Alexandre Jacob known as Marius Jacob, was a French anarchist

Anarchism

Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...

 illegalist

Illegalism

Illegalism is an anarchist philosophy that developed primarily in France, Italy, Belgium, and Switzerland during the early 1900s as an outgrowth of individualist anarchism...

. A clever burglar equipped with a sharp sense of humour

Humour

Humour or humor is the tendency of particular cognitive experiences to provoke laughter and provide amusement...

, capable of great generosity towards his victims, he became one of the models for Maurice Leblanc's

Maurice Leblanc

Maurice Marie Émile Leblanc was a French novelist and writer of short stories, known primarily as the creator of the fictional gentleman thief and detective Arsène Lupin, often described as a French counterpart to Arthur Conan Doyle's creation Sherlock Holmes.- Biography :Leblanc was born in...

 character Arsene Lupin

Arsène Lupin

Arsène Lupin is a fictional character who appears in a book series of detective fiction / crime fiction novels written by French writer Maurice Leblanc, as well as a number of non-canonical sequels and numerous film, television such as Night Hood, stage play and comic book adaptations.- Overview :A...

.

A rough start

Jacob was born in 1879 in Marseille

Marseille

Marseille , known in antiquity as Massalia , is the second largest city in France, after Paris, with a population of 852,395 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Marseille extends beyond the city limits with a population of over 1,420,000 on an area of...

 to a working-class family. At the age of twelve, he signed up as a sailor's apprentice for a voyage that would carry him to Sydney

Sydney

Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...

 where he deserted from the crew. Of his voyage he would later say, "I saw the world; it is not beautiful". After a short episode of piracy

Piracy

Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence at sea. The term can include acts committed on land, in the air, or in other major bodies of water or on a shore. It does not normally include crimes committed against persons traveling on the same vessel as the perpetrator...

, which he soon rejected as too cruel, he returned to Marseilles in 1897 and gave up navy life definitively, plagued by fevers which would accompany him for the rest of his life. As an apprentice typographer he attended anarchist

Anarchism

Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...

 meetings and met his future wife Rose.

The parliamentary socialists

Socialism

Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...

 of the late 19th century were opposed, often violently, to anarchists

Anarchism

Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...

 in the working world. Socialists sought to attain power legally through the electoral process. Anarchists, however, felt that social justice was not something that could be attained through the existing power structure, but instead had to be seized by the working classes. In the Europe of the Belle Epoque

Belle Époque

The Belle Époque or La Belle Époque was a period in European social history that began during the late 19th century and lasted until World War I. Occurring during the era of the French Third Republic and the German Empire, it was a period characterised by optimism and new technological and medical...

, after the repression of the Paris Commune

Paris Commune

The Paris Commune was a government that briefly ruled Paris from March 18 to May 28, 1871. It existed before the split between anarchists and Marxists had taken place, and it is hailed by both groups as the first assumption of power by the working class during the Industrial Revolution...

, revolt tended towards the individual act of violence, often directed towards kings, politicians, soldiers, police officers, tyrants, and magistrates. Numerous militant anarchists

Anarchism

Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...

 were imprisoned and faced the guillotine

Guillotine

The guillotine is a device used for carrying out :executions by decapitation. It consists of a tall upright frame from which an angled blade is suspended. This blade is raised with a rope and then allowed to drop, severing the head from the body...

. Men such as Ravachol

Ravachol

François Claudius Koenigstein, known as Ravachol, , was a French anarchist. He was born 14 October 1859 at Saint-Chamond and died guillotined 11 July 1892 at Montbrison.-Biography:...

, considered by many to be terrorists, were condemned to death.

Caught with explosives after a string of minor larcenies, Jacob was condemned to six months in prison, after which he had difficulty reintegrating himself. From that point forward, he choose "a pacifistic

Pacifism

Pacifism is the opposition to war and violence. The term "pacifism" was coined by the French peace campaignerÉmile Arnaud and adopted by other peace activists at the tenth Universal Peace Congress inGlasgow in 1901.- Definition :...

 illegalism

Illegalism

Illegalism is an anarchist philosophy that developed primarily in France, Italy, Belgium, and Switzerland during the early 1900s as an outgrowth of individualist anarchism...

."

Criminal activity

In Toulon

Toulon

Toulon is a town in southern France and a large military harbor on the Mediterranean coast, with a major French naval base. Located in the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur region, Toulon is the capital of the Var department in the former province of Provence....

 on July 3, 1899, Jacob pretended to suffer from hallucinations in order to avoid five years of reclusion. On April 19, 1900, he escaped from the asylum in Aix-en-Provence

Aix-en-Provence

Aix , or Aix-en-Provence to distinguish it from other cities built over hot springs, is a city-commune in southern France, some north of Marseille. It is in the region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, in the département of Bouches-du-Rhône, of which it is a subprefecture. The population of Aix is...

 with the assistance of a male nurse and took refuge in Sète

Sète

Sète is a commune in the Hérault department in Languedoc-Roussillon in southern France. Its inhabitants are called Sétois....

. There he organized a band of men, calling them "the workers of the night." The principles were simple: one does not kill, except to protect his life and his freedom from the police; one steals only from those considered to be social parasites - bosses, judges, soldiers, and the clergy - but never from the professions considered useful - architects, doctors, artists, etc.; finally, a percentage of the stolen money was to be invested into the anarchist cause. Jacob chose to avoid working with the idealistic anarchists and instead surrounded himself with criminals and fellow illegalists.

