thumb|Raoul Villain
Raoul Villain (19 September 1885 – 17 September 1936) was a French nationalist. He is primarily remembered for his assassination of the French socialist leader Jean Jaurès on 31 July 1914, in Paris. Villain was acquitted by a jury of peers in 1919 and later fled to the Balearic island of Ibiza, where he was killed during the first stages of the Spanish Civil War.
Early life and background
Villain was born in Reims, Marne, France on 19 September 1885. As a 29-year-old student in archeology at the École du Louvre, he was a member of the Ligue des jeunes amis de l'Alsace-Lorraine ("League of Young Friends of Alsace-Lorraine"), a nationalist student group.
After France's defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, the French provinces of Alsace and Lorraine were annexed by Germany. This was a source of anger and resentment in France, causing many to feel that a new war with Germany was in order to recover both territories and French pride. Therefore, many like Villain were opposed to the pacifist policies of Jean Jaurès. Villain lived for some time in England, at Loughton, where he stayed with Mrs Annie Francis, who described him, according to The Observer on 6 June 1915, as "a gentle and very kind man".
Attack on Jaurès and result
thumb|The still existing [[Café du Croissant which was located next to Jaurès's newspaper L'Humanité (photo by Rémi Jouan)]]
Villain focused on Jaurès, bought a revolver and began stalking him, scribbling incoherent notes about the socialist leader's habits into his pocket-book. At about 21:40 on Friday, 31 July 1914, Villain fired two bullets through a window embrasure into Jaurès' head while his victim was having supper with his contributors in Le Croissant at the corner of Rue Montmartre and Rue du Croissant.
The next day, posters went up all over France announcing the general mobilization, and war was declared three days after Jaurès's death. What would be World War I began.
Incarcerated for the duration of the war, Villain was brought to trial in 1919. He was acquitted by a jury of peers on 29 March 1919, and Anatole France wrote in L'Humanité: "Workers! ... A monstrous verdict proclaims that the assassination of Jaurès is not a crime...". Jaurès's wife, as plaintiff, was ordered to pay the court costs.
After being acquitted
After having briefly been arrested in 1920 in Paris after trying to pass some false currency, Villain fled to Cala de Sant Vicent, Ibiza in the Balearic Islands off Spain. Receiving some money through an inheritance, he fled France and arrived in Ibiza. Villain thought that, by hiding out in the remote northeastern corner of Ibiza, he could live anonymously and be forgotten. In 1933,