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[ INVESTIGATIVE FILES JOE NICKELL Joe Nickell, PhD, is CSI’s senior research fellow and author of numerous books, including: Crime Science: Methods of Forensic Detection.

The ‘Murder’ of Vincent

id the great post-impressionist even later statement made by an eighty- famous “last” painting Wheat Field with painter two-year-old man shortly after the re- Crows?1 I believe this new hypothesis is D (1853–1890) die—not by his lease of the movie Lust for Life in 1956. in keeping with van Gogh’s desire to own hand, as history has recorded, but Only sixteen at the time of van Gogh’s paint from life. Everyone agrees the pis- instead by a pistol-wielding teenage death, René Secrétan told how he and tol was the innkeeper’s, so statements rowdy, either as a murder or an accident his friends had enjoyed playing pranks from him, even via his daughter, should that was covered up? The latter view is on the eccentric painter. The authors be most credible. advanced in the troubled artist’s latest suggest that somehow this behavior led 2. How can one explain van Gogh’s biography, Van Gogh: The Life, written to the artist’s shooting. Although René’s missing belongings—his easel, shoulder by Steven Naifeh and Gregory White older brother was a friend of van Gogh, bag of brushes and paints, and canvas— Smith (2011). (See “Was Vincent van Naifeh and Smith include him in their unless having shot the painter, René Gogh Murdered?” 2011.) Naifeh told scenario also. René claimed that van and his brother “apparently had the Morley Safer of CBS’s 60 Minutes that Gogh had stolen the fatal gun from his time and presence of mind to collect in claiming he had shot himself, Van rucksack—or rather, must have done the pistol and all of Vincent’s belong- Gogh “was covering up his own mur- so—while René fished because it was ings before hurrying off into the gath- der” (CBS News 2011). later missing (870–876). René in turn ering dusk” (850, 873)? Questioned Death claimed to have bought or borrowed the But why would the Secrétan broth- pistol from Gustave Ravoux, keeper of ers take van Gogh’s possessions as part As related in various sources—in stan- the inn where van Gogh boarded (871). of “their hasty cover-up of the deed”? dard reference works as well as the best- Alternative Possibility Far from helping them conceal their selling fictionalized biography by Irving act, removal of the items would instead Stone, Lust for Life (1934), and the Although René Secrétan said abso lutely only suggest involvement by others movie of the same title starring Kirk nothing about shooting van Gogh, the and—if they were actually seen with Douglas (1956)—van Gogh’s death re- authors are off and running with their such bulky painters’ items—would con- sulted from a self-inflicted gunshot suggestions of manslaughter or worse. firm their guilt. Perhaps van Gogh had wound. He had gone into the fields to They raise a number of questions they discarded the items himself (even per- paint but instead, despairing of life, shot believe suggest something—anything— haps in the river) in one of his fits of himself just below the ribs with a re- other than suicide (869–85). Here I ad- rage, determined not to need them volver. dress each question and provide a more again. Or perhaps they were abandoned Surviving, he struggled over a mile likely answer. in a secluded place. back to his room in Auvers sur Oise (a 1. According to the innkeeper’s 3. If van Gogh had been in the dis- French town northeast of Paris). There daughter, van Gogh had obtained the tant to paint, how did he he told friends, his brother Theo, doc- old revolver (which sometimes mal- manage, after shooting himself, to de- tors, and police that he was responsible: functioned) from her father directly “in scend a steep slope and walk over a mile “Do not accuse anyone. It is I who order to scare away crows.” Naifeh and home—“virtually impossible in his wanted to kill myself.” He lingered for Smith suggest that the innkeeper de- condition”? some thirty hours before dying in vised this “cover story” so as “to conceal The issue does not argue against sui- Theo’s arms (Naifeh and Smith 2011, his own culpability.” They call it “a cide. Years later, two elderly residents 850–869). patent falsehood, since Vincent had no said that their ancestors, a father and Naifeh and Smith (2011, 856) pres- fear of birds and thought of crows in grandfather respectively, had seen the ent a far different scenario based on a particular as good omens” (879). Are we painter in a different place, less than a rumor that surfaced in the 1930s, alleg- really to believe such a story? half mile from the inn, entering a small ing that some “young boys” had acciden- What if van Gogh had said it was to farmyard where he did the deed. Yet tally shot the painter. The authors at- scare up crows—so he could paint them both had seen the painter alone, and tempt to link that late rumor with the in flight, just as they are depicted in his neither mentioned his having painting

