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CHESNIER-DUCHESNE Marcel (EN)

Créé par Camille Chapelle (trad. Judith Andreyev) - 09/03/2022 Répertoire des acteurs du marché de l'art en France sous l'Occupation, 1940-1945, RAMA (FR)

Gabrielle Chesnier-Duchesne was a broker in objets d’art for an antiques stock owned by her husband, Marcel Chesnier-Duchesne. During the Occupation, she was implicated in the affair of the sale by Henri Aumaitre of tapestries to Hermann Göring.

Marcel Chesnier-Duchesne was born 13 May 1889 in Lille and moved to Paris in 1916 as a renter of automobiles. He married Gabrielle Dubois on 15 March 1930 and in that year started out as an antiques dealer at 83, rue de la Convention. Also included in the enterprise was a warehouse located 115, rue de Javel. The business was run essentially by his wife, Gabrielle Chesnier-Duchesne, assisted by her daughter Solange Sturbois, from a first marriage. As of 1932, business was severely affected by the crisis.¹

After the Occupation, Marcel Chesnier-Duchesne was called before the Comité de confiscation des profits illicites, since the business run by his wife was registered in his name.² From July 1939 to the end of 1940, the shop was closed and remained so on average six months out of twelve for the length of the Occupation.³

In a decision of 5 June 1947, the Comité de confiscation des profits illicites, decided on a 200,000 F confiscation order and a fine of the same amount for his wife, for which he was declared jointly responsible.⁴ The amount of the fine was doubled by decision of the Conseil supérieur des profits illicites dated 7 July 1950. Moreover, a confiscation of 25,000 F was pronounced directly against him, regarding two paintings taken by Josef Angerer for the sum of 170,000 F in 1941.⁵ Accepting the fact he had sold under duress, the Comité de confiscation des profits illicites did not add a fine to that confiscation.

An information bulletin of the Paris Customs Directory mentions a sale of objects exported to Germany for a sum of 190,000 F. This sale is mentioned in the Chesnier-Duchesne accounts, but Mr. et Mrs. Chesnier-Duchesne claim to have sold those objects to a Russian in March 1944. The Chenue enterprise was in charge of the delivery, and that was how they learned that the objects were in fact intended for a German, M. Glasmer (perhaps Heinrich Glasmeier).⁶ But that sale was not considered illicit.