To see whether those who they sought to burglarize were on their premises, Jacob's gang wedged pieces of paper into their doors and returned the following day to check if the paper was still in place. Additionally, Jacob became an expert on lock-picking doors and safes. Another clever criminal method involved entering an apartment from the floor above. Jacob would slip an umbrella through a small hole in the target apartment's ceiling. Once inserted, the umbrella could be opened to catch rubble and dampen the noise created by breaking through the ceiling.

Between 1900 and 1903, operating with groups of two to four people, Jacob made over 150 burglaries in Paris, surrounding provinces and even abroad. But Jacob began to feel that his was a lost cause. One day while attempting to convert a workman to anarchism

Anarchism

Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...

, Jacob obtained a significant answer: "And my retirement

Retirement

Retirement is the point where a person stops employment completely. A person may also semi-retire by reducing work hours.Many people choose to retire when they are eligible for private or public pension benefits, although some are forced to retire when physical conditions don't allow the person to...

?"

On April 21, 1903, an operation carried out in Abbeville

Abbeville

Abbeville is a commune in the Somme department in Picardie in northern France.-Location:Abbeville is located on the Somme River, from its modern mouth in the English Channel, and northwest of Amiens...

 turned sour. Having killed a police officer in order to escape, Jacob and his two accomplices were captured. Two years later in Amiens

Amiens

Amiens is a city and commune in northern France, north of Paris and south-west of Lille. It is the capital of the Somme department in Picardy...

 Jacob appeared in court. Anarchist supporters flocked to the city, creating a platform for his ideas. "You now know who I am: one revolted, living on the product of his burglings." He escaped from the guillotine

Guillotine

The guillotine is a device used for carrying out :executions by decapitation. It consists of a tall upright frame from which an angled blade is suspended. This blade is raised with a rope and then allowed to drop, severing the head from the body...

 but was condemned to a life of forced labor in Cayenne

Cayenne

Cayenne is the capital of French Guiana, an overseas region and department of France located in South America. The city stands on a former island at the mouth of the Cayenne River on the Atlantic coast. The city's motto is "Ferit Aurum Industria" which means "Work brings wealth"...

.

Forced labor and resurrection

In Cayenne, Jacob maintained correspondence with his mother Marie, who never gave up on her son. He tried to escape seventeen times without success.

Following the countrywide ban on forced labor (inspired by the writings of Albert Londres

Albert Londres

Albert Londres was a French journalist and writer. One of the inventors of investigative journalism, he criticized abuses of colonialism such as forced labour. Albert Londres gave his name to a journalism prize for Francophone journalists.- Biography :Londres was born in Vichy in 1884...

), Jacob returned to the city, where he suffered from depression until 1927, after which he relocated to Loire Valley

Loire Valley

The Loire Valley , spanning , is located in the middle stretch of the Loire River in central France. Its area comprises approximately . It is referred to as the Cradle of the French Language, and the Garden of France due to the abundance of vineyards, fruit orchards, and artichoke, asparagus, and...

 where he became a commercial peddler and remarried (Rose having died during his time in prison).

In 1929 Jacob was introduced to Louis Lecoin

Louis Lecoin

Louis Lecoin, Louis Lecoin, Louis Lecoin, (b. 30 September 1888, Saint-Amand-Montrond in the Cher département, d. 1971, was a militant anarcho-pacifist. He was at the center of the foundation of the Union pacifiste de France.- Biography :...

, director of the newspaper Libertaire. The two men resembled each other and built a lasting friendship. After the international support effort for anarchist prisoners Sacco and Vanzetti

Sacco and Vanzetti

Ferdinando Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were anarchists who were convicted of murdering two men during a 1920 armed robbery in South Braintree, Massachusetts, United States...

, they gave their support to prevent the extradition of Durruti

Buenaventura Durruti

José Buenaventura Durruti Dumange was a central figure of Spanish anarchism during the period leading up to and including the Spanish Civil War.-Early life:...

, who had been promised the death penalty in Spain

Spain

Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

. In 1936, Jacob went to Barcelona

Barcelona

Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...

 in the hopes of aiding the syndicalist CNT

Confederación Nacional del Trabajo

The Confederación Nacional del Trabajo is a Spanish confederation of anarcho-syndicalist labor unions affiliated with the International Workers Association . When working with the latter group it is also known as CNT-AIT...

, but convinced that there was no hope for the struggle in Spain, he returned to the market-life of France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

.

If he did not engage directly in the French resistance

French Resistance

The French Resistance is the name used to denote the collection of French resistance movements that fought against the Nazi German occupation of France and against the collaborationist Vichy régime during World War II...

 (there were very few anarchist networks, even though some libertarians, primarily Spanish, participated in the movement), partisans

Resistance movement

A resistance movement is a group or collection of individual groups, dedicated to opposing an invader in an occupied country or the government of a sovereign state. It may seek to achieve its objects through either the use of nonviolent resistance or the use of armed force...

were able to find refuge in his home. After the death of his mother (1941) and of his wife (1947), surrounded by friends and comrades, Jacob never renounced his criminal life-style or his opinions.

External links

• A comic strip about Marius Jacob (in French)
• À la mémoire de l’anarchiste: Marius Jacob (in French)
• Amiens trial Daily Bleed Calendar, March 22, 1905
• The Night Workers from Journal L'Alsace/Le Pays (in French)
• le blog Alexandre Jacob l'honnête cambrioleur : http://www.atelierdecreationlibertaire.com/alexandre-jacob/