THE "ILLEGALISTS"

Reprinted from "Anarchy: a Journal Of Desire Armed", Fall-Winter, 1994-95

by Doug Imrie

"It is idiotic that those who have figured things out are forced to wait for the mass of cretins who are blocking the way to evolve. The herd will always be the herd. So let's leave it to stagnate and work on our own emancipation (... ) Put your old refrains aside. We have had enough of always sacrificing ourselves for something. The Fatherland, Society and Morality have fallen (...) That's fine, but don't contribute to reviving new entities for us: the Idea, the Revolution, Propaganda, Solidarity; we don't give a damn. What we want is to live, to have the comforts and well-being we have a right to. What we want to accomplish is the development of our individuality in the full sense of the word, in its entirety The individual has a right to all possible well-being, and must try to attain it all the time, by any means..."
(Hugot, an illegalist, writing to the anarchist journal Les Temps Nouveaux in 1903, on behalf of a "small circle" who shared his opinions.)

Parallel to the social, collectivist anarchist current there was an individualist one whose partisans emphasized their individual freedom and advised other individuals to do the same. Individualist anarchist activity spanned the full spectrum of alternatives to authoritarian society, subverting it by undermining its way of life facet by facet. The vast majority of individualist anarchists were caught in the trap of wage labor like their collectivist comrades and the proletariat in general: they had to work for peanuts or starve. Some individualists rebelled by withdrawing from the economy and forming voluntary associations to achieve self-sufficiency. Others took the route of illegalism, attacking the economy through the direct individual reappropriation of wealth. Thus theft, counterfeiting, swindling and robbery became a way of life for hundreds of individualists, as it was already for countless thousands of proletarians. The wave of anarchist bombings and assassinations of the 1890s (Auguste Vaillant, Ravachol, Emile Henry, Sante Caserio) and the practice of illegalism from the mid-1880s to the start of the First World War (Clement Duval, Pini, Marius Jacob, the Bonnot gang) were twin aspects of the same proletarian offensive, but were expressed in an individualist practice, one that complemented the great collective struggles against capital. The illegalist comrades were tired of waiting for the revolution. The acts of the anarchist bombers and assassins ("propaganda by the deed") and the anarchist burglars ("individual reappropriation") expressed their desperation and their personal, violent rejection of an intolerable society. Moreover, they were clearly meant to be exemplary invitations to revolt.

All of society's snares lay in wait for the illegalists, and to survive they were forced to make compromises, such as dealing with organized crime. They were constantly at risk of being set up by informers and agents provocateurs. When their nearly inevitable arrests occurred, some made deals with the cops and turned in their friends; others did long prison terms. In France the laws were draconian then. Prisons were much worse and the penal colonies were basically death camps (1). The guillotines were constantly supplied with fresh meat. Hundreds of illegalists were imprisoned. Many abandoned their anarchist politics,degenerating to the point where they behaved in a completely mercenary way. What started out as a revolt against bourgeois society usually turned into a purely economic affair, reproducing the cycle of "crime" and repression.

Marius Jacob was one of the foremost exponents and practitioners of anarchist illegalism in pre-war France. He was born to working class parents in Marseilles on Sept. 27, 1879. After finishing school he went to sea to train as a sailor. His sailing included a long voyage along the west coast of Africa. At 16 he had to abandon his life as a sailor for health reasons, and returned to France. By then he had already been introduced to the anarchist milieu by a friend, and became an anarchist. Soon after, in 1896, at the end of the period of "propaganda by the deed" in France, he was set up by an agent provocateur who procured explosives for then snitched him off. He was sentenced to six months' imprisonment at age 17. After his release, the police systematically visited each of his employers and got him fired. Together with two anarchist friends be hatched a scheme to pass himself off as a senior police officer, and carried out a fake raid on a pawnshop in Marseilles in May, 1899. He then traveled to Spain and Italy. Upon his return to France he was arrested in Toulon, then imprisoned in Aix-la-Provenec. He escaped and turned to illegalism on a full-time basis.

