The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) returned on April 2nd 2002 valuable historical documents to French authorities 14 years after these were stolen from the French National Archives. These documents, including the Treaty of Fontainebleau that Napoleon signed on April 11th 1814 when he abdicated, had been stolen by two American researchers.
The theft was detected when the treaty, imposed on Napoleon by the Czar of Russia, the king of Prussia and the Emperor of Austria, was offered for sale at Sotheby's in May 1996.
According to that treaty, Napoleon was allowed to keep his imperial title beside being granted the sovereignty over the island of Elba and an annuity of two million French francs from the French government.
There were four versions of that treaty, including the one kept by the French National Archives signed by the Prussian plenipotentiary minister of Prussia, which was stolen by the two researchers.
The copy of the treaty had been estimated between US $ 50,000 and 75,000 by Sotheby's and the representatives of the French National Archives, who discovered that several other important documents were missing, then lodged a complaint for its restitution.
Among those documents seized by the FBI were a letter giving full powers to Caulaincourt, the then French foreign minister, to ratify a treaty with Austria as well as thirty letters written by the Count of Provence, who was to become king under the name of Louis 18th, and sent to the Prince of Condé and a letter of condolences sent by the Count to the Duke of Bourbon following the death of his son the Duke of Enghien, who had been executed by a firing squad after a death sentence delivered by a Napoleonic court.
The FBI arrested John William Rooney, 69, and Marshall Lawrence who used the alias of Frederick Tomcezak, 39, who were later released on bail. They both face a 10-year prison term sentence.
Rooney was a retired professor of European history who taught at the University of the South in Sewanee while Lawrence was still a student who envisaged to publish historical novels.
The documents were stolen in 1988 but Rooney and his accomplice claimed they acquired them from a woman living in central France, the identity of whom they refused to disclose.
Following searches in their homes, the FBI seized several documents that remained to be analysed. The two accused will be tried in May 2002.
Napoleonic documents are much sought after by amateurs throughout the world, notably letters by Napoleon, which often fetch astronomic prices at auction.
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