Great Gold Robbery
The Great Gold Robbery took place on the night of 15 May 1855, when a routine shipment of three boxes of gold bullion and coins was stolen from the
During transit, the gold was held in "railway safes", which needed two keys to open. The men took wax impressions of the keys and made their own copies. When they knew a shipment was taking place, Tester ensured Burgess was on guard duty, and Agar hid in the guard's van. They emptied the safes of 224 pounds (102 kg) of gold, valued at the time at £12,000 (approximately equivalent to £1,193,000 in 2021), then left the train at Dover. The theft was not discovered until the safes arrived in Paris. The police and railway authorities had no clues as to who had undertaken the theft, and arguments ensued as to whether it had been stolen in England, on the ship crossing the English Channel, or on the French leg of the journey.
When Agar was arrested for another crime, he asked Pierce to provide Fanny Kay—his former girlfriend—and child with funds. Pierce agreed and then reneged. In need of money, Kay went to the governor of
The crime was the subject of a television play in 1960, with Colin Blakely as Pierce. The Great Train Robbery, a novel by the writer and director Michael Crichton, was published in 1975. Crichton adapted his work into a feature film, The First Great Train Robbery, with Sean Connery portraying Pierce.
Background
South Eastern Railway
In 1855 the
As a security measure, the boxes were weighed when they were loaded onto the
Participants
The originator of the plan was William Pierce, a 37-year-old former employee of the SER who had been dismissed from its service after it was found that he was a gambler; he worked as a ticket printer in a betting shop after leaving the company.[6] According to the historian Donald Thomas, Pierce was "a large-faced and rather clumsy man with a taste for loud waistcoats and fancy trousers. ... he was described as 'imperfectly educated'. The turf was his true schooling".[8]
The burglar and
James Burgess was a married, thrifty and respectable man who had worked at the SER since it had started running the Folkestone line in 1843.[10] He worked for the company as a guard, and was often in charge of the trains that carried the bullion.[3] As with many railwaymen of the time, Burgess's wages had been reduced as the railway boom had passed.[10]
Fanny Kay, aged 23 in 1855, was Agar's partner and lived with him at his house, Cambridge Villa, in Shepherd's Bush. She had previously been an attendant at
William Tester was a well-educated man who wore a monocle and had a desire to improve his position; he was briefly employed after the robbery as a general manager for a Swedish railway company. He worked in the traffic department at London Bridge station as the assistant to the superintendent, which gave him access to information about the carriage of valuable goods and the guards' rota.[12][13]
James Townshend Saward, also known as Jim (or Jem) the Penman, was a barrister and special pleader at the Inner Temple.[14] His activities were described by contemporary sources as "planning and perfecting schemes of fraud, the bold audacity of which is equalled only by their success".[15] He was the head of a forgery gang who had been practising cheque fraud for several years.[16]
Planning and preparation
After being dismissed from the SER, Pierce continued to drink in the pubs and beer shops around London Bridge in which railway employees also drank. Over time he picked up detailed information about the gold shipments to Paris,[2] while he watched and planned. He concluded that a theft would only be possible if he obtained copies of the keys to the safe.[17] He relayed his thoughts to Agar before the latter's visit to the US;[6][18] at the time Agar declined to take part, telling his friend the scheme was impracticable. When Agar returned to Britain, the two discussed the possibility again and Agar said that "it would be impossible to do it unless an impression of the keys could be procured".[19] Pierce said he thought he knew how that could be arranged. They realised that for any theft to succeed, they needed the assistance of a guard travelling in the van with the safes, and an official with access to the staff rotas and who knew when the bullion shipments were to be made.[20] It was at this stage that Pierce recruited Burgess and Tester to join the group.[21]
In May 1854 Pierce and Agar travelled to Folkestone to watch the process involved at that end of the line, particularly the location and security surrounding the keys. They spent so long, and were so obvious, in their surveillance that they came to the notice of the SER's own police force and the Folkestone Borough Police. As a result, Pierce returned to London and left Agar to watch alone.[18][22] As part of his intelligence gathering, Agar drank in the Rose Inn, a public house near the pier, where railway staff also drank.[23] The pair concluded that one of the keys was carried by the superintendent of the Folkestone end of the line; the other was locked in a cabinet at the railway offices on Folkestone pier.[24]
