HOAXER / FAKE VISIONARY
(Image: an illustrator depicting the 'vision' of St. Raphael to Martin, imaged dated 1859.)
Thomas Martin, also known as “Martin de Gallardon” was a peasant bean stalker born in Gallardon near Chartres in France, 1783.
Starting 1816, he claimed to have witnessed a series of appearances of a man dressed in a frock coat and a top hat who presented himself as the Archangel Raphael, “a very famous angel with God ”. He claimed he received a message from the 'angel' in that he must go see King Louis XVIII and ask him to restore order in the country, and to enforce Sunday as a day of rest to honour Christ.
Martin's fake visions were an obvious attempt to capitalise on the traditional Catholicism of the royalists. His 'visions' of the man in the frock coat saying he was St. Raphael demanded expiation for the faults of the French Revolution, that King Louis XVIII must roll back growing impiety and re-establish a strict monarchy constantly inspired by the Faith.
Martin's message was relayed to the bishop of Versailles , M gr Louis Charrier Roche , by the priest of Gallardon, Father Laperruque. Sceptical of the peasant's statements, the bishop had Martin taken to the Charenton asylum where he was examined by psychiatrists Philippe Pinel and Antoine-Athanase Royer-Collard , who declared him sane after several days of internment.
King Louis XVIII decides to give Martin an audience at the Tuileries in April 1816. The content of this interview feeds the gazettes through the articles of Louis Silvy, a Jansenist and royalist polemicist. According to contemporaries, after an interview, the king appeared very moved by the statements of Martin who appeared always calm, apparently helped by the appearances of “Archangel Raphael”.
However, his visions later took a royalist fanatical turn. In 1828 Martin declared his visions accused the king of having desired to assassinate Louis XVI in the forest of Rambouillet before the Revolution in order to obtain the throne faster, and also accused him of not making an effort to seek the hidden prince, Louis XVII, thereby fuelling the conspiracy theory that the son of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette did not die in the Temple prison, and that he was still alive and the real heir to the throne. The reports of this interview were repressed by the police, but was clandestinely distributed.
Martin became a “peasant prophet” both in the salons and in the countryside, where he was consulted until his death by lay people and ecclesiastics. His fakery was finally made apparent in 1833 when he claimed the German clock and watch-maker Karl Wilhelm Naundorff was indeed the hidden prince Louis XVII, and supported the fraudster's claim, (which no doubt also helped fuelled the fire ! Mélanie of La Salette believed Nuandorff was indeed the hidden Louis XVII!) The approved stigmatist and mystic Marie-Julie Jahenny would later declare Nuandorff nor his pretender descendants would have the French throne, proof they are not true descendants of the Royal house.
Martin died of congestion in 1834. His family said he was murdered, the autopsy proved he had been poisoned.
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