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THE DEVILS OF LOUDOUN
by Bruce, H. Addington (Henry Addington), b. 1874
Loudoun is a small town in France about
midway between the ancient and ro-
mantic cities of Tours and Poitiers. To-day
it is an exceedingly unpretentious and an
exceedingly sleepy place; but in the seven-
teenth century it was in vastly better estate.
Then its markets, its shops, its inns, lacked
not business. Its churches were thronged
with worshipers. Through its narrow streets
proud noble and prouder ecclesiastic, thrifty
merchant and active artisan, passed and re-
passed in an unceasing stream. It was rich
in points of interest, preeminent among which
were its castle and its convent. In the castle
the stout-hearted Loudunians found a refuge
and a stronghold against the ambitions of the
feudal lords and the tyranny of the crown.
To its convent, pleasantly situated in a grove
of time-honored trees, they sent their children
to be educated.
It is to the convent that we must turn our
steps; for it was from the convent that the
devils were let loose to plague the good people
of Loudun. And in order to understand the
course of events, we must first make ourselves
acquainted with its history. Very briefly,
then, it, like many other institutions of its
kind, was a product of the Catholic counter-
reformation designed to stem the rising tide
of Protestantism. It came into being in 1616,
and was of the Ursuline order, which had been
introduced into France not many years earlier.
From the first it proved a magnet for the
daughters of the nobility, and soon boasted a
goodly complement of nuns.
At their head, as mother superior, was a
certain Jeanne de Belfiel, of noble birth and
many attractive qualities, but with character-
istics which, as the sequel will show, wrought
much woe to others as well as to the poor
gentlewoman herself. Whatever her defects,
however, she labored tirelessly in the inter-
ests of the convent, and in this respect was
ably seconded by its father confessor, worthy
Father Moussaut, a man of rare good sense
and possessing a firm hold on the consciences
and affections of the nuns.
Conceive their grief, therefore, when he
suddenly sickened and died. Now ensued
an anxious time pending the appointment of
his successor. Two names were foremost for
consideration that of Jean Mignon, chief
canon of the Church of the Holy Cross,
and that of Urbain Grandier, cure of Saint
Peter's of Loudun. Mignon was a zealous
and learned ecclesiastic, but belied his name
by being cold, suspicious, and, some would
have it, unscrupulous. Grandier, on the con-
trary, was frank and ardent and generous,
and was idolized by the people of Loudun.
But he had serious failings. He was most un-
clerically gallant, was tactless, was overready
to take offense, and, his wrath once fully
roused, was unrelenting. Accordingly, little
surprise was felt when the choice ultimately
fell, not on him but on Mignon.
With Mignon the devils entered the Ursu-
line convent. Hardly had he been installed
when rumors began to go about of strange
doings within its quiet walls; and that there
was something in these rumors became evi-
dent on the night of October 12, 1632, when
two magistrates of Loudun, the bailie and the
civil lieutenant, were hurriedly summoned to
the convent to listen to an astonishing story.
For upwards of a fortnight, it appeared, sev-
eral of the nuns, including Mother Superior
Belfiel, had been tormented by specters and
frightful visions. Latterly they had given
every evidence of being possessed by evil
spirits. With the assistance of another priest,
Father Barre", Mignon had succeeded in ex-
orcising the demons out of all the afflicted
save the mother superior and a Sister Claire.
In their case every formula known to the
ritual had failed. The only conclusion was
that they were not merely possessed but be-
witched, and much as he disliked to bring
notoriety on the convent, the father confessor
had decided it was high time to learn who was
responsible for the dire visitation. He had
called the magistrates, he explained, in order
that legal steps might be taken to apprehend
the wizard, it being well established that
"devils when duly exorcised must speak the
truth," and that consequently there could be
no doubt as to the identity of the offender,
should the evil spirits be induced to name the
source of their authority.
Without giving the officials time to recover
from their amazement, Mignon led them to
an upper room, where they found the mother
superior and Sister Claire, wan-faced and
fragile looking creatures on whose counte-
nances were expressions of fear that would
have inspired pity in the most stony-hearted.
