Background
Alphonse Bertillon was born in Paris on April 24, 1853. He was the son of Louis Adolphe Bertillon, a physican and statistician.
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(Excerpt from Signaletic Instructions: Including the Theor...)
Excerpt from Signaletic Instructions: Including the Theory and Practice of Anthropometrical Identification A very considerable portion of the crimes and wrongs which disturb the order of human society result either directly or indirectly from the apparent impossibility of distinguishing in every case and with unerring certainty one individual from another. It is for this reason, especially, that so many of the professional and habitual criminals who abound in every land have hitherto gone "unwhipt of justice." Men would be unlikely to render themselves liable to the penalties of the law if they knew that, wherever they might flee, their identity could not fail to be discovered. A sure means of identification would not only have the effect of deterring from crime in general, but would evidently nullify all attempts of whatever kind at u substitution of persons. No impersonations of a pensioner, or a missing heir, or a business man could ever hope to be successful. How much more precious still would such a means of identification be if it could be applied, not only to the living man, but to his dead body, even when crushed, mangled or dismembered beyond the recognition of his nearest friends and relatives! The life insurance companies and associations of mutual benevolence, for example, could not be robbed under cover of the pretended death of the holder of a policy, indicated by the finding of a body resembling his, or unrecognizable by ordinary means on account of mutilation, fire or decay, but dressed in his clothes and furnished with his papers. Then, too, those who fell in battle, no matter how mutilated they might be, would not need to be buried in nameless graves, but could be recognized and taken, when peace returned, to lie among their own kin. This powerful instrument of social order is already in existence. One of the most remarkable steps in modern progress is the development of a new form of applied science which has for its
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Alphonse Bertillon was born in Paris on April 24, 1853. He was the son of Louis Adolphe Bertillon, a physican and statistician.
He was expelled from the Imperial Lycée of Versailles.
Because of Alphonse's poor scholarship, his father sent him to Great Britain, where he was forced to rely on his own resources. Returning to France, he was inducted into the army.
In 1879, having completed his service, he took a minor clerk's job with the Paris Prefecture of Police. One of his duties was to copy onto small cards the recorded descriptions of the criminals apprehended each day. Bertillon realized that the short descriptions he was laboriously re-recording were practically useless for the purpose of identifying recidivists, or criminal repeaters. He had a general familiarity with anthropological statistics and anthropometric techniques because of the work of his father and his elder brother Jacques, a doctor and statistician. Bertillon devised a system of identification of criminals which relies on 11 bodily measurements and the color of the eyes, hair, and skin. He added standardized photographs of the criminals to his anthropometric data. He first described his system in Photography: With an Appendix on Anthropometrical Classification and Identification (1890). The Bertillon system proved successful in distinguishing first-time offenders from recidivists, and it was adopted by all advanced countries.
It is commonly believed that Bertillon was the first to recognize the value of fingerprints. He was not; that achievement must be associated with Sir Francis Galton, Edward Henry, and Juan Vucetich. However, Bertillon was the first on the Continent to use fingerprints to solve a crime.
In 1888 the Department of Judicial Identity was created for the Paris prefecture of Police, and Bertillon became its head. He invented many techniques useful to criminologists. His use of photography was especially effective, and he did much to improve photographic techniques in criminology. Around the turn of the century, fingerprinting began to replace the Bertillon system and has now superseded it throughout the world.
Bertillon died on February 13, 1914, in Paris.
Alphonse Bertillon was the inventor of the first scientific method of identifying criminals.
His anthropometric method of identifying recidivists represented a first step toward scientific criminology. It is said that his work played an important role in inspiring greater confidence in police authorities and in establishing a more favorable sense of justice toward the end of the 19th century.
(Excerpt from Signaletic Instructions: Including the Theor...)
(This Elibron Classics book is a facsimile reprint of a 18...)
(This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of th...)
(This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)
(Book by Parry, Eugenia)
(1 April 1821 in Paris – 28 February 1883)
(November 11, 1851 – July 7, 1922)
