In the first two parts I touched on some of the theories surrounding the disappearance of the Méchinaud family as they drove from Cognac to their home in the village of Boutiers-Saint-Trojan in the early hours of Christmas morning in 1972 and followed the events of the initial 1973 inquiry and the new searches in 2011. In this last part I will look more closely at some of the competing theories and the rumours which have surrounded the case in the past 46 years.
Accident
An obvious initial contender given the weather conditions on the night of the disappearance. A freezing fog blanketed the town of Cognac and would have been at its thickest as the family crossed the two bridges over the Charente. But, as a result Jacques would have been obliged to drive slowly on the homeward journey and, short of going off one of the bridges into the river (with consequent obvious damage to the parapet) it's unlikely that the car could have remained hidden for 46 years and following at least two intensive searches along the length of the route in 1973 and 2011.
Collective suicide (or murder-suicide)
In the wake of claims that Pierrette had a lover and based on Jacques' alleged comment in May 1972 that he would "make everyone disappear," this became the favoured hypothesis of the first inquiry. It was said that Jacques Méchinaud knew the various quarries and caves of the region well - not least the abandoned underground quarry workings at St-Même-les-Carrières, his wife's former home town. But opinions vary - some say that it would have been impossible to drive a small Simca 1100 into a quarry, others claim that had Jacques managed it, especially in the serpentine St-Même caverns, there would have been little chance of finding or recovering the vehicle or its occupants.
And that is assuming that all in the car went willingly to their deaths. The thick fog would have made for slow driving, giving Pierrette at least some chance to escape the vehicle if she realised she was being driven into danger. In respect of this, there were some suggestions that Jacques had deliberately delayed the family's departure from the Fontanillas' house and had spent an unusually long time warming up the car - possibly in the hope of encouraging his passengers to fall asleep quickly. To what extent this might be true is unknown - the Fontanillas are on record saying that the Méchinauds left at 1am, not an unusually late time following a midnight 'reveillon' meal, though several press reports state that the departure was as late as 2.30am
Perhaps worth noting that in all of the variations of the suicide and flight theories (below) it was generally assumed that the family never returned to their house in Boutiers after leaving the Fontanillas in Cognac, based on the discovery of food in the fridge and presents still wrapped under the Christmas tree. Denise Grall however, in addition to stating that she considered Jacques to have a jealous personality and claiming tensions between him and Pierrette's family, went as far as to suggest that the scene discovered by gendarmes when they entered the house may have been carefully staged at some point after the supposed disappearance.
Flight to a new life - Australia, Spain, the Vendée?
According to Ismaël Karroum writing in 2010 for the Charente Libre newspaper the Méchinaud bank account had been emptied of everything except enough to cover the rent on the house (for how long he doesn't say). Additionally Karroum cites relatives as saying that Jacques had close to 50,000 Francs, the proceeds of his cash-in-hand car repair work. None of this money has ever been traced. If the claim regarding the bank account is true (and it should be noted that Karroum appears to be alone in reporting this) then clearly there is a suggestion of premeditation and planning.
So did the whole family simply take off for a new life elsewhere, using the advantage of the Christmas break from school and work to get a head-start on anyone looking for them? Pierrette's alleged lover Maurice Blanchon variously suggested that they had fled to Australia or Chalon-sur-Saône. According to a relative of Pierrette, in the 1980s a baptism certificate was requested for one of the boys from an address in Pouzauges in the Vendée region - another area mentioned by Blanchon as a place visited by Jacques only days before the family's disappearance.
Others suggested Spain and some even claimed that the family had not gone far at all; their car apparently being seen between Angoulême and Cognac in the year after the disappearance and Jacques' wallet found in the village square in Boutiers. Sufficient to say, none of this was ever confirmed and even if the bank account was emptied, it does not necessarily indicate that the whole family was party to any escape plan.
Crime (third party)
While the criminal theories in this case tend to centre on Jacques Méchinaud as a potential perpetrator, other possibilities have been considered in varying degrees. An unfortunate encounter on the road between Cognac and Boutiers? A settling of accounts, possibly in relation to his car repair work? Was he fixing up and/or 'ringing' stolen cars? No evidence was found, though such a possibility does bring the 'wrong' Simca 1100 found near the Pont de Basseau to mind.
In Boutiers Maurice Blanchon was questioned by the gendarmes. According to him "they questioned me, but they weren't too bothered. As they said to me at the time, if they suspected everyone who was in and out of the neighbours..." Certainly it seems that little effort was made to verify Blanchon's various claims about the family and events prior to their disappearance.
In April 2003, in the wake of a TV documentary on the case an anonymous letter writer contacted the then mayor of Boutiers, who had appeared in the film. In two letters, the author described a murder, stating "it happened at 3am ... it's time the little ones were laid to rest properly." The author wrote of an altercation and gave the names of those allegedly involved, though the details were hazy. But in addition he or she also named an address and a specific location within the property where the bodies of the family were hidden. This may have been the abandoned house and grounds on Rue de Port Boutiers searched intensively in 2011, though the basement of one other property is believed to have also been scanned with ground penetrating radar at around the same time, with no result reported at either location.
Resources
For those wanting to know more, a few of the resources used in compiling these blog posts:
From Philippe Dumas' Boutiers-St-Trojan blog, a fairly comprehensive compilation of press articles from 1972-2014:
http://philippe.dumas.pagesperso-orange.fr/actua2.htm
Ismaël Karroum's 2010 piece for Charente Libre, listing many of the additional claims and rumours detailed in part 3 in particular:
http://relaischux.cluster021.hosting.ovh.net/PagesCL/pdf/disparusboutiers.pdf
Jean Berthelot de la Glétais' 2017 investigation for 'Sang-Froid' magazine, including a rare interview with Maurice Blanchon:
https://jeanberthelot.com/2017/06/01/disparus-de-boutiers-le-deuil-impossible
Jacques Pradel's "L'Heure du Crime" on RTL radio:
https://www.rtl.fr/actu/debats-societe/l-affaire-des-disparus-de-boutiers-7782803802
https://www.rtl.fr/actu/debats-societe/les-disparus-de-boutiers-7789076944
A very atmospheric news report from April 1973, featuring scenes of Boutiers house and interviews with the Fontanillas and gendarmes in charge of the case at the time:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=706hhM7PY7M
The route from the Fontanilla's house in Rue de la Plante to the Méchinaud house 14 Rue St Trojan, Boutiers:
As seen on Google Maps
And as ever a Google search will bring up plenty more articles:
https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=Mechinaud+Boutiers+disparus+Noel&oq=Mechinaud+Boutiers+disparus+Noel
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