Free The Complete Idiot's Guide to Werewolves by Brown Robert

thereafter, the bodies of three other missing children were discovered. In December of that same year, the French authorities in Dole officially declared that these murders were the work of a werewolf. A hunting warrant was immediately issued for the child-killing beast, and a large number of hunting parties were formed to track it down.
     
    This is where things get a little difficult to follow when it comes to the information available. According to the official records of the incident, the werewolf was soon caught in the act of attacking another child. However, the locals in the hunting party testified that they recognized this werewolf as Gilles Garnier (because it would seem that, even though in werewolf form, he retained enough of his human features to be recognizable). Garnier was well known by the villagers as a local hermit.
     
    According to the official account, Garnier immediately returned to his human form upon being apprehended. The local hermit did not deny any of the accusations brought against him. In fact, it would appear that he openly admitted to the killings. (Of course, his confession could still have been the result of torture or coercion.) He even offered a gruesome account of how he’d murdered and eaten some of the children. He was sentenced to death for his crimes.
     
    On January 8, 1574, Gilles Garnier, the long hunted “Werewolf of Dole,” was tied to a stake and burned alive for committing crimes related to the forbidden practice of lycanthropy.

The Werewolf Family of St. Cloud
    The Gandillons of St. Cloud, France, might have been one of the most unusual families in history. No one can say for certain what criminal actions, if any, they truly committed before their apprehensions. The case first began in 1574, when two children were savagely attacked by a woman named Pernette Gandillon. Pernette appeared to have been the violent matriarch of her own “werewolf pack,” which included her brother, Pierre, and his two children (a son and daughter).
     
    In her attack on the two children, she killed the younger. The older child managed to escape and reported the attack to authorities. Pernette Gandillon was soon located, and the surviving child identified her as the attacker. There wasn’t really a trial. Apparently, a lynch mob had formed and immediately fell upon the crazed woman, who is said to have snarled and howled at them as she walked around on all fours. The mob, according to accounts, tore Pernette Gandillon to pieces on the spot. They more than likely believed that she was a werewolf, if her behavior was truly as accounts describe.
    The Savage Truth
    In the 2007 werewolf-themed, horror-romance film Blood and Chocolate, the female lead character’s name is Vivian Gandillon. This name refers to the most famous family of alleged werewolves in history, the infamous Gandillon clan, which was known as the “Werewolves of St. Cloud.”
    Pernette’s brother Pierre was soon arrested, along with his son, under the suspicion that he was also involved in lycanthropy. Officially, he was accused of being both a werewolf and a witch. While in custody, both Pierre and his son confessed to using a special ointment that, when rubbed on their bodies, gave them the power to shapeshift. It is written that both men removed their shirts to expose a multitude of scars, which they claimed to have received in fights with other canines while in the form of werewolves.
     
    When the two men were placed in a cell, they began to walk around on all fours, howl, and growl at their jailors. The two men were sentenced to hang. However, before their executions, authorities also arrested and tried Pierre’s daughter. She was accused and quickly convicted of being a witch and was sentenced to hang alongside her father and brother. All three were executed by hanging, and their remains were then burned to ashes. The entire family was executed, it would appear, for the crimes of one. Only Pernette Gandillon, when all