a 150-actor play about Joan of Arc and the siege of Orleans (and he pays for costumes that are only worn once before being substituted and treats his audiences to food and wine during performances), travels with an entourage of 200 men-at-arms, lavish furnishing for his properties (at one of his castles he has a chapel filled with gold and silken tapestries, along with sacred vessels covered in gems), the maintenance of a huge amount of servants, heralds, singers, astrologizers, and pages and priests, patronizing works of art that include music, literature, and pageants, commissions the building of several chapels (the 1433 construction of the "Chapel of Holy Innocents" is staffed with with a boys choir hand picked by de Rais) and a cathedral. and always dines on the finest foods and libations possible. Desperate to continue feeding his urges despite having empty pockets, when many of his bills come due in 1435 and he is cut off from funding by the King's interdict, he turns to form of alchemy in which demons will attempt to be called forth to solve his financial woes. Incensed when no demon manifests, de Rais consults a 22-year-old sorcerer from Florence named Francois Perlati that advises that the demon he is trying to contact, known as Barron, needs the soul of a child before doling out riches to anyone ... and so it is that de Rais slaughters one of the region's youths, dismembers the lad and places his limbs in a glass vessel and presents the corpse to Satan from within a pentagram along with a contract for continued wealth (along with the Devil's promise not to kill him or grab his soul). And there is another attempt at contact in which a boy is killed and then his hands, heart, and eyes are put on a glass tray and covered with linen before being gifted to the darkness. Again, Satan and his demons fail to show up, but that is only a slight problem as the knight now has a new hobby to wallow in as he begins wearing a small silver box containing a strange black powder around his neck, a gift from Perlati that the magician claims will enhance de Rais' powers to contact demons.
Disposing Of A Body
Seeking Audience With The Devil
From the spring of 1432 to the spring of 1440, children begin vanishing in the regions of Brittany, Anjou, and Poitou ... all territories de Rais has holdings within. Gone, gone, and gone, in all between 200 and 600 little ones, between the ages of six and eighteen, mostly boys, go missing while begging for alms at the gates of de Rais properties, running errands to de Rais castles, after being promised sweet treats from castle kitchens, disappear while tending sheep, gathering plums, guarding cows, and chasing butterflies through nearby woodlands, picking apples, going to open market of Machecoul to buy bread, and are simply abducted from their homes in the dead of night. When anyone is brave enough to inquire from de Rais or his servants as to the missing, their questions are shrugged off with "the child was never seen here," and reports of red lights being seen at night from a high tower casement, along with faint cries coming from the de Rais castle are ignored (he is almost caught though when following the King's indictment in 1435 when his younger brother takes over the family castle at Champtoce ... a castle in which murderous evidence has been removed of Gilles' crimes as the knight has his servants burn and bury forty bodies just hours before Rene de Rais takes possession of his new residence, an outcome that also occurs when three weeks later, Rene also moves into Machecoul, where two male skeletons will be missed in the cleanup). It goes on for years and years, but with the main suspect in the mystery of the missing being one of the most powerful lords in the land, no end seems in sight for the put upon peasants of the region until de Rais makes a mistake selling one of his castles, Saint-Etienne-de-Mer-Morte, to a nobleman and the Treasurer of Brittany, Geoffroy Le Ferron, a trusted servant of the Duke of Brittany, John V.
Procuring A Victim
After the sale of Saint-Etienne-de-Mer-Morte, Geoffroy Le Ferron turns administration of the property over to his brother, Jean Le Ferron, a high-ranking tonsured cleric, but there is a problem, Gilles de Rais wants to call off the transaction because he can get a better deal by selling it to his cousin, the Sire de Vieillevigne. The Le Ferrons however are having none of it and won't give the property back. Still one of the most formidable knights in the land, De Rais' reaction to the being told to pound sand is to raise a small force of brigands that invade the sanctity of the Saint-Etienne-de-Mer-Monte church during High Mass on Pentecost Day of 1440, with Gillis brandishing a double-edged guisarme at Jean Le Ferron and threatening to cut him into pieces if he does not give back the castle. Complying for the moment, Le Ferron is locked up inside the structure, while other supporters of the Le Ferrons, like Jean Rousseau, the sergeant-general of the Brittany duchy, are roughed up or arrested. But there are rules even for nobles and de Rais' moves are too much for either the King or the Church to put up with. Responding immediately, Duke John V orders his vassal de Rais to free Le Ferron, return the castle to the cleric, and pay a fine of 50,000 gold coins. De Rais responds by moving his hostages to a fortress outside the control of Brittany's authorities and begins negotiations with the crown over the transaction unaware that his actions have set off a secret ecclesiastical investigation of his activities (inquisito infamiae) led by a long time de Rais foe, the Bishop of Nantes, Jean de Malestroit. And so it is that after a visiting the region, on July 29, 1440, de Malestroit publicly accuses his enemy of raping and murdering numerous children as well as entering into pacts with Satan and his minions. Less than a month later, Duke John V works out a deal with his brother, the Constable of France, Arthur de Richemont, for Le Ferron to be freed from his captivity in exchange for receiving the land of Bourgneuf-en-Retz, property owned by de Rais, and that blow to the knight is followed on September 15, 1440, with the arrests of de Rais, alchemist Francois Prelati, priest Eustache Blanchet, servants Henriet Griart and Etienne Corillaut, and two local women that have provided children to the nobleman, Tiphaine Branchu and Perrine Martin (two participants in the crimes, de Rais' cousins, noblemen Gilles de Sille and Roger de Briqueville, sensing what is coming, use money they have hidden away to escape retribution, and before they can be arrested, ride off and are never heard from again).
