Hubert-Joseph Henry

Hubert-Joseph Henry (born with Pogny, in the the Marne in 1846, dead at the height of the Mount Valérien in 1898) was a Officier French which produced false documents aiming at making show Alfred Dreyfus.

With the service of the army

Resulting from a family of farmers, sergeant major in 1870, twice prisoner, twice escaped during the conflict free-Prussian, it gains, left the row, the gallons of lieutenant. Its notes of 1872 predict a limited future to him: “officer without another future that which the seniority will give him inevitably”.

But a turning in its career occurs in 1875, when it is named ordinance of the general of Miribel, chief of the État-major, which will become its guard. It is affected with the ministry for the War in 1879, with the section of statistics (Against-espionage). It there côtoie then Esterházy, which will be recognized later like the true traitor of the Affaire Dreyfus.

Starting from 1886, it is named successively in Tunisia, with the Tonkin, then finally in Algérie, with Oran.

The discovery of the form

In May 1893, ordering it Henry returns to the section of statistics of the service of the French information. He will be quickly the assistant of the head clerk, Jean Sandherr, until in 1895.

Its work consists in supervising the activity of the German authorities , in particular by using double agents, among which Marie Bastian, a cleaning lady employed with the embassy of Germany. It is it which entrusts to him, in September 1894, the famous form which starts the Dreyfus business. Addressed to the military attach3e Maximilien von Schwarzkoppen by a mysterious unknown, and written in French, this document contains information concerned with the Secret defense.

Once in possession of the form, Henry waits several weeks before transmitting it to his superiors. One is unaware of if he then recognized or not the writing of his friend Esterházy. In October, an internal survey establishes that the form was written by Alfred Dreyfus, which is stopped a few days later. Henry then provides information to the newspaper the Free word , famous for his Antisémitisme, which titrates on November 1st “high treason. Arrest of Jewish officer A. Dreyfus” .

Invited to testify at the time of the lawsuit behind closed doors of Dreyfus in council of war, Henry overpowers the suspect: “The traitor that we seek, it is him! I swear it! ”.

“Small blue” and the “Henry forgery”

In January 1896, Georges Picquart takes the direction of the service of the information to the detriment of Henry, who ambitionnait to obtain the station. Being wary and jealous, this last is arranged so that the documents recovered by its contacts, like Marie Bastian, are not transmitted to Picquart, in spite of the request express of this one. In March 1896, an agent of the service recovers a telegram (“small blue”) in which the German diplomat Schwartzkoppen informs the commander Esterházy that it wishes to break his relations with him, considering its activities of Espionnage insufficient. Absent from Paris, Henry cannot take note of this document. It is thus Picquart which takes delivery of it. Intrigued, he excavates the businesses of Estherázy, and notes that the writing of this last is the same one as that of the form of 1894.

Whereas the wife of Alfred Dreyfus asks for a revision of the lawsuit, Henry addresses the November 2nd 1896 to his superiors a document which he claims to have recovered with the embassy of Germany and which shows Dreyfus of treason openly. This document, which it has in fact itself carried out, is known under the name of the “Henry forgery”. It is about an assembly of various texts, improved and imitated, which aimed at proving that the Italian diplomat Panizzardi, being addressed to Schwartzkoppen, Dreyfus like a traitor in France described: he asks his correspondent not to reveal that he was in relation to “this Jew”.

In his impetus, Henry composes of new false to accredit the culpability of Dreyfus. The motivations of Henry were largely discussed. According to the ones, it would have acted under the pressure of the État-major. “He wrote a forgery, in the presence of the intrigues of colonel Picquart, to save the army which was in a terrible dead end by the bad faith of its enemies”, his wife at the time of the lawsuit of Rennes in 1899 will declare. According to the others, among which Jean Jaurès, Henry wished to attract itself good the grace of its hierarchy while bringing to him decisive parts in the hope to be rewarded by its nomination with the head for the service for the information: “The things went thus. Hardly colonel Henry it had put under the eyes of his chiefs the false part which it was named chief of the service of the information”.

Indeed, in 1897, Henry reaches the direction of the intelligence service finally. It worries about discovered about its predecessor, Picquart, and decides, with the commander of Paty de Clam, to warn Esterházy of the suspicions which weigh against him. In exchange of the protection of the Staff, they ask him to compile a document intended to accuse Dreyfus again. Henry hastens to communicate it to the press.

The charge will not fail to use the “Henry forgery” at the time of the lawsuit Zola which proceeds from February 7th to 23rd. Picquart, against which a procedure of reform is set in motion, is convinced of the machiavelic innocence of Dreyfus and the role of Henry. The two men clash in duel with the Military academy.

Consents

It will be necessary to await July 1898 and the initiative of the new Minister for the War, Godefroy Cavaignac, which wants to close the file at all costs, so that the Staff takes finally conscience of the true nature of the “Henry forgery”. August 30th, colonel Henry acknowledges his fixed price with Cavaignac. Henry is arrested and imprisoned at the height Mont Valérien. The following day, it slices the throat with the razor in its cell. Cavaignac resigns. Esterházy flees in England. The opinion then starts to doubt the culpability of Dreyfus.

The antidreyfusards, them, do of Henry one their heroes. the Free Word of Edouard Drumont lance a subscription to give to the widow of the Henry lieutenant-colonel the means of continuing in slandering Joseph Reinach, following an article published on November 7th, 1898 in the Century . Among the subscribers, one counts Jean Lorrain, Pierre Louÿs, Paul Valéry, Maxime Weygand, and Henry Gauthier-Villars. In September 1898, Charles Maurras publishes a praise of Henry in the catholic daily newspaper the Gazette of France , evoking “this heroic servant of the great interests of the State, this great man of honor. ”

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