About them hovered monks and nuns. At
sight of the strangers, Sister Claire lapsed into
a semi-comatose condition; but the mother
superior uttered piercing shrieks, and was at-
tacked by violent convulsions that lasted until
the father confessor spoke to her in a com-
manding tone. Then followed a startling
dialogue, carried on in Latin between Mignon
and the soi-disant demon possessing her.
"Why have you entered this maiden's
body?"
"Because of hatred."
"What sign do you bring?"
"Flowers."
"What flowers?"
"Roses."
"Who has sent them?"
A moment's hesitation, then the single word
"Urbain."
"Tell us his surname?"
"Grandier."
In an instant the room was in an uproar.
But the magistrates did not lose their heads.
To the bailie in especial the affair had a sus-
picious look. He had heard the devil "speak
worse Latin than a boy of the fourth class,"
he had noted the mother superior's hesitancy
in pronouncing Grandier's name, and he was
well aware that deadly enmity had long ex-
isted between Grandier and Mignon. So he
placed little faith in the latter's protestation
that the naming of his rival had taken him
completely by surprise. Consulting with his
colleague, he coldly informed Mignon that be-
fore any arrest could be made there must be
further investigation, and, promising to return
next day, bade them good night.
Next day found the convent besieged by
townspeople, indignant at the accusation
against the popular priest, and determined to
laugh the devils out of existence. Grandier
himself, burning with rage, hastened to the
bailie and demanded that the nuns be sep-
arately interrogated, and by other inquisitors
than Mignon and Barre. In these demands
the bailie properly acquiesced ; but, on attempt-
ing in person to enforce his orders to that
effect, he was denied admittance to the con-
vent. Excitement ran high; so high that,
fearful for his personal safety, Mignon con-
sented to accept as exorcists two priests ap-
pointed, not by the bailie, but by the Bishop
of Poitiers who, it might incidentally be
mentioned, had his own reasons for disliking
Grandier.
Exorcising now went on daily, to the dis-
gust of the serious-minded, the mystification
of the incredulous, the delight of sensation-
mongers, and the baffled fury of Grandier.
So far the play, if melodramatic, had not ap-
proached the tragic. Sometimes it degener-
ated to the broadest farce comedy. Thus, on
one occasion when the devil was being read
out of the mother superior, a crashing sound
was heard and a huge black cat tumbled down
the chimney and scampered about the room.
At once the cry was raised that the devil had
taken the form of a cat, a mad chase ensued,
and it would have gone hard with pussy had
not a nun chanced to recognize in it the pet
of the convent.
Still, there were circumstances which tended
to inspire conviction in the mind of many.
The convulsions of the possessed were un-
doubtedly genuine, and undoubtedly they
manifested phenomena seemingly inexplicable
on any naturalistic basis. A contemporary
writer, describing events of a few months
later, when several recruits had been added
to their ranks, states that some "when com-
atose became supple like a thin piece of lead,
so that their body could be bent in every direc-
tion, forward, backward, or sideways, till
their head touched the ground," and that
others showed no sign of pain when struck,
pinched, or pricked. Then, too, they whirled
and danced and grimaced and howled in a
manner impossible to any one in a perfectly
normal state.*
For a few brief weeks Grandier enjoyed a
respite, thanks to the intervention of his
friend, the Archbishop of Bordeaux, who
threatened to send a physician and priests
of his own choice to examine the possessed, a
threat of itself sufficient, apparently, to put
the devils to flight. But they returned with
undiminished vigor upon the arrival in Loudun
of a powerful state official who, unfortunately
* Aubin's "Histoire des Diables de Loudun," a book by a writer
who scoffed at the idea that the nuns had actually been bewitched.
