Red inn
When the Auberge Rouge is evoked, everyone immediately thinks of Claude Très-Lara's film as well as Fernandel confessing Françoise Rosay behind a meat grill and all those travellers who had the bad fortune to stop there and never leave.
True history is authentic, The inn existed And is still there, but what exactly is it?
The inn of Peyrebeille
It is known mainly as the « Red Inn »
It is located in the municipality of Lanarce in Ardèche on a plateau swept by a Burle Ice cream in winter.
History takes place during the First Empire. This lost corner of Ardèche acquires a notoriety that still does not deny itself today, thanks to a criminal case that takes on incredible proportions despite its insignificance.
It is claimed that the tenors, the husbands Martin with the complicity of their mulatto servant Jean Rochette, made disappear after having stripped them about fifty travelers, however only the death of a client named Jean Antoine Enjolras is clearly established, which is more his body is found several kilometers away and there is no evidence that he was killed at the inn. Yet Martin and Jean Rochette were sentenced to death and guillotined in front of the inn after a resounding trial.
Three people sentenced to death for a murder that we're not sure they're the perpetrators, how did we get there?
History
It is said that between 1805 and 1830, Pierre and Marie Martin (née Breysse) dug up and murdered some 50 travellers who stopped in their inn.
Their accomplice Jean Rochette says « Fetish » is a pure strain ardéchois but its tanned complexion will make it describe as a mulatto in popular imaging, moreover in the 1951 film, Très-Lara entrusts its role to Lud Germaina Haitian actor and singer.
Pierre Martin, a man of character with an easy punch and always flanked by Jean Rochette whom they say he comes « Americas » is feared in the neighborhood. In addition, in 1830, the Martins put the inn under management and lived on their rents valued at 30,000 gold francs (about 600,000). €). All this stirs up resentment and jealousy. This sense of distrust of the local population will lead them to their loss, because how can we explain that a hostel lost in the middle of nowhere has allowed such a fortune to be raised if not by theft? But it is nothing and we will see it later.
The case began at the end of October 1831 with the discovery on the banks of the Allier, about ten kilometres from the inn, of the corpse of a man with a broken skull. This is a maquignon named Jean Antoine Enjolras who slept at the inn a few days before, where a witness shows up to the authorities and tells that he « had seen Martin, Rochette and a stranger (who would be André, Martin's nephew) carry a body on a cart ».
No more is needed for justice of the peace Étienne Filiat-Duclaux to visit the Martins to investigate the disappearance of the maquignon. The murder investigation ignites imaginations and several witnesses, who are not credible, blame Martin for fifty-three disappearances and several attempts to murder and rob.
In fact, the indictment contains only two murders, four attempts and six robberies; They were arrested as well as their nephew and Rochette.
The trial
The trial of « four monsters » opened at the Assizes of the Ardèche in Privas on 18 June 1833.
No less than one hundred and nine witnesses are called to the bar essentially relaying the rumours of the time, Marie Martin « would have » makes customers eat stews and pâtes of human flesh, some of them « would have » same glimpse of human hands simmer in the pot, others still « would have » feeling nauseathy smokes escaping from the fireplace, and children « would have » was incinerated in the bread oven, in short nothing very serious and everything conditional.
Seventeen witnesses for the defence were heard, the trial simmered so much that it was envisaged for a moment that the acquittal of the accused would be acquittal when a dramatic blow occurred: Laurent Chaze, a beggar who had been expelled from the inn one night because he could not pay for his overnight stay, claims to have witnessed the murder of Enjolras from the barn where he found refuge. This surely arranged testimony is subject to bail because Chaze only expresses himself Vivaro-Alpin and the trial in French and therefore communication is not easy.
The fate of the accused is then sealed by the lawyer of Jean Rochette who, during his pleading, implicitly accepted his guilt by pleading irresponsibility, because he could not escape the influence of his masters to whom he was dedicated body and soul.
Finally Martin and Rochette were found guilty of the only murder of Enjolras, four attempts and six robberies, and acquitted for everything else. André the nephew is acquitted requires evidence against him.
On 28 June, the verdict was delivered. It is death for the Martins and Rochette; the appeal in cassation is dismissed as well as the petition for pardon lodged with the king Louis-Philippe.
They were brought back from Privas to the inn to be guillotined at the scene of their harms as it was used at the time.
A stone now marks the place where the guillotine was erected.
The execution took place on October 2, 1833, at noon, a very large crowd was present, there were 30,000 people, which seemed to be exaggerated but demonstrated the extent of the publicity surrounding the case.
When the turn of Rochette comes, he exclaims: « Damn masters, what have you not done! » which accredits that while they cannot be blamed for the delusions reported during the trial, they still have blood on their hands but we will never know to what extent.
The bodies of the three patients are buried in the cemetery of Lanarce but since their grave has disappeared.
The night after execution the three heads are stolen with the help of the fosseur. Moulded for study purposes phrenology then in vogue at the time, they are still preserved at the Crozatier museum in Puy en Velay.
Analysis of the trial and irregularities.
The prosecution referred at length to the prescribed facts, because too old, manifestly inadmissible evidence of anthropophageal or child cremation was heard and negatively influenced the jury.
In addition, against all the usages which give the floor to the defence last, the president of the court d ́assises, Fornier de Claussonne, carried out a « Executive summary » After the defence's pleadings, which is akin to a second indictment in which he knowingly ignored the defence's arguments that the main witness Chaze was a drunken tramp and that his account was implausible and incomprehensible because of his lack of knowledge of French.
Many of the documents in the file describing the stages in the lives of the Martin spouses were removed and disappeared from the judicial archives. The mystery of their guilt or innocence will never be clarified.
Political context and collective imagination
The case of the Red Inn must be seen in its historical context.
The year 1831 was the scene of the insurrections of the royal forests in Ardèche following the restriction of the farmers' right to collect wood for the benefit of the sawmills. Some are burned by night and the area that the incendiary know perfectly allows them to escape from the gendarmes. It is in this context that the Martin case is being investigated.
No one is unaware of the Martin couple's membership in the ultra-royalist clan. Marie Breysse hid a refractory priest during the Revolution while Pierre Martin was a man of the local nobility.
It is certain that he has pressured the local owners to give up their land at low prices to the noble incomes from exile to the Restoration, which is worth a lot of animosity on the part of the local population.
In addition, he is suspected of sympathising with the wood cutters, which puts him in a state of general discontent.
It is this deleterious context that allows the case to be severely judged, the ardèche royalists are targeted through them. Louis-Philippe, on the report of the prosecutor, refuses to grant his pardon, thus giving his approval to partisan justice and local political rancours.
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