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equipment with him or being in the n. 87). (However, the authors, who are company of teenagers (872–73). advocating a contrary view, call this “a 4. Why did van Gogh, if he in tended red herring.”) suicide, fire the bullet at such an odd 6. When the police came to investi- trajectory—the gun being “held too low gate the morning after the shooting, and pointing downward” (854)—if he they inquired, “Did you want to commit had meant to kill himself, say with a suicide?” The wounded man replied, fatal wound to the heart? “It looked like “Yes, I believe so.” After they reminded the crazy angle of an accidental shoot- him that suicide was illegal—a crime ing,” say the authors, “not the studied against both the state and God—he in- straightness of a determined suicide” sisted that the deed was by his own (854). And why was the wound not a hand, urging, “Do not accuse anyone; it contact one but one “fired from farther is I who wanted to kill myself ” (851). out” (855)? Does not this equivocation suggest that Asking such questions implies that he was protecting the Secrétan brothers? the authors think all suicides are bold, But why? “The answer, we believe, is that coolly rational acts, carried out accord- Vincent welcomed death.” Indeed, “Vin- ing to formula, whereas in fact they may cent must have seen no reason, no ben- be hesitant, erratic, and unusual. Van efit, in dragging the Secrétans—even the Gogh may have lacked decisiveness in mischievous, careless René—into the committing the act, just as in an earlier glare of public inquiry and embarrass- self-wounding when he cut off only the ment simply for having done him this lower portion of his ear (704). Thus the favor” (875). authors should beware of the false di- Actually, van Gogh’s reply, “Yes, I be- chotomy of suggesting that, if van lieve so,” obviously reflects his own un- Gogh did not shoot himself in the head certainty as to whether he meant only or heart, someone else probably fired to hurt himself once again or whether the shot. As to the trajectory, it could he indeed meant to end his life. His suggest that the painter held the small- equivocation confirms the indecisive- caliber revolver by the barrel in his left ness of the act itself, as mentioned ear- hand (with his palm on the underside lier. It most emphatically does not sug- rather than over the barrel) and, with gest he was unclear about who shot his arms extended, pushed up and away him! His subsequent insistence that he on the trigger with his right thumb. He alone was responsible was no doubt so might even have jerked at the trigger, that the police would understand what greatly altering the aim. happened and not go after some inno- 5. Why did van Gogh not shoot cent party. Besides, if the Secrétans again when his first shot failed? Why meant to kill Vincent, why did they not did he “choose instead to take the far shoot him again? And if the shooting more painful and embarrassing path were accidental, why did they not lend back to his attic room at the Ravoux assistance? The other brother was a Inn” (874)? good friend of the artist. According to innkeeper Ravoux, as Psychological Autopsy his daughter recalled: “Vincent shot himself and fainted. The coolness of the Having investigated a number of night revived him. On all fours he deaths—including homicide, suicide, looked for the gun to finish himself off, and accidental cases for police depart- but he could not find it. Then Vincent ments and others (e.g., Nickell 1992), got up and climbed down the hillside as well as enigmatic historical deaths to return to our house” (852). Then (e.g., Nickell 2005)—I can say that again, the adage “Once burned twice such a death is no place to start with a shy” may also have applied. Van Gogh supposed answer and work backward to did tell others—while he lay abed dur- the evidence. I believe Naifeh and ing the hours before his death—that he Smith made just this mistake—an ex- had intended to die. Artist Émile ample of “confirmation bias.” Bernard claimed van Gogh had told In investigating a suspected or pos- others he would “do it over again” (883, sible suicide, says one expert, “It is im-

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portant to note that the deceased may begin to hate our own life because it is of van Gogh’s death). It does not seem have indicated an interest to commit sui- not as good as others” (letter of Decem- a final letter, and was probably written cide through activities and statements ber 9, 1877). He frequently ate only between July 23 and 27. Yet its last prior to death.” Indeed, an in-depth psy- bread, avoided an overcoat in and paragraph reads in part, “Well my own chological autopsy may be conducted “to cold, suffered sleep deprivation, and slept work, I am risking my life for it and my determine the state of mind of a person sometimes on a hard floor or even the reason has half foundered because of prior to the fatal act” (Geberth 1993). cold ground. At other times he flagel- it. ...” The letter is unfinished and un- Van Gogh’s famous letters (van lated himself with his walking stick, signed. (See van Gogh-Bonger 1981, Gogh-Bonger 1981) and other biogra- among other abuses. Although self-mor- III: 298.) Just a week before, Theo had phical materials provide ample infor- tification is typically