For an account by a contemporary who firmly believed the charges
brought against Grandier, consult Niau's " La Veritable Histoire des
Diables de Loudun." This latter work is accessible in an English
translation by Edmund Goldsmid.
for Grandier, was a relative of Mother Supe-
rior Belfiel's. This official, whose name was
Laubardemont, had come to Loudun on a
singular mission. Richelieu, the celebrated
cardinal statesman, in the pursuit of his pol-
icy of strengthening the crown and weakening
the nobility, had resolved to level to the ground
the fortresses and castles of interior France,
and among those marked for destruction was
the castle of Loudun. Thither, therefore,
he despatched Laubardemont to see that his
orders were faithfully executed.
Naturally, the cardinal's commissioner be-
came interested in the trouble that had be-
fallen his kinswoman, and the more interested
when Mignon hinted to him that there was
reason to believe that the suspected wizard
was also the author of a recent satire which
had set the entire court laughing at Riche-
lieu's expense. What lent plausibility to this
charge was the fact that the satire had been
universally accredited to a court beauty form-
erly one of Grandier 's parishioners. Also there
was the fact that in days gone by, when
Richelieu was merely a deacon, he had had a
violent quarrel with Grandier over a question
of precedence. Putting two and two together,
and knowing that it would result to his own
advantage to unearth the real author to the
satire, Laubardemont turned a willing ear to
the suggestion that the woman in question
had allowed her old pastor to shield himself
behind her name.
Back to Paris the commissioner galloped to
carry the story to Richelieu. The cardinal's
anger knew no bounds. From the King he
secured a warrant for Grandier's arrest, and
to this he added a decree investing Laubarde-
mont with full inquisitorial powers. Events
now moved rapidly. Though forewarned by
Parisian friends, Grandier refused to seek
safety by flight, and was arrested in spectac-
ular fashion while on his way to say mass.
His home was searched, his papers were
seized, and he himself was thrown into an
improvised dungeon in a house belonging to
Mignon. Witnesses in his favor were in-
timidated, while those willing to testify against
him were liberally rewarded. To such
lengths did the prosecution go that, discov-
ering a strong undercurrent of popular in-
dignation, Laubardemont actually procured
from the King and council a decree prohibit-
ing any appeal from his decisions, and gave
out that, since King and cardinal believed in
the enchantment, any one denying it would be
held guilty of lese majesty divine and human.
Under these circumstances Grandier was
doomed from the outset. But he made a
desperate struggle, and his opponents were
driven to sore straits to bolster up their case.
The devils persisted in speaking bad Latin,
and continually failed to meet tests which
they themselves had suggested. Sometimes
their failures were only too plainly the result
of human intervention.
For instance, the mother superior's devil
promised that, on a given night and in the
church of the Holy Cross, he would lift Lau-
bardemont's cap from his head and keep it
suspended in mid-air while the commissioner
intoned a miserere. When the time came for
the fulfilment of this promise two of the spec-
tators noticed that Laubardemont had taken
care to seat himself at a goodly distance from
the other participants. Quietly leaving the
church, these amateur detectives made their
way to the roof, where they found a man in
the act of dropping a long horsehair line, to
which was attached a small hook, through a
hole directly over the spot where Laubarde-
mont was sitting. The culprit fled, and that
night another failure was recorded against
the devil.
But such fiascos availed nothing to save
Grandier. Neither did it avail him that,
before sentence was finally passed, Sister
Claire, broken in body and mind, sobbingly
affirmed his innocence, protesting that she
did not know what she was saying when she
accused him; nor that the mother superior,
after two hours of agonizing torture self-
imposed, fell on her knees before Laubarde-
mont, made a similar admission, and, passing
into the convent orchard, tried to hang her-
self. The commissioner and his colleagues
remained obdurate, averring that these con-
fessions were in themselves evidence of witch-
craft, since they could be prompted only by
the desire of the devils to save their master
from his just fate. In August, 1634, Gran-
dier 's doom was pronounced. He was to be
put to the torture, strangled, and burned.
This judgment was carried out to the letter,
save that when the executioner approached
to strangle him, the ropes binding him to the
stake loosened, and he fell forward among
the flames, perishing miserably.
It only remains to analyze this medieval
tragedy in the light of modern knowledge.
