A SWINDLER'S END

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 70, 15 December 1917, Page 10

A SWINDLER'S END

ADVENTURES OF BOGUS DOCTOR. , Paul '.'Loubet." who in 1915 had escapades in London and Paris, recently committed suicide in Melbourne. "Loubet" was not his real name; he adopted it, and led people to believe ho was related to M. Emile Loubet, the ex-President of France. In London lie assumed the, name of Percy Webber Black, M.D., 'a Dublin doctor who was out of the country at the time. ■' "Loubet" was a French medical student who just before the war came to England from Germany. He spoke English with little trace of a foreign accent, and was a tall, finely built man of twenty-four, with engaging manners but a slight "kink" that gavo some people the impression that ho was not altogether responsible for "bis actions. Although he had not a doctor's full qualifications, his knowledge of medicine and surgery was fairly sound, if not extensive, and by means of forged papers he succeeded in getting temporary appointments from doctors at Bexley, Leyton, Ipswich, and Southampton. On August 4, 1914, when the war began, he applied at the' Admiralty for temporary service as naval surgeon, representing himself to be Dr. Edward Heffcrnan. Hβ was requested to furnish a birth certificate and a recommendation, but the Admiralty heard nothing moro from "him. Two days later ho obtained a naval surgeon's uniform at £13 from a West End firm, but failed to pay for it. Eight days afterwards ho applied for a position as temporary surgeon in the Royal Army Medical Corps, and signed the application form "Percy Webber Black, M.D." He was gazetted temporary lieutenant on September 11, and drew his Army pay , from that date to March, 1015, when he was arrested in London. The charges against him were of fraudulently personating Dr. Percy AVebber Black, of obtaining by falso pretences Army pay to the amount of £219 17s. 10d., and a naval uniform, of giving a falso certificate relating to a death, and of forging the certificate.

At the Old Bailey, wlicro ho was tried, ho was liberated on condition that ho joined tho French Army. He did so, and it is believed that for a time ho performed good work. A]>parently ho deserted from the French Army, for the next time he was hoard of ho was in .Australia.