Death in the City of Light: The Serial Killer of Nazi-Occupied Paris

CHAPTER 25. THE KNELLERS

1 “Shit! I’ll run over there” Hazel Rowley, Tête-à-Tête: Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2005), 147.

2 “land of freedom and equality” Ibid, 150.

3 “that doctrine which makes” … “Existentialism defines” Annie Cohen-Solal, Sartre: A Life, translated by Anna Cancogni (New York: Pantheon Books, 1987), 249–251.

4 “Too Many Attend Sartre” Ronald Aronson, Camus & Sartre: The Story of a Friendship and the Quarrel That Ended It (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2004), 47.

5 “the hairy adolescents” … P.T. Barnum Annie Cohen-Solal, Sartre, 261.

6 what the historian Ronald Aronson Ronald Aronson, Camus & Sartre, 48.

7 A journalist asked Jean-François Dominique, L’affaire Petiot: médecin, marron, gestapiste, guillotiné pour au moins vingt-sept assassinats (Paris: Éditions Ramsay, 1980), 171.

8 “constitutional delinquent” … “completely amoral” John V. Grombach, The Great Liquidator (New York: Zebra Books, 1980), 266–269.

9 “[Petiot’s] hesitations, his contradictions” DGER Report, Conclusions, May 3, 1945, APP, Série J, affaire Petiot, carton n° V and IV.

10 On September 11, 1944 Marthe Wetterwald, Audition, November 20, 1944, APP, Série J, affaire Petiot, carton n° V.

11 He wanted to help Petiot had obtained Wetterwald’s name after trying the same method two days before offering to help in the release of another physican, who, in the middle of his pitch, walked into the room. Marguerite Gérard, Audition, November 20, 1944, APP, Série J, affaire Petiot, carton n° V.

12 He was a leader François Wetterwald, Audition, November 13, 1944, APP, Série J, affaire Petiot, carton n° V. See also Wetterwald’s memoir, Vengeance: Histoire d’un corps franc (Paris: Mouvement Vengeance, 1946).

13 12,884 Jewish men, women, and children There were 3,031 men, 5,802 women, and 4,051 children between the ages of two and sixteen. Serge Klarsfeld, Vichy-Auschwitz (Paris: Fayard 1983), 121–122.

14 “I know, this appears suspect” Ernest Jorin, Audition, November 6, 1944, APP, Série J, affaire Petiot, carton n° IV.

15 Roart was struck Report, October 10, 1944, APP, Série J, affaire Petiot, carton n° IV.

16 a woman’s black coat Ibid.

17 though she could not say for certain Ibid.

18 the mutilated remains of a young boy Asnières report, August 19, 1942, APP, Série J, affaire Petiot, carton n° VII.

19 Petiot suddenly refused L’Aurore, November 6, 1945, and Franc-Tireur, November 9, 1945.

20 “On what date did you buy” … “Write ‘ditto’ ” The interrogation is in Jacques Perry and Jane Chabert, L’affaire Petiot (Paris: Gallimard, 1957), 162.

21 all charges would be dropped Combat, January 4, 1946.

22 “Yet it is certain that” Réquisitoire définitif, December 31, 1945, APP, Série J, affaire Petiot, carton n° VII.