EXTRAORDINARY MURDER OF A MARCHIONESS AND FAMILY.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VIII, Issue 200, 20 August 1873, Page 4

EXTRAORDINARY MURDER OF A MARCHIONESS AND FAMILY.

A Paris correspondent furnishes the following account of a shocking domestic tragedy, particulars of which will soon be fully placed before the world. Their names, in the meantime, are suppressed :— " Ten years ago was celebrated a gay wedding. Beauty on the one side, fortune on the other, nobility on both. Since then the married lffe has run on with apparent calm, children have been born, and two of them lived to be six and seven years old respectively. The lady had, as French ladies certainly sometimes have, many admirers; but even gossip never accused her of going too far, and the husband treated her with more than usual courtesy and love. All went smoothly up to a few weeks since, when the marquis rather suddenly insisted on carrying off wife and family to a lonely chateau in Auvergne. When there he became sullen and reserved. One morning excuses were made on account of the village fete to give moßt of the household leave of absence, and one old man-servant aloae was left in the chateau. After dinner this man too was Sfint away in order to deliver a letter to a brother of the marquis, who lived in the neighbourhood. This gentleman was from home at the moment of the messenger's arrival, but no sooner returned and read what had been brought than he turned deadly pale, and started off again at once for his brother's house. The old servant was naturally frightened at the effect of his missive, and followed as quickly as he could. When they arrived at the chateau, all looked peaceful enough outside, but it was almost impossible that the family had gone out as well as their domestics, and yet no amount of ringing could bring any answer to the gate. The brother tried to scale the iron railings, but

it was too high for him ; at last he remembered the wall of the park, or as we should call it small lawn, at the back, and running round, both he and the servant managed to climb over this. They crossed this lawn, and found a door from the house into the flower garden, open. No one, however, could be seec inside. They searched various rooms, and at length came to a door from under which what seemed a bit of dark wool was trailing out into the passage. Close inspection showed that the dark thread was a little stream of blood and with horrible expectation, they burst open the door of the room from whence it came. What they saw was more frightful than their utmost fear. The apartment was an armoury on the ground floor, and having the roof supported by arches, which spread from a central stone column. To this column the marquise was bound, but she appeared also to have been shot, for she was quite dead, and stained by the blood which had flowed from a frightful wound in her head. On the floor not far from her were the two children, also dead j and, in a chair drawn near the table, upon which was an open letter, wfts the marquis himself, also dead, and a pistol lying as if just fallen from his hand. The story told itself, but was confirmed by the open letter, which purported to have been written by the husband and father before his own suicide. In this he declared that he had discovered lately that his wife was false, and that he had become convinced that the children he had supposed his own were really another's. He could not suffer that so treacherous a woman should live, nor should have the comfort of thinking that her children at least were safe. After sending everyone away from the house, he had therefore brought his false wife here, and had her bound to the column. He had there murdered her little ones before her eyes, and afterwards executed her. He waß now about to do the only thing left for him to dp, and blow out his own brains.