CHURCH ROBBING.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume LVIII, Issue 8944, 19 December 1907, Page 2

CHURCH ROBBING.

A PROFITABLE BUSINESS

An amazing confession, reported to have been made at Paris by a provincial merchant, has provided the explanation of a great series of robberies from French churches. The disappearance of some valuable relics from a village church was reported to the police early in October. The only people who were known to have visited the church on the day of the robbery were highly respected commercial magnates concerning whose honesty the priest had no doubts. The police, however, had the courage to suspect them, aud a search of their homes led to the arrest of the mother of one of them, on a charge of having stolen goods iv her possession. Hearing of this calamity, the sou, who was in London, returned to France and made a full confession of his guilt. NeAy three years ago, he said, lie had.'coHTe to au arrangement with a wealthy antiquarian under which they were to purchase church relics, replacing them with imitations. The antiquarian had apparently had previous dealings of the kind, and had found some of the church people very ready to trade because of the impression that the Government would shortly confiscate the whole property of the Roman Catholic Church in France. The scheme worked profitably. The antiquarian was well known, and did not desire to figure in the transactions, and the youug merchant carried out most of the trading, superintending the business side of it aud shipping the treasures for sale in Loudon" and New York. The trade thus opened made the antiquarian more and more covetous. He wanted reliquaries, vestments, statuettes, and crucifixes that could not be bought, and in order to meet the demaud the traders took to robbery. One reliquary, which is said to have goue to Loudon, was valued at £5000, and the jewels it contained were worth perhaps £20,000. The operators worked both on their own account and on commission, and within two years had created ormous business for themselves. *Pul the time the youug merchant gave what attention he could to his legitimate business, and his absences were explicable because he took the opportunity to push his firm's trade in the French provinces.