Guisarme
de Richemont
De Rais is confined at the city of Nantes' Chateau-des-ducs-de-Bretagne as three weeks of testimony is provided to both a secular and a ecclesiastical court, and on October 13th, the Marshal of France is indicted on 34 charges of murder, sodomy, heresy, and for violating the sanctity of the Church. Standing before the judges of both courts, de Rais is asked to answer the charges and instead launches into verbal attacks on the authorities that have arrested him. After the fourth request to plea his case is refused, the Bishop of Nantes excommunicates de Rais and then adjourns the hearing. Denied Communion and penitential rites, fearing for his immortal soul, two days later a tearful de Rais acknowledges the authority of the court, admits to committing the crimes described in his indictment, and asks for forgiveness for his previous outbursts, actions that allow the vice inquisitor and bishop to absolve the knight and readmit de Rais to the Church. Foolishly though, he refuses to admit to trying to summon demons, so his captured confederates are brought back into court and spend five days providing the courts with testimony on their master's attempts to conjure up Satan. Asked after his accomplices testimony what he has to add to the record, de Rais states he has nothing to add, and so the frustrated prosecutor asks to be allowed to physically pull a confession out of the defendant in the torture chambers of La Tour Neuve. Aware of what will be coming his way having tortured his own victims, de Rais agrees to give up the details of his crimes.
Chateau-Des-Ducs-De-Bretagne
Torture Devices
Braquemards
Again, de Rais cries and begs on his knees for forgiveness and to be let back into the church, and again for some reason, the Bishop of Nantes absolves the knight and allows him to participate in the sacraments and okays his absolution upon death and burial in sacred ground, which is a good thing for the killer who is sentenced by both courts to be hung by the neck until he is dead (a death back then that comes slowly through choking as the drop into death does not break the victim's neck) and then have his body burnt to ash (his two servants, Griart and Corillaut receive the same sentence, while Prelati receives a sentence of life in prison, but when he escapes later and is caught again, his end is amended to death by hanging). Sentenced on October 25 to death at 11:00 in the morning of the next day, de Rais and his two servants are led out of the cells in La Tour Nueve to a meadow on the other side of the Loire River overlooking Nantes. Following the three condemned men is a procession of over a thousand witnesses chanting prayers and singing. Arriving at the execution site, the trio of murderers are greeted by three gibbets ready to fire, with the center one slightly larger than the other two ... where de Rais will be leaving from. Requesting to be the first to go so he can provide his servants with a manly example of how to die nobly, de Rais addresses the crowd gathered at the execution site and begs for their forgiveness, then addresses his two accomplices, "We have sinned, all three of us, but as soon as our souls depart our bodies we shall see God in all his glory in Heaven." Then the knight is hung, but as the flames lit below him burn through the execution rope, four women of high rank rush forward and snatch the corpse away before it can be transformed into ashes and put it in a nearby coffin so that de Rais can be buried in the sanctified ground of Nantes' Church of Notre-Dame-du-Carmel at 35-years-of-age; Griart and Corillant shortly afterward follow their master into death, but in their cases the flames are allowed to burn their bodies into ashes which are then scattered to the winds. And of course with de Rais' death, his secular prosecutor, the Duke of Brittany, is given title to the knight's valuable lands.
Trial
Execution
Though dead, the protector of Joan of Arc, nobleman, Marshal of France, and convicted serial killer never really leaves the psyche of the French people. Bizarrely, de Rais receives posthumous acclaim as a model of Christian penitence for how he faces his execution and a three day fast is observed after his death. For over a century, a tradition also begins in Nantes on the anniversary of his execution in which parents whip their children to impress on them the gravity of the sins for which the knight repented (not surprising I guess from a people who will one day declare Jerry Lewis to be a genius). De Rais will also be used as the rough model for the 1697 Charles Perrault bogeyman fable of the killer, Bluebeard. His connection with Saint Joan also means anytime her life is discussed or portrayed, right there beside her is Gilles de Rais and his designation as history's first identified serial killer, means he appears again and again and again in horror stories and medical psychiatric literature. On the silver screen he has been portrayed by numerous actors, including Henry Brandon (the actor famous for playing the Comanche chieftain called "Scar" in John Ford's classic Western, "The Searchers"), David Oxley (Sir Hugo Baskerville in the 1959 Sherlock Holmes Hammer classic, "The Hound of the Baskervilles"), and French actor Vincent Cassel (the voice of Diego in the "Ice Age" feature length cartoons). De Rais even has a role in the Castlevania computer games as Dracula's Servant.
Bluebeard
Cassel As De Rais
And he is the fodder for countless discussions over the years as to whether he was actually guilty (other than the two skeletons found at one of his castles, there is no hard evidence against him beyond a whole lot of matching confessions, including the one made by de Rais) or was railroaded by fellow nobles so his lands could be confiscated. The back and forth finally builds up to Frenchman freemason Gilbert Prouteau's orchestrating a 1992 retrial of de Rais in which a group of highly though of French ministers, parliament members, and UNESCO experts examines all the evidence available and declares the knight not guilty (a verdict that many historians don't agree with and consider to be an Orenthal James Simpson type wrong). Hero, horror, or maybe a little or a lot of both, after 500 years, de Rais' life is still debated with it's truth being impossible to know without new evidence coming to light ... either way, the anniversary of his death is today, October 26th.
Gilles de Rais
No comments:
Post a Comment