a different impulse written hauntingly, “As long as he’s not mation on his chronic depression— than suicide, van Gogh’s is not a typical melancholic and heading for another even periods of outright madness. As case. His self-harm was clearly escalating. crisis, it was all going so well.” Having early as 1877 in Amsterdam he had (See Naifeh and Smith, 167, 883 n. 39.) talked with his brother, Theo concluded mused on death as an escape, a chance Van Gogh had a number of break- after the shooting that Vincent had lost to get “far away from everything.” He downs. During an especially tortured “faith in life.” His repeated failures, un- spoke repeatedly of “emptiness,” “deep time, van Gogh lived disputatiously ending poverty, and deteriorating health melancholy,” and “unutterable misery,” with fellow painter Paul Gaugin in were obvious chronic factors (Naifeh and often mentioning suicide—although ; van Gogh was on the edge, Smith 2011, 843, 856, 858). usually rejecting it. At times, however, drinking absinthe and experiencing Van Gogh’s life reveals numerous he found the “horror” and “loathing of hallucinations. He wrote in his diary, “I warning signs frequently associated with life” so overwhelming that he would ask myself whether I am mad.” When suicide. The persistence of his situation appears to have resulted in what suicide expert Irving Berent, MD, (1981) calls “chronic unrelenting stress syndrome”— Van Gogh was used to inflicting harm on himself, the result of such an “onslaught” of trauma as to cause “erosion of the spirit” being given to self-mortification. He held a and so lead potentially to suicide. doctrine of guilt and self-loathing, which he Alibis and Other Loose Ends attributed in part to his Christian background. If Naifeh and Smith think they have a smoking gun in the statement of René Secrétan, they need to think again. It ap- pears the Secrétan brothers had an alibi: They had left Auvers for Normandy be- have em braced death gladly (Naifeh Gaugin determined to leave, worrying fore van Gogh was fatally shot. and Smith 2011, 852–53). that there might come “a fatal and The very same account by eighty-two- He occasionally mentioned the pos- tragic attack” (Naifeh and Smith 2011, year-old René that Naifeh and Smith in- sibility of suicide by drowning. Once he 701) that would threaten his own safety, troduce and use in an attempt to incrim- wrote, “I am trying to recover, like van Gogh’s madness spilled over. Just a inate him—even though he gave not the someone who has meant to commit day before Christmas 1888, he cut off slightest indication that he or any other suicide, but then makes for the bank the lower part of his right ear with a boy had shot the painter—provides him because he finds the water too cold.” straight razor. During his convalescence with an alibi. The authors read one of (Note again the theme of equivoca- he realized he indeed suffered from in- René’s statements as implying “that Vin- tion.) On being spurned in love in sanity, and—for a year, from May 1889 cent had stolen the pistol from him on 1882, he contemplated “jumping into to May 1890—committed himself to the very day of the shooting,” but that is the water” out of despair (qtd. in Naifeh the asylum at Saint-Rémy where fits of not implied at all. What René said was, and Smith 2011, 853). depression alternated with spells of ge- “We left [the erratically working gun] on Van Gogh was used to inflicting nius. At one point he wrote to Theo, the spot with all our fishing stuff, haver- harm on himself, being given to self- “Oh, if I could have worked without sacks . . . and even our trousers. ... As fate mortification. He held a doctrine of this accursed disease—what things I would have it, the day Van Gogh used it, guilt and self-loathing, which he attrib- might have done” (Naifeh and Smith it worked” (882, n. 69). He does not say it uted in part to his Christian back- 2011, 684–820). was taken on that day. ground, and stated, “When we look at His last letter was to Theo (whose The issue is important because what others who have done more than we, handwritten notation it also bears: René does clearly say is that he and his and are better than we, we very soon “Letter found on him July 29”—the day older brother had left Auvers (where

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they spent summers at their wealthy fa- realm “continue to dress as they did at Authors Naifeh and Smith would ther’s villa on the Oise River) sometime the time of the artists’ earthly existence.” have us assume that a late rumor about earlier that month. They had gone to an- Actually, people like Florencio An - van Gogh being shot by boys is true, that other family villa located in Normandy. ton crop up from time to time. For ex- a particular teenager was the culprit, that While away from Auvers, the Secrétans ample, not only did a British woman the youth told the truth in several re - first learned of van Gogh’s death from a named Rosemary Brown specialize in spects but lied outright in others, that he newspaper. René also stated that he did playing newly composed music by such inexplicably removed the artist’s paint- not discover the gun was missing prior famous dead