L’Éclair

L’Éclair is a newspaper whose articles help turn the secret dossier in the Alfred Dreyfus case from a concealed element of a court-martial into a public controversy. Its anonymous reporting discloses the dossier’s existence and then describes some of its contents, while presenting those contents as conclusive proof of Dreyfus’s guilt. For Georges Picquart, the timing and selective accuracy of the articles raise a further question: whether the leak is intended not simply to persuade readers, but to harden the army’s position and constrain his investigation of Esterhazy.

The First Disclosure

The first article appears under the headline “The Traitor.” It claims that Alfred Dreyfus’s guilt was proved beyond doubt by a secret file of evidence passed to the judges at his court-martial, and calls on the army to publish the file to end what it describes as an inexplicable sense of pity for the accused. The report is notable not only for its accusation but for revealing, for the first time in the press, that the secret file exists.

The disclosure reaches Picquart just after he has taken possession of the dossier. Its timing alarms him. He brings the paper to Lauth, who reacts that someone must be talking, and orders him to find Guénée, the officer assigned to monitor the Dreyfus family. Picquart then lists those who know of the file: senior officers and intelligence staff, the seven judges, the court president, the president’s doctor, and Mathieu Dreyfus. His count reaches twenty before he considers how many others Mathieu may have told. The list makes the leak a problem of institutional secrecy, not merely a newspaper story.

The Second Article and Its Claims

On the following Monday, L’Éclair publishes a longer sequel, “The Traitor: The Guilt of Dreyfus Demonstrated by the Dossier.” Picquart finds it grossly inaccurate, though it contains details that strike him as telling. It says the dossier was handed to the judges in their deliberation room, that it included confidential correspondence between the German and Italian military attachés, and that one letter referred to “that animal Dreyfus.” The article presents this supposed evidence as the decisive reason for the verdict.

The report’s mixture of error and specificity makes its effect especially consequential. Its account echoes the existence and handling of a file that Picquart knows was used secretly, while its description of the letters and their language frames the material as proof of guilt. The article does not establish that conclusion; it asserts it. Picquart, meanwhile, recognizes the phrase about Dreyfus as resembling the language Armand du Paty de Clam used in describing him as having “animal urges.” That verbal echo leads Picquart to question not only what has leaked, but who benefits from the way the leak is being presented.

Picquart’s Response and Suspicions

Picquart cuts out the second article and sends it to Charles-Arthur Gonse, who is on leave, with a renewed warning that the army must act without delay. He fears that waiting will leave the institution trapped in a position from which it can neither defend itself nor discover the truth. The clipping thus becomes part of his effort to persuade his superiors that secrecy is failing and that delay will make the crisis harder to control.

Guénée attributes the disclosures to the Dreyfus family, but Picquart is unconvinced. From his perspective, the leak could serve those who want to produce a siege mentality within the Ministry of War and curb his inquiry into Esterhazy. This remains his suspicion, not an established account of the articles’ authorship or source: the first piece is explicitly anonymous, and the evidence does not identify who supplied the information. The uncertainty itself intensifies the pressure on Picquart, since the public disclosure may expose the dossier while also furnishing a rationale for the army to close ranks.

Role in the Affair

L’Éclair’s two articles mark successive stages in the dossier’s passage into public debate: first its existence is announced, then selected details are used to reinforce the claim that Alfred Dreyfus was rightly convicted. Their disclosures help make the secret procedure harder to contain, but they do not resolve the questions Picquart is pursuing. Instead, the articles sharpen the conflict between public claims of certainty and the unresolved evidence behind the case, while leaving him to suspect that the leak may be serving the effort to limit his investigation.