To the people of his own generation Grand-
ier was either a wizard most foul, or the vic-
tim of a dastardly plot in which all concerned
in harrying him to his death knowingly par-
ticipated. These opinions posterity long
shared. But now it is quite possible to reach
another conclusion. That there was a con-
spiracy is evident even from the facts set down
by those hostile to Grandier. On the other
hand, it is as unnecessary as it is incredible
to believe that the plotters included every one
instrumental in fixing on the unhappy cure
the crime of witchcraft.
Bearing in mind the discoveries of recent
years in the twin fields of physiology and psy-
chology, it seems evident that the conspirators
were actually limited in number to Mignon,
Barre, Laubardemont, and a few of their in-
timates. In Laubardemont's case, indeed,
there is some reason for supposing that he
was more dupe than knave, and is therefore
to be placed in the same category as the super-
stitious monks and townspeople on whom
Mignon and Barre so successfully imposed.
As to the possessed the mother superior
and her nuns they may one and all be
included in a third group as the unwitting
tools of Mignon's vengeance. In fine, it is
not only possible but entirely reasonable to
regard Mignon as a seventeenth-century fore-
runner of Mesmer, Elliotson, Esdaile, Braid,
Charcot, and the present day exponents of
hypnotism; and the nuns as his helpless
"subjects," obeying his every command with
the fidelity observable to-day in the patients
of the Salpetriere and other centers of hyp-
notic practice.
The justness of this view is borne out by
the facts recorded by contemporary annal-
ists, of which only an outline has been given
here. The nuns of Loudun were, as has been
said, mostly daughters of the nobility, and
were thus, in all likelihood, temperamentally
unstable, sensitive, high-strung, nervous. The
seclusion of their lives, the monotonous rou-
tine of their every-day occupations, and the
possibilities afforded for dangerous, morbid
introspection, could not but have a baneful
effect on such natures, leading inevitably to
actual insanity or to hysteria. That the
possessed were hysterical is abundantly shown
by the descriptions their historians give of the
character of their convulsions, contortions,
etc., and by the references to the anesthetic,
or non-sensitive, spots on their bodies. Now,
as we know, the convent at Loudun had been
in existence for only a few years before Mignon
became its father confessor, and so, we may
believe, it fell out that he appeared on the
scene precisely when sufficient time had
elapsed for environment and heredity to do
their deadly work and provoke an epidemic
of hysteria.
In those benighted times such attacks were
popularly ascribed to possession by evil spirits.
The hysterical nuns, as the chronicles tell us,
explained their condition to Mignon by inform-
ing him that, shortly before the onset of their
trouble, they had been haunted by the ghost
of their former confessor, Father Moussaut.
Here Mignon found his opportunity. Pic-
ture him gently rebuking the unhappy women,
admonishing them that such a good man as
Father Moussaut would never return to tor-
ment those who had been in his charge, and
insisting that the source of their woes must be
sought elsewhere; in, say, some evil disposed
person, hostile to Father Moussaut's successor,
and hoping, through thus afflicting them, to
bring the convent into disrepute and in this
way strike a deadly blow at its new father con-
fessor. Who might be this evil disposed per-
son? Who, in truth, save Urbain Grandier?
Picture Mignon, again, observing that his
suggestion had taken root in the minds of two
of the most emotional and impressionable,
the mother superior and Sister Claire. Then
would follow a course of lessons designed to
aid the suggestion to blossom into open accu-
sation. And presently Mignon would make
the discovery that the mother superior and
Sister Claire would, when in a hysterical state,
blindly obey any command he might make,
cease from their convulsions, respond intel-
ligently and at his will to questions put to
them, renew their convulsions, lapse even
into seeming dementia.
Doubtless he did not grasp the full signifi-
cance and possibilities of his discovery had
he done so the devils would not have bungled
matters so often, and no embarrassing con-
fessions would have been forthcoming. But
he saw clearly enough that he had in his hand
a mighty weapon against his rival, and history
has recorded the manner and effectiveness
with which he used it.
Finish