GET-RICH-QUICK SCHEME

Auckland Star, Volume LV, Issue 211, 5 September 1924, Page 7

GET-RICH-QUICK SCHEME

THE END OF DEPERDUSSIN.

MAN WHO HAD £8,000,000. DIES WORTH A SHILLING. When Armand Deperdussin, aviation pioneer and juggler of millions, died in a hospital in Paris last month of a self-inflicted wound, he had two francs and a quarter, or less than a shilling, in his possession. They were the last sous left of a fortune, which at the height of his meteoric financial career, only 10 years or so ago, was not less than 200,000,000 gold francs, or about £8,000,000.

Master Swindler. But he was a worthy successor to Therese Humbert, who swindled canny French bankers out of tens of millions on the strength of the famous nonexistent Crawford fortune, or of Cassie Chadwick, who performed a ; similar feat with their Ohio and Pennsylvania colleagues. When Deperdussin finally came to trial, it was officially estimated that he ■ had induced his dupes to subscribe 270,000,000 francs (in those days about £11,000,000) to his various enterprises. His procedure was simple. He merely paid 40 or 50 per cent interest to subscribers to his companies for a couple of months—and then, benefiting by the extraordinary publicity which newspapers gave him, started a new company. He was one of the tried and trusted "get-rich-quicfe" artists.

Lost to Sight. Since leaving gaol, right in the middle of the war, Deperdussin had been lost to sight. After his death it became known that he had taken his place in the outskirts of the Parisian tenderloin. In other words, he frequented the little bars where the crumbs from the tables of the tourists might fall into his lap. Recently he had sold a safety razor to buy himself a mid-day meal.

In the little hotel where he lodged, he was sometimes glad to accept a piece of bread from the porter. He told the owner of his favourite bar that his last "invention," something new in the aviation line, had fallen flat. Then he went back to his hotel, wrote a letter to his proprietor excusing himself for the trouble he was about to cause, and shot himself through the head.