The French government continued to insist that Dreyfus was guilty. Ministers were shown a letter from the Italian military attache to his German counterpart that actually named Dreyfus; it had been forged by Col. Henry of the Statistical Section. Protected by the Statistical Section, Esterhazy proclaimed his innocence and demanded a court martial to clear his name.

The government acceded to his demand: Esterhazy was tried and acquitted. But now France's leading writer, Émile Zola, entered the fray, publishing a polemic, "J'Accuse," which charged the army high command with protecting Esterhazy and conspiring to keep the innocent Dreyfus on Devil's Island. Zola's "J'Accuse" led to anti-Semitic riots throughout France.

French nationalists, mostly from a Catholic background, were convinced that the campaign to free Dreyfus was a plot to discredit the French army by a Jewish "syndicate," aided and abetted by atheists, Protestants, and Freemasons. The minister of war, Gen. Cavaignac, wanted to charge the leading Dreyfusards with treason, and to prepare the case against them instructed a subordinate officer to go through the evidence in the Dreyfus file.

Holding the incriminating letter forged by Henry up to the light, this subordinate officer saw that three separate fragments had been pasted together. It was clearly a forgery by the head of the Statistical Section's dirty-tricks department, Col. Henry. He was arrested and sent to a military prison, where he cut his throat.

GUILTY VERDICT, AGAIN

Henry's suicide brought about a reversal in public opinion. It became impossible for the government to refuse a retrial. Dreyfus was brought back from Devil's Island. There was a second court-martial in Rennes in 1899, but he was again found guilty by a majority of the judges.

Public opinion throughout the world was outraged. A campaign was mounted to boycott the Great Exposition in Paris planned for the following year to mark the start of a new century. To save France from such a humiliation, the president, Émile Loubet, pardoned Dreyfus and declared an amnesty for all those associated with the affair.