ECHO OF GREAT SCANDAL.

Shannon News, 18 December 1923, Page 3

ECHO OF GREAT SCANDAL.

PANAMA CAiVAIi J'KAUiIS.

FAMILY'S TRAGIC LIFE,

Paris telegrams announoe the death of Comte Charles de Lessops, son, of Vicomte Ferdinand de Lesseps, builder of the Suez Canal. He was 82 years old.

He died from heart failure, a few hours after making a speech at a Suez Canal directors' meeting. Charles de Lesseps, an engineer, Like his famous father, lived.for many years a life of unalloyed tragedy. The opening of the Suez Canal in 186,9, and the great success of 'that enterprise inspired America with the idoa of cutting a oanal across the isthmus of Panama. .The enterprise was put in the hands of Ferdinand de Lesseps and his son in 1881, but failed partly owing to the deadly climate and partly owing to corruption for which the de Lesseps were in no way responsible. In 1892 both men were prosecuted en various charges of fraud, and were sentenced to five years* imprisonment. Charles was released after serving seven months of his sentence, and Ferdinand, too ill to be taken to prison, died in 1894 of a broken heart. Charles de Lesseps went into retirement, and even after it was proved that neither he nor his father had any part in the Panama Canal frauds, he rarely appeared in society.