Alphonse Bertillon and Inspector Lefebvre
Alphonse Bertillon (1853-1914), pioneer French criminologist, appears in The Devil in Montmartre, my first Inspector Lefebvre mystery, and he is referenced in The Hanged Man (Inspector Lefebvre #2) and the upcoming The Man Upon the Stair (Inspector Lefebvre #3).
As chief of the department of identification in the prefecture of police of the Seine (Paris and its environs) Bertillon devised a system for identifying criminals by anthropometric (physical) measurements. Bertillon’s method was the first scientific system used by police to identify criminals. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Bertillon’s anthropometric method was adopted by police departments worldwide until superseded by fingerprinting. Bertillon was also noted for developing and maintaining a vast, well-organized system of records that aided in the identification and capture of criminals.
In The Devil in Montmartre, Inspector Achille Lefebvre seeks Bertillon’s assistance in identifying a female torso found in a Montmartre sewer. In the course of his investigation, Lefebvre adds a new wrinkle: fingerprinting. At the time, 1889, no police department had adopted fingerprinting as part of its method of identification. However, recent (1888-89) publications by the British scientist Sir Francis Galton provided the foundation for a new system of identification. Although Galton was not the first to propose the use of fingerprints for this purpose, he was the first to develop a scientific method that could be used in criminal identification. He also developed the first practical fingerprint classification system that was later (1901) adapted for use by the London Metropolitan Police.
For a time, Bertillon’s and Scotland Yard's methods were in competition, but by the end of the first decade of the twentieth century fingerprinting had largely replaced the anthropometric method.
Although he doesn’t appear as a character in The Hanged Man and The Man Upon the Stair, Bertillon is mentioned in both novels. Furthermore, his contributions to criminology extended beyond identification and records-keeping. Bertillon also pioneered other forensic procedures, including the use of galvanoplastic compounds to preserve footprints, ballistics, and the dynamometer, used to determine the degree of force used in breaking and entering. He also dabbled in graphology, and this pursuit, in which he was not expert, resulted in a major blot on an otherwise exemplary career.
In 1894 and again in 1899 Bertillon appeared as a witness for the prosecution of Captain Alfred Dreyfus on a charge of treason. He testified as a handwriting expert, claiming that Captain Dreyfus had written the incriminating document (known as the “bordereau”). Bertillon’s evidence was a contributing factor to a notorious miscarriage of justice – the sentencing of an innocent man to imprisonment on Devil’s Island.
Why did Bertillon hold himself out as a handwriting expert and testify against Dreyfus? Was it prejudice, politics, or over-confidence coupled with an inability to admit to a catastrophic blunder? Regardless, the damage was done and with Dreyfus’s ultimate exoneration Bertillon’s reputation declined. However, despite this one great failure he remains an important figure in the history of criminology and the development of modern forensic science.
A final note. In the course of doing research for the Inspector Lefebvre novels I came across a long out of print book, The Forgotten Clue (Houghton Mifflin, 1930) by Harry Ashton-Wolfe. Ashton-Wolfe was a British detective and author who, for a time in the early 1900’s, worked and studied with Alphonse Bertillon. The book proved to be an invaluable source of information on the Bertillon method of identification as well as the methods of investigation and criminal procedure of what was then the Sûreté and is now La brigade criminelle de Paris.
As chief of the department of identification in the prefecture of police of the Seine (Paris and its environs) Bertillon devised a system for identifying criminals by anthropometric (physical) measurements. Bertillon’s method was the first scientific system used by police to identify criminals. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Bertillon’s anthropometric method was adopted by police departments worldwide until superseded by fingerprinting. Bertillon was also noted for developing and maintaining a vast, well-organized system of records that aided in the identification and capture of criminals.
In The Devil in Montmartre, Inspector Achille Lefebvre seeks Bertillon’s assistance in identifying a female torso found in a Montmartre sewer. In the course of his investigation, Lefebvre adds a new wrinkle: fingerprinting. At the time, 1889, no police department had adopted fingerprinting as part of its method of identification. However, recent (1888-89) publications by the British scientist Sir Francis Galton provided the foundation for a new system of identification. Although Galton was not the first to propose the use of fingerprints for this purpose, he was the first to develop a scientific method that could be used in criminal identification. He also developed the first practical fingerprint classification system that was later (1901) adapted for use by the London Metropolitan Police.
For a time, Bertillon’s and Scotland Yard's methods were in competition, but by the end of the first decade of the twentieth century fingerprinting had largely replaced the anthropometric method.
Although he doesn’t appear as a character in The Hanged Man and The Man Upon the Stair, Bertillon is mentioned in both novels. Furthermore, his contributions to criminology extended beyond identification and records-keeping. Bertillon also pioneered other forensic procedures, including the use of galvanoplastic compounds to preserve footprints, ballistics, and the dynamometer, used to determine the degree of force used in breaking and entering. He also dabbled in graphology, and this pursuit, in which he was not expert, resulted in a major blot on an otherwise exemplary career.
In 1894 and again in 1899 Bertillon appeared as a witness for the prosecution of Captain Alfred Dreyfus on a charge of treason. He testified as a handwriting expert, claiming that Captain Dreyfus had written the incriminating document (known as the “bordereau”). Bertillon’s evidence was a contributing factor to a notorious miscarriage of justice – the sentencing of an innocent man to imprisonment on Devil’s Island.
Why did Bertillon hold himself out as a handwriting expert and testify against Dreyfus? Was it prejudice, politics, or over-confidence coupled with an inability to admit to a catastrophic blunder? Regardless, the damage was done and with Dreyfus’s ultimate exoneration Bertillon’s reputation declined. However, despite this one great failure he remains an important figure in the history of criminology and the development of modern forensic science.
A final note. In the course of doing research for the Inspector Lefebvre novels I came across a long out of print book, The Forgotten Clue (Houghton Mifflin, 1930) by Harry Ashton-Wolfe. Ashton-Wolfe was a British detective and author who, for a time in the early 1900’s, worked and studied with Alphonse Bertillon. The book proved to be an invaluable source of information on the Bertillon method of identification as well as the methods of investigation and criminal procedure of what was then the Sûreté and is now La brigade criminelle de Paris.
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