composers as Bach, Cho - ing apparatus from the scene, that van to leaving Auvers. pin, Mozart, and Liszt, but she also took In any event, I think the aging René’s dictation from playwright George Gogh falsely claimed he had shot him- account of the pistol is not trustworthy. Bernard Shaw and others and received self, that he was not actually likely to Perhaps he had borrowed it from the drawings and paintings from various have attempted suicide, that the inn- innkeeper and—having forgotten over artists. She was followed by one Mat - keeper’s daughter repeated a false story the following sixty-six years—had re- thew Manning who also channeled texts from her father about the pistol, and so turned it. We certainly must wonder: If and artworks by famous artists (Guiley on and on. In contrast it is likely that van van Gogh had stolen the pistol from 2000, 26–27). Such phenomena are Gogh, despairing over his life, shot him- automisms René in order to shoot himself, how did called and are due to the self with a pistol—ostensibly borrowed he n René instead get it back so that could ideomotor effect—that is, the uncon- to scare up the crows. shoot van Gogh before he shot himself? scious muscular activity that is also re- And if René was lying about the sup- sponsible for the movement of dowsing Note posed theft, why should we believe any- rods and Ouija board planchettes. Such 1. It was not his very last painting, having thing he says? Moreover, if René had automists tend to be little more than been done about July 10, over two weeks before shot the artist, accidentally or otherwise, mimics. A channeled Abraham Lincoln his suicide (Naifeh and Smith 2011, 879). it seems unlikely he would even have text I once examined neither matched References brought up the subject of the painter and the assassinated president’s distinctive The Algebra of Suicide the pistol. Why not let sleeping dogs lie? handwriting nor passed a forensic-lin- Berent, Irving. 1981. . New York: Human Sciences Press. Naifeh and Smith (2011, 876) think it guistics test (Nickell 2007, 39–47). CBS News. 2011. The life and death of Vincent was “to ease his conscience at the end,” Automists tend to have fantasy- van Gogh. 60 Minutes (October 16). not but then René did unburden himself prone personalities; that is, they are Geberth, Vernon J. 1993. Practical Homicide In- vestigation: Tactics, Procedures, and Foren- of the very act that would have needed sane and normal people who neverthe- sic Techniques confessing. less have a marked tendency to fanta- , 2nd ed. Boca Raton, Florida: CRC Press. Channeled Artist size. Florencio Anton is such a person, Guiley, Rosemary Ellen. 2000. The Encyclopedia exhibiting a number of traits associated of Ghosts and Spirits, 2nd ed. New York: Putting aside for the moment whether with fantasy proneness, such as receiv- Checkmark Books. Naifeh, Steven, and Gregory White Smith. 2011. van Gogh’s death was an accident, mur- ing special messages from higher be- Van Gogh: The Life der, or suicide, we pause to consider: Is ings, experiencing trances, and having . New York: Random House. he still alive as a spirit anyway? That is alternate identities (see Nickell 2007, Nickell, Joe. 1992. Mysterious Realms: Probing the claim of a Brazilian medium named 251–258). Paranormal, Historical, and Forensic Enig - mas Florencio Anton who purports to The Verdict . Lexington: University Press of Ken tucky, 107–29. channel the famous Dutch painter, pro- Unsolved History: Investigating duce modern artworks in (loosely) his Apparently neither Anton nor any other ———. 2005. Mysteries of the Past. Lexington: University style, and then sign them “Vincent.” He spiritualist has been able to communicate Press of Kentucky, 18–33. also allegedly channels Renoir, Picasso, with van Gogh successfully regarding the ———. 2007. Adventures in Paranormal Investi- Miro, and others. details of his fatal shot. Until that hap- gation. Lexington: University Press of Ken- Some readily accept the pseudo-cre- pens in a credible fashion (and I am not tucky. ations, while others question why the holding my breath), I will continue to Stemman, Roy. 2010. A Vincent van Gogh now adorns my wall. Online at http://paranormal various artists still paint unmistakably conclude that he died by his own hand. review.com/articles/20100502; accessed Jan - Earth-like scenes. Anton responds that That should be the verdict of history, uary 11, 2012. the pictures are not of this world but based on the best evidence—the rudi- Van Gogh-Bonger, Johanna. 1981. The Complete Letters of Vincent van Gogh rather of a plane of existence in the sim- mentary forensic evidence and a psycho- , in three volumes. ilar-appearing next world—al though logical autopsy—with an appeal to the Boston: New York Graphic Society. Was Vincent van Gogh murdered? 2011. Online curiously, comments Roy Stem man principle of Occam’s razor: that the hy- at http://theweek.com/article/index/220446/ (2010) of the Paranormal Review web- pothesis that makes the fewest assump- was-vincent-van-gogh-murdered; accessed site, the discarnate folk in the other tions is most likely correct. December 7, 2011.

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