Cemetery Thieves.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 86, 2 April 1914, Page 5

Cemetery Thieves.

CRAVE DESECRATION,

POLICE MAKE ARRESTS.

I.By Electeio Telxouaph—Oopyeight] [United Press Association.] Paris, April 1.

Four men have been arrested for despoiling seventy vaults at the Pere la Chaise cemetery of chalices, pyxes and art objects, some of which were recovered at antiquarian shops. The same gang is suspected of despoiling Mademoiselle Lanthelm’s tomb in 1911. CHALKMARKS ON THE TOMBS. (Received 90 a.m.) Paris, April 1. Thirty-six keepers were on duty at Pere la Chaise Cemetery for many weeks during the night time, but the searches proved fruitless. Detectives thereupon posted themselves in wine shops in the vicinity and overheard the conversation of two of a gang. One was followed and was seen making chalkmarks on certain tombs. Subsequently, when an attempt was made to open these tombs, three men and a woman were arrested. Pere-la-Chaise is the largest of the cemeteries of Paris, extending over 200 acres, and occupies the site of the house and grounds of a great establishment of Jesuits, Mount Louis, of which the favorite confessor of Louis XII., Pere-la-Chaise, was the principal. The site was purchased for a national cemetery in 1814. Many eminent persons are buried there. -