One of the keys held at Folkestone was lost in July 1854 by Captain Mold of the steamship company.[b] The SER sent the safes back to Chubb for the locks to be reconditioned and new keys issued. The clerk involved in corresponding with the company was Tester.[26] By October, Chubb's work had been completed and the keys sent to the SER. Tester was able to smuggle them out of the office briefly, and met Pierce and Agar in a beer house on Tooley Street, London, where Agar made an impression of them in green wax. Tester was so nervous when he removed the keys, that he brought two identical ones with him, rather than one for each lock; the plotters were still missing one of the keys.[27] Agar, using the false name of E. E. Archer, used his own funds to send £200 of gold sovereigns on the SER line.[c] The box of bullion, labelled "E. R. Archer, care of Mr. Ledger, or Mr. Chapman", was sent through to Folkestone where Agar would collect it.[28] Agar collected the package from the SER office and watched while the company's superintendent retrieved the safe key from a cupboard at the back of the room. Knowing where the keys were stored, the following weekend Agar and Pierce stayed in nearby Dover and walked to Folkestone. When the boat arrived from Boulogne, both members of the SER staff left the office to meet it; they left the door unlocked when they left. Pierce entered the office while Agar waited at the door on lookout. Pierce opened the cupboard and took the safe key to Agar who made a wax impression. The key was returned, and the two men returned to London via Dover.[29]
Over the following months Pierce and Agar created rough keys from the impressions they had taken. In April and May 1855 Agar would travel along the Folkestone route when Burgess was on duty—seven or eight trips in total—and would hone the keys until they worked smoothly and without effort. Pierce and Agar then separately visited the
By May 1855 the men were now ready to carry out the robbery, and only needed to wait for a day when a gold shipment was taking place. Tester altered the staff rosters to ensure Burgess was working on the evening mail service for the month to ensure Agar had access to the safe. A signal was arranged whereby either Agar or Pierce would wait outside London Bridge station every day; if a shipment was being made, Burgess would walk out of the station and wipe his face with a white handkerchief to alert them. At the same time, Tester would travel to Redhill railway station and await the first stop of the train. He would take one of the bags of gold and return to London.[30][31]
Robbery: 15 May 1855
On 15 May 1855, while Agar was waiting outside London Bridge station, Burgess came out of the station, wiped his face with his handkerchief and went back inside. Agar notified Pierce and the two men purchased first-class tickets for the journey to Folkestone. They gave their bags to Burgess for storage in the guard's van during the journey and, just before the train was due to leave, Pierce took his seat in the cabin, and Agar slipped into the guard's van and hid in the corner, covered by Burgess's overalls.[32][33]
As soon as the train departed the station, Agar began work. Only one of the locks was secured—an SER employee later reported that typically only one lock was used—and Agar soon had the bullion boxes out of the safe. Instead of opening the box through the front, he used pincers to pull the rivets out of the iron bands that bound the box, and used wedges in the reverse of the box to open the lid without too much visible damage. He removed gold bars from inside the box from Abell & Co,[d] weighed them with the scales he was carrying in the bag, and put the same weight of lead shot back into the box. He nailed the bars back around the box, then resealed a wax seal on the front, using a die he had made himself, rather than one of the official seals of the bullion dealers. He deduced—correctly—that on the poorly lit station at Folkestone, a cursory glance at the seals would not show any change. He managed to do this before the train arrived at Redhill, which was a 35-minute journey from London Bridge. When it arrived at Redhill, Agar again hid, while Tester was handed the bag containing some of the gold. He returned to the SER offices in London, as arranged, so that he could be seen by colleagues and give himself an alibi for later. Pierce took the opportunity to leave his carriage and join his confederates in the guard's van.[32][35][36]