Around 1900, Jacob formed a band of anarchist illegalists who specialized in burglaries and fencing stolen goods. The band was based in Paris but operated throughout France, as well as in Italy and Belgium. The band was well-organized and very professional. The members' activities fell into three main categories: the scouts, who went from town to town looking for homes whose owners were absent and collected the information necessary to make the break-ins function flawlessly; the burglars, with a set of first-rate tools at their disposal, valued at 10,000 francs (easily $2500); and a fencing operation to sell the loot. Jacob persuaded some of the members to contribute ten percent of their take to anarchist propaganda efforts; some, refused on individualist grounds, preferring to keep their share. The band stole only from "social parasites" like priests, the wealthy and military officers. They spared the poor and those whose occupations the considered useful, like doctors, architects and writers. By common agreement, murder was excluded as an option except in cases of legitimate self-defense. The band was armed. To minimize the, risk of violence, they perfected a system of door seats which they attached to all exits of the buildings they were "working" in, Jacob later admitted that he participated in 106 burglaries, whose take was estimated at 5 million francs (an estimate, by the way that Jacob considerably inflated). One of the most memorable break-ins was at the Cathedral of Tours, where the band stole 17th century tapestries valued at 200,000 francs. They left behind a graffito: "All-powerful god, find your thieves!"

In late 1903, three members of the band were caught in Abbeville by a cop, Provost, who was shot dead. The burglars escaped, but two were caught in a trap set for them in Paris, and this arrest led to the arrests of most of the members. After 18 months investigation by a magistrate, the trial of 23 out of. the 29 accused members began in March 1905. Most were found guilty: Jacob and Bour (who apparently killed Provost) were sentenced to hard labor for life in the penal colonies. Fourteen other members received sentences totaling 100 years. Another ten, among them Jacob's mother, were acquitted. Jacob was deported to the penal colony in the lies du Saint in January 1906 and served twenty years, including 8 years 11 months in chains. Due to a campaign for his release organized primarily by his mother, he was released in 1925. He took up work as a traveling salesman, selling hosiery and clothing until his death by a deliberate morphine overdose on Aug. 28, 1954. The accounts of his friends show that Marius Jacob did not commit suicide out of despair, but out of a calm desire to avoid the infirmities of old age.

Looking back on his experiences in 1948 Jacob observed: "I don't think that illegalism can free the individual in present-day society. If he manages to free himself of a few constraints using this means, the unequal nature of the struggle will create others that are even worse and, in the end, will lead to the loss of his freedom, the little freedom he had, and sometimes his life. Basically, illegalism, considered as an act of revolt, is more a matter of temperament than of doctrine. This is why it cannot have an educational effect on the working masses as a whole. By this, I mean a worthwhile educational effect."

Notes

For good accounts of Jacob's life, see A. Sergeant's Un anarchiste de la belle epoque, Marius Jacob (Ed. Le Seuil, 1950), Bernard Thomas' Jacob (Ed. Tchou) and Jacob's text of Sept. 1948, Souvenirs d'un demi-sicle. Richard Parry's The Bonnot Gang (Rebel Pr.) is an excellent account of the illegalist individualists whose actions followed Jacob's arrest by a mere five years. Highly recommended. Finally, The Art of Anarchy (Cienfuegos Pr.) contains magnificent illustrations by anarchist Flavio Costantini that portray the actions of Jacob's band and of other illegatists.

1. For a good account of what the penal colonies were like, see Dry Guilliotine: Fifteen Years Among the Living Dead, Rene Belbenoit (E.P. Dutton, 1938)

"Why I Took Part in a Burglary, Why I Committed Murder"

The Trial Statement of Raymond Callemin (also known as Raymond-la-Science, member of the turn-of-the century Paris illegalist culture and the celebrated 'Bonnot Gang')

Every being comes into the world with a right to live a real life. This is indisputable, for it is nature's law. Also I ask myself why, on this earth, there are people who expect to have all the rights. They give the pretext that they have money, but if one asks them where they got their money from, what do they answer? As for myself, I answer as follows: "I give no one the right to impose his own wishes, regardless of the pretext given. I don't see why I wouldn't have the right to eat those grapes or those apples just because they are the property of Mr. X. . . .What did he do that I have not that let's him alone gain an advantage? I answer nothing and consequently I have the right to make use of things according to my need and if he wants to prevent me forcibly I will revolt and against his strength I will oppose my own because, finding myself attacked, I will defend myself by any means at my disposal.'

"That's why, to those who will say that they have money and, thus, I must obey them, I will say;' When you are able to demonstrate that part of the whole represents the whole, that this is another earth than that on which you have been born, as I have, and that this is another sun the one which lights the way and makes plants grow and fruit ripen, when you have proven that, I will give you the right to keep me from living, because, well, where DOES money come from: from the earth, and silver is one part of the earth transformed into a metal that came to be called silver and one part of the world monopolized this silver and, in using this metal, violently forced the rest of the world to obey it. For this end, they invented all kinds of torture systems such as prisons, etc.

Why does this minority which 'has' seem stronger than the majority which 'has not'? Because this majority is ignorant and lacking in energy; it allows all sorts of caprices on the part of those who 'have' by simply slouching its shoulders at each new caprice that comes up. These people are too faint-hearted to revolt themselves and, even better, if amongst them there are some who leave the flock, the others hold them back, either directly or indirectly, to without knowing it, but nevertheless in just as dangerous a manner. They claim honesty, but underneath that facade hides a hypocrisy and a cowardice which cannot be disavowed.

That someone could bring an honest man before me!

It is due to all of these things that I have revolted, it's because I didn't want to live the life of the present society, because I didn't want to wait until death to be alive that I defended myself against my oppressors by all means at my disposition.

From my earliest days, I knew the authority of the father and mother and before I was even old enough to understand what it all meant, I rebelled against that authority, just as I did against the authority of the educational system.

I was thirteen at the time. I started working; when I began to experience and understand what was going on around me. I also became familiar with life and social abuse; I saw people I found to be bad and corrupt, and told myself: "I must find a way to get out of this shit of bosses, workers, bourgeoisie, judges, officers, and others; all of these people disgust me, some become they allow themselves to go through the motions of life without really doing a thing." Not wanting to be exploited or, on the other hand, to be an exploiter of others, I stole from the shelves of stores, without getting too far head, the first time I was arrested I was seventeen; I was sentenced to three months in prison; and then I understood justice as it really was; my chum who was charged with the same crime (because we were working together) was given only two months, and that only a suspended sentence (of observation and good conduct). Why that was, I have always wondered. But I can say that I give no one the right to judge me, be he a judge from the educational system or one from the tribunal, because no one can possibly understand or know the reasons for my actions; no one can put himself in my place in one word no one can be me.

When I got out of prison, I returned to my parents, who reproached me severely. But to have undergone what I did in the name of "Justice", that is, prison, made me all the more rebellious. I started working again, although not the same job. (See, after having worked in an office for some time, I threw myself into work with a butcher, then into work in a deli, something which I did well, but, now wherever I went, people asked me for some sort of certification. I didn't have any, no one wanted to hire me, and that made me even more rebellious. That's when I began to play games in order to find work, I fixed up false certificates and finally found work for sixteen to eighteen hours a day for 70 to 80 francs a week, seven days a week, and when I asked for a day's vacation Monsieur the Boss got angry.

At the end of these months of work there, I was distraught and exhausted and yet I had to keep going for fear of dying of hunger, seeing that what I earned was just enough to pay for my most basic needs, but to look at what was going on the other side of the street, I felt that my boss was reaping all the benefits of MY work and what was he doing to deserve THAT? Nothing, other than reminding me that I had arrived ten minutes late or criticizing my work and threatening me with losing my job if my work didn't improve.

Anyway, as I don't like doing the same thing all the time (I don't think of myself as a machine), I would have liked to teach myself, to know lots of things, to develop my intelligence, as well as my body, in one word, to become a being incapable of moving out in all directions as he pleases, needing as little as possible from others around him. But to get to that point, I needed time, I needed books. How could I get those things while remaining so tied to my work? It was impossible for me to pull these things together as I had to eat and in order to do that I had to work and for whom? For a boss. I thought all this over and said for myself: I am going to change jobs once again, maybe things will go better for me now, but I really hadn't expected to encounter a social system such as the one I find myself fighting constantly these days; I was pretty interested in mechanical work, but when I inquired about working, mechanics responded: We'd like to take you on but we can't pay you because you wouldn't work fast enough since you don't know anything about what it takes to be a mechanic. . . they would (one day) pay me, but only once I know the rudiments of the trade, which meant in fifteen to eighteen months (or more) and then they could pay me six to eight francs a day for ten to twelve hours of work per day. The state really began to disgust me at this point. In the end I found work digging embankments but nothing changed: I had to work a lot in order to fall short of satisfying even my most basic needs. I came to the same conclusions in looking at situations all around me; I saw nothing but poverty for those who worked at my side and, worse, all these miserable people instead of trying to get out of the rut they were in, dug in their heels and drank themselves into oblivion, thereby casting their faculties of reason to the wind.

I saw all that, I saw the exploiter getting satisfied by the whole thing, and worse, I saw him pay for rounds of drinks for men who had already drunk too much; and for good reason, for while they got smashed, the workers couldn't think and that's what was necessary to keep them under the authority of the exploiting bosses.

When, accidentally, there was a gesture of revolt by the imbeciles (I make no distinction by trade here), the boss threatened to fire them and the imbeciles calmed down immediately.

I went on strike once too but I quickly understood the meaning and the ramifications of this token gesture. All of those 'men', incapable of acting individually, appointed a leader whose responsibility it was to discuss the discontent amongst our members with the boss.

Some times, this stupid leader sold out to the boss by asking for a small bribe, whereas when the other brutes had no money, he suggested they return to work if they needed to pay for things. These were the results, the rewards we got from the strikes, and when we did finally get a raise, the capitalists reacted by increasing the cost of our food, so much so that nothing really changed, we had lost a lot of time and energy, that's all. Also, in the unions, I only made one short appearance, as I was quickly aware that all of these gentlemen were noting more than profiteers and careerists who screamed for rebellion everywhere, but why? I understood that they wanted to destroy the present state so that they could put themselves in power, to change the whole apparatus in name only. Like the capitalists, they utilized the same technique: promises. One's sincerity, in the end, is only one more lousy working class trait to be exploited. When I left this, I came upon a group which was somewhat different: the revolutionaries. I then became an anarchist,. I was eighteen, I didn't want to return to work and I started my campaign of individual reprisals once more, with the same unfortunate luck as before. After three or four months, I was arrested. I was sentenced to two months imprisonment . When I got out I tried to find work. I worked on a general strike, during which we had a lot of trouble with the police. I was arrested and sentenced to six days in jail.

All of this sharpened my character and, naturally, the more I learned, the more I understood about life. I spent time with anarchists, I understood their theories and became a fervent supporter of their point of view, not because the theories seemed god but because I found them to be the most just of those that were current at the time.

In the anarchist milieu I encountered individuals who were trying as much as possible to get rid of their prejudices, those same prejudices which made this world so stupid and so savage, people with whom I enjoyed talking because they showed me things I could see and touch rather than utopias. More than that, these people were sober, clear thinkers. When with them I didn't need to turn my head the other way as I did with most of the brutes, their mouths didn't reek of alcohol or tobacco. They seemed reasonable and I found them to have lots of energy and wills of iron.

My opinions solidified, I became a part of the group, I wanted no part of the world in which I worked for others, I wanted to work for myself, but in order to do that, I didn't have much choice, but I had acquired some experience in some areas, and, full of energy myself, I resolved to defend myself to the death, against the stupid yelping of the present society.

I left Paris when I was nineteen and a half, because I saw that everything in the city was becoming regimented. I understood what the words republic, liberty, equality, fraternity, flag, country and so on meant. I mulled these words over, what part I was to take in all of this and I also spoke with my friends about the supposed valor of that social vocabulary that surrounded me; I understood the horrible hypocrisy represented by the language of the state. It's all nothing more than a religion, like God's religion that gets slopped out to the world's religious folk. They say to them. 'respect your country, die for your country, but what is the nation for me, it's all the earth without borders. "Country" is where I live, whether it is in Germany, Russia, or France, for me "country" or "nation" knows no bounds, it is everywhere that I am contented. I don't distinguish between peoples, I seek only mutual understanding, but around me I see only religious types and Christians or deceitful hypocrites. If the workers would think a bit, they would see and understand that between capitalists there are no boundaries, these rapacious wrongdoers organize themselves to oppress others better. It is only now that I am here and it is now that I must live and I shall do just that by any means that science puts at my disposition. I may not live to be terribly old, I will probably be overtaken by the open struggle between me and the society which has better means of winning than I will ever have, but I will defend myself as best I can, to deceitfulness and tricking I will respond in kind, likewise to force, until I am beaten, that is to say, dead.

