16 postcards with photographs of the trial and degradation of Charles Benjamin Ullmo. [France, ca. 1908].
Charles Benjamin Ullmo, a Jewish-French navy officer, was trialed tried in 1907 for stealing restricted military documents. Ullmo stole the documents when he needed money to fund his lover and his opium addiction. He tried to sell the documents to the Germans, and when this attempt failed he tried to blackmail his commanders in exchange for the return of the documents. Ullmo was caught, pleaded guilty, was publicly degraded, found guilty in a trial and deported to the Island of Devils (at first he was imprisoned in the same cell where Alfred Dreyfus was formerly held).
Ullmo's defense attorneys in the trial based their defense on the the mind-altering effects of opium. Following the trial, which was widely reviewed by the media, the government of France restricted the opium trade.
16 postcards. Good overall condition. Four postcards were used.