PEASANTS TERRORISED.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18089, 13 May 1922, Page 2 (Supplement)

PEASANTS TERRORISED.

>; •*. BANDIT GANG NEAR PARIS. The districts of Meaux and Lagny, near Paris, far some months past have been terrorised by the exploits of a gang of brigands who'nightly hold up people on the roads and put them to ransom after eavagely beating and often •wounding .them. A part of this gang has raided farm?., lifting cattle, hencoops and setting fire to< bams. So daring are they that the local peasants now barricade themselves every sundown, never venturing out after dark. The chief of the gang has been seen by many of his victims. He is a short, powerful built man with a great shock of red hair and the lower part of "*s face hidden by a black kurchief, only his low forehead and a pair of remarkably bright eyes appearing above U. His mark—two parallel red lines—is left ** a souvenir whenever an outrage is perpetrated. A lew days ago a postman who attempted to resist when _ attacked on a lonely rosid had this sign imprinted on his cheek with a knife. Despite the fact that the man. whoso sobriquet is "le grand Rouquin," 1S known, the gendarmes have been unable to catch him or any of his associates. Already the superstitious French peasants are convinced that ho is possessed of supernatural powers. An attack upon a local priest some weeks ago resulted in the Paris police authorities taki.ng the matter into their own hands, sending a force down from the city in order to lay by the heels '.' le grand Rouquin." who is said to have ftwom Jo soil hjs pkin dearix.