Around May of 1910, I tried going to the provinces, hoping to leave the country and thereby escape military service, but in July I was put into prison for assault and battery. I go tout at the end of August, one month before my class of military trainees was to leave. As soon as I left prison, I got a job with a ditch-digging concern to earn some money; I took the train for the Belgian border, paying for part of the trip, but not all of it - I had to have money to eat on the train. Once in Valenciennes, I got off the train, looked for the exit doors of the station, and was spied on by a policeman, who asked me a few questions, then let me go. I didn't have any money, so I took a job for a week. I committed two robberies and left the country for Belgium. I got to Charleroi about the sixth of October, found a job for a few days, got to know a group of anarchists and in the early part of November I was arrested and then released eight days later (they couldn't prove the charges against me).

I worked a bit, met some people with similar opinions, people who were frank, motivated, with whom I did some robberies. I was twenty and a half years old.

February 1911. I had to get out of Brussels as they were looking to accuse me of doing those robberies at Charleroi; I returned to Paris, where I worked on the newspaper ANARCHY, something I worked hard for. I worked hard, just about every day of the week, and as usual, I was a bit thin, so I did a couple of robberies without much real success. I started printing counterfeit bills, but that wasn't too successful and it was just as risky as doing a big job that would bring in more money. I stopped the counterfeiting.

In July, lots of my friends were arrested. I was upset and determined to avenge my position in this criminal society. I left the newspaper and moved to Vincennes with some friends.

While working on the newspaper, we decided to rent a number of rooms so as to better insure our security. We didn't have much money so we robbed some places to get what we needed.

For a time I had been looking for a friend to drive me places, but I couldn't find anyone. I had learned to drive, but not being very skillful at it, I was hesitant to try stealing a car and risk causing our group more trouble than we could handle. It was during this time that I met Bonnot.

It was about December 10, 1911, at night, that we stole a car in Boulogne and proceeded to hide it in a friend's garage. I told him simply that we would be back for it in eight hours or so. I gave him a false name and false address and we left.

We discussed what we had to do. We had two big jobs to do. We were four strong. We drove around Paris for the rest of the night until; 8:30 the next morning. I stayed at the wheel and grew confident in my own abilities to handle the curves in the road, even at high speed. That was good, we really needed tw0 drivers in case one was wounded in the pursuit.

At 8;30 I let Bonnot take over.

We hadn't mutually decided how we were to pull off what we wanted to do - rob a cash collector. We had already observed the collector and timed his arrival at the rue Ordineur but still, it was nine in the morning, right out in the middle of the street, and in a quarter which was rather heavily populated.

At 9:00 exactly we spotted him stepping off the street car as usual, accompanied by someone else assigned to protect him. We don't have a second to lose; the car approaches him, I get out, hand on my revolver. My companion, on the other side of the sidewalk, is a few steps behind me.

Three feet away from the cashier, I take out my revolver, coldly, and shoot him twice; he falls, his accompanying guard runs off; I pick up one sack, my companion takes another.

We get back on the car, some passerby trying to keep us from getting in. We pull out our revolvers, shoot and everyone flees. We take the route to Le Havre, taking lots of detours to keep from getting caught or having to put up a fight (we aren't poorly armed). I have no less than six revolvers on my person. We had about four hundred rounds and had decided to fight to the death if we had to.

We were hungry. I let Bonnot drive. Later, we started running out of gas and decided to leave the car behind, having arrived at the sea and the sandy earth pulling our tires down into it. We throw the license plates away. we got to the trains station to get tickets to Paris and arrive without incident, although the national security agency is close at our feet. I expect they thought the revolution had begun! To think that it was only a slightly serious prank. They are going to see quite a few more before they fall. . .