The other two boxes were examined after the train left Redhill. The box from Adam Spielmann & Co contained hundreds of American gold eagles worth $10 each;[32][e] these were weighed and lead shot was again left in their place before the box was resealed. The final box, from Messrs Bult & Co, contained more gold bars. These weighed more than the remaining lead they had left and many of the ingots were left behind to ensure there were no major differences in the weights of the boxes when they were later weighed. When they replaced the bands on the final box, it was damaged, but they repaired it as best they could and replaced it in the safe. The three men then cleared away the mess they had made—mostly splinters and drops of wax—and prepared themselves by strapping on the courier bags beneath their cloaks. When the train arrived in Folkestone at about 10:30 pm, Pierce and Agar hid in the van while the safes were removed by staff. They then left the van and entered the main part of the train, passing through until they reached first class, where they sat until it arrived in Dover.[32][37][38] When the train reached Dover, Pierce and Agar alighted, collected their carpet bags full of gold from the guard's van, then went to a nearby hotel for supper. Agar threw the keys and tools into the sea before the two men returned to London on the 2:00 am train, which arrived at around 5:00 am.[39] In total they had stolen 224 pounds (102 kg) of gold, valued at the time at £12,000.[40][f]
Immediate aftermath
When the steamer carrying the gold arrived in Boulogne, one of the crew saw that the bullion boxes were damaged, but, as staff at Folkestone had not mentioned it, saw no cause for concern.[41] The boxes were weighed on arrival at Boulogne where the box from Abell was found to be 40 pounds (18 kg) lighter than it had been in London, whereas the other boxes both weighed more. They were transported to Paris, where they were weighed again, with the same results as at Boulogne. When they were opened the lead shot was found and the news relayed back to London.[42][43]
When the working day began on 16 May, Pierce and Agar went to a
The three bullion merchants demanded recompense for the lost gold—most of Abell's gold was insured through the SER, but the company denied any culpability, claiming that the robbery must have taken place in France. The French authorities pointed out that as the weights of the boxes in France both matched, and differed from that in England, it must have occurred in the UK; both the French and British companies stated "that the crime was an impossibility", according to Thomas.[43][44][45][h] Newspapers reported that "It is supposed that so well planned a scheme could not have been executed in the rapid passage by railway from London to Folkestone".[47] Burgess was examined, but not deemed a suspect because of his 14 years of service to the company. Tester had been seen at the SER offices while the train was still en route to Folkestone, so was also discounted as a potential thief.[48] A reward of £300 was soon advertised in several newspapers for information regarding the case.[49][i][j]
Discovery, investigation and arrest
Pierce and Agar began to melt down the bars to create new, smaller bars of 100 ounces (2.8 kg), although they briefly set fire to the floor of Cambridge Villa when one of the crucibles cracked, spilling molten gold. Relations between Agar and Kay deteriorated around this time, and he moved out of their house to stay with Pierce while they continued to process and dispose of the bullion.[53]
£2,500 of bullion was sold to Saward, acting as a
At around the time Agar had separated from Kay, he met Emily Campbell, a 19-year-old prostitute, and the two began a relationship; Campbell's
Agar was interviewed in October 1856, while still in Pentonville, by John Rees, the company solicitor for the SER; Agar refused to answer any questions, and so Rees returned around two weeks later and tried again. In the interim, Agar had heard that Pierce had not kept his word and so, angered by the deceit of his erstwhile partner, he turned
Legal process
In November and December 1856 hearings took place at the Mansion House, presided over by the Lord Mayor of London in his role as the Chief Magistrate of the City of London.[m] For the first two hearings, Agar was not present, but was brought to the court on the third day. When questioned, he confirmed the story he had given to the police, and identified pieces of evidence that had been gathered.[64][65] On 10 December Tester appeared in court, having been dismissed from his position with the Swedish company.[66][67] When the Lord Mayor gave his decision on 24 December that the three men were to stand trial for the robbery, Pierce said "I have nothing at all to say. I reserve my defence." Burgess and Tester both stated "I am not guilty".[68][69]
The trial took place at the Old Bailey between 13 and 15 January 1857,
It took the jury ten minutes to decide on the guilt of the three men, Pierce of larceny, Burgess and Tester of larceny as a servant.[74][75] The judge, Sir Samuel Martin, showed what the journalist Fergus Linnane calls "a grudging admiration" for Agar during his summing up:
The man Agar is a man who is as bad, I dare say, as bad can be, but that he is a man of most extraordinary ability no person who heard him examined can for a moment deny. ...
Something has been said of the romance connected with that man's character, but let those who fancy that there is anything great in it consider his fate. It is obvious ... that he is a man of extraordinary talent; that he gave to this and, perhaps, to many other robberies, an amount of care and perseverance one-tenth of which devoted to honest pursuits must have raised him to a respectable station in life, and considering the commercial activity of this country during the last twenty years, would probably have enabled him to realise a large fortune.[76]
Burgess and Tester were both sentenced to penal transportation for 14 years. Pierce, as he was not a member of SER staff, was given the lighter sentence of two years'
Later
Tester and Burgess were transported on board the
An account of the trial was published in 1857, with illustrations by Percy Cruikshank, the eldest son of the caricaturist
On 25 December 1960 the television anthology series Armchair Theatre dramatised the crime under the title The Great Gold Bullion Robbery. Adapted by Malcolm Hulke and Eric Paice from a play by the lawyer Gerald Sparrow, and directed by John Llewellyn Moxey, it starred Colin Blakely as Pierce, James Booth as Agar, Henry McGee as Tester and Leslie Weston as Burgess.[86]
The writer and director Michael Crichton produced his novel The Great Train Robbery in 1975;[87] his introduction reads "The Great Train Robbery was not only shocking and appalling, but also 'daring', 'audacious' and 'masterful'."[88] A feature film based on the novel, The First Great Train Robbery (1978), presents a highly fictionalised version of the event, portraying Pierce (played by Sean Connery), as a gentleman master criminal who eventually escapes from the police.[89] The robbery also featured as one of the themes in the 2006 mystery novel Kept by D. J. Taylor.[90]
See also
Notes and references
Notes
- ^ £3,000 in 1853 equates to approximately £323,000 in 2021, according to calculations based on the Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.[9]
- ^ Mold was dismissed by the company for this error, so seriously was it taken.[25]
- ^ £200 in 1854 equates to approximately equivalent to £20,000 in 2021, according to calculations based on Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.[9]
- ^ Agar, in his testimony, refers to four gold bars;[34] David Hanrahan, in his history of the robbery, states it was six bars.[35]
- ^ $10 in 1855 equates to approximately $164 in 2024, according to calculations based on Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.[9]
- ^ £12,000 in 1855 equates to approximately equivalent to £1,193,000 in 2021, according to calculations based on Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.[9]
- ^ £200 in 1855 equates to approximately £22,000 in 2021, according to calculations based on the Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.[9] The journalist Fergus Linnane states that £200 at the time was enough to buy a suburban villa.[32]
- ^ An additional pointer, to the French authorities, was that the lead pellets were soft when bitten; British lead was known to be slightly softer than the French equivalent.[46]
- ^ £300 in 1855 equates to approximately equivalent to £30,000 in 2021, according to calculations based on Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.[9]
- ^ This included in The Times,[50] The Morning Chronicle,[49] The Morning Post[51] and The Shipping and Mercantile Gazette.[52]
- ^ £2,500 in 1855 equates to approximately equivalent to £249,000 in 2021, according to calculations based on Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.[9]
- ^ £700 in 1855 equates to approximately equivalent to £70,000 in 2021, according to calculations based on Consumer Price Index measure of inflation.[9]
- Sir David Salomons and his successor, Thomas Quested Finnis.[63]
- ^ A "ticket of leave" was given to convicts for good behaviour. It allowed them to live independently of the prison system and take employment, but only within a limited geographical area. Their behaviour was still scrutinised and the ticket could be withdrawn if the conditions were infringed. A "conditional pardon" gave freedom to a convict, but not the permission to return to the UK.[79][80][81]
References
- ^ Fletcher 1980, p. 77.
- ^ a b c Thomas 1998, p. 209.
- ^ a b Griffiths 1899, p. 389.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 10–11, 61.
- ^ a b Thomas 1998, p. 210.
- ^ a b c d e Linnane 2004, p. 84.
- ^ Thomas 1998, pp. 209, 210.
- ^ a b c Thomas 1998, p. 207.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Clark 2020.
- ^ a b Thomas 1998, p. 211.
- ^ Evans 1859, p. 238.
- ^ "The Great Gold Robbery, 1855". British Transport Police.
- ^ Linnane 2004, p. 85; Thomas 1998, p. 211; Storey 2007, p. 23.
- ^ Shore 2015, p. 127.
- ^ The Bankers' Magazine, and Journal of the Money Market 1857, p. 108.
- ^ Shore 2015, p. 128.
- ^ Storey 2007, p. 23.
- ^ a b Fletcher 1980, p. 78.
- ^ Cruikshank 1856, pp. 16–17.
- ^ Griffiths 1899, p. 390.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, p. 50.
- ^ Robbins 1955, p. 316.
- ^ Matlock 2018, p. 87.
- ^ Thomas 1998, p. 213.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, p. 55.
- ^ Thomas 1998, pp. 213–214.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, p. 56.
- ^ Evans 1859, p. 488.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 58–59.
- ^ a b Thomas 1998, p. 217.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 61–63.
- ^ a b c d e Linnane 2004, p. 87.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 65–66.
- ^ Cruikshank 1856, p. 19.
- ^ a b Hanrahan 2011, p. 66.
- ^ Thomas 1998, pp. 218–219.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 66–67.
- ^ Thomas 1998, p. 220.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 67–70.
- ^ Cruikshank 1856, p. 3.
- ^ a b Thomas 1998, p. 222.
- ^ Thomas 1998, pp. 222–222.
- ^ a b c d The Times. 14 January 1857, p. 7.
- ^ Thomas 1998, pp. 222–223.
- ^ a b Linnane 2004, p. 88.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, p. 18.
- ^ "The Bullion Robbery". London Evening Standard, p. 1.
- ^ a b Thomas 1998, pp. 224–225.
- ^ a b "Three Hundred Pounds Reward". The Morning Chronicle, p. 1.
- ^ "Three Hundred Pounds Reward". The Times, p. 8.
- ^ "Three Hundred Pounds Reward". The Morning Post, p. 1.
- ^ "Three Hundred Pounds Reward". The Shipping and Mercantile Gazette, p. 5.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 73–75.
- ^ The Times. 14 January 1857, p. 8.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 76–77.
- ^ Thomas 1998, pp. 225–226.
- ^ "Police". The Times, p. 9.
- ^ "Edward Agar". Old Bailey Proceedings Online.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 80–81.
- ^ Thomas 1998, pp. 226–227.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 81–82, 110.
- ^ Linnane 2004, p. 89.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 84, 87, 91, 92, 98, 101, 107, 110, 111.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 92–95.
- ^ The Times. 18 November 1856, p. 11.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 105–107.
- ^ The Times. 11 December 1856, p. 8.
- ^ The Times. 25 December 1856, p. 9.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 111–112.
- ^ Robbins 1955, p. 317.
- ^ Shore 2015, p. 121.
- ^ Thomas 1998, p. 227.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, pp. 141–151.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, p. 189.
- ^ Cruikshank 1856, p. 45.
- ^ Cruikshank 1856, p. 46.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, p. 191.
- ^ "Edwin Fox Hull and Anchor Windlass". Heritage New Zealand.
- ^ a b Hanrahan 2011, p. 199.
- ^ "Convicts and the British colonies in Australia". Australian Government.
- ^ Bradley Hirst 2008, p. 117.
- ^ Hanrahan 2011, p. 203.
- ^ Cordery 2013, pp. 106–107.
- ^ Robbins 1955, pp. 315–317.
- ^ Fletcher 1980, pp. 77–81.
- ^ "The Great Gold Bullion Robbery (1960)". British Film Institute.
- ^ Andrews 1975, p. 236.
- ^ Crichton 1995, p. xvii.
- ^ Richman 2015, p. 10.
- ^ Hill 2006.
Sources
Books
- "The Great Banking Forgeries". The Bankers' Magazine, and Journal of the Money Market. XVII. London: Richard Groombridge. 1857.
- Bradley Hirst, John (2008). Freedom on the Fatal Shore: Australia's First Colony. Melbourne, Victoria: Black Inc. ISBN 978-1-86395-207-1.
- ISBN 978-0-0994-8241-3.
- Cruikshank, Percy (1856). A Full Report of the Great Gold Robbery. London: H. Vickers. OCLC 86086166. (subscription required)
- Evans, D. Mourier (1859). Facts, Failures and Frauds: Revelations, Financial, Mercantile, Criminal. London: Groombridge & Sons. OCLC 898881745.
- OCLC 847151446.
- Hanrahan, David (2011). The First Great Train Robbery. London: Robert Hale. ISBN 978-0-7090-9040-3.
- Linnane, Fergus (2004). London's Underworld: Three Centuries of Vice and Crime. London: Robson. ISBN 978-1-8610-5742-6.
- Shore, Heather (2015). London's Criminal Underworlds, c. 1720 – c. 1930: A Social and Cultural History. Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan UK. ISBN 978-1-137-31391-1.
- Storey, Neil (2007). London: Crime, Death and Debauchery. Stroud, Gloucestershire: Sutton Publishing. ISBN 978-0-7509-4624-7.
- ISBN 978-0-8147-8238-5.
Journals and magazines
- Cordery, Simon (2013). "The First Great Train Robbery, by David C. Hanrahan". Railroad History (208): 106–107. JSTOR 43524697.
- Fletcher, John (November 1980). "The First Great Train Robbery". Journal of the Railway and Canal Historical Society. XXVI (3): 77–81. ISSN 0033-8834.
- Matlock, Daniel (26 March 2018). "Dr. Smiles and the 'Counterfeit' Gentlemen: Self-Making and Misapplication in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Britain". Victorian Literature and Culture. 46 (1): 83–94. .
- Robbins, Michael (May 1955). "The Great South-Eastern Bullion Robbery". The Railway Magazine. 101 (649): 315–317.
News sources
- "The Bullion Robbery". London Evening Standard. 22 May 1855. p. 1.
- "The Bullion Robbery". The Times. 18 November 1856. p. 11.
- "The Bullion Robbery". The Times. 11 December 1856. p. 8.
- "The Bullion Robbery". The Times. 25 December 1856. p. 9.
- "The Bullion Robbery on the South-Eastern Railway". The Times. 14 January 1857. pp. 7–8.
- Andrews, Peter (22 June 1975). "The Great Train Robbery". The New York Times. p. 236.
- Hill, Susan (11 February 2006). "Review: Kept: A Victorian Mystery by DJ Taylor". The Guardian.
- "Police". The Times. 8 September 1855. p. 9.
- Richman, Darren (6 December 2015). "No 45: The First Great Train Robbery; Take Two: Movies Not to be Missed". The Independent. p. 10.
- "Three Hundred Pounds Reward". The Morning Chronicle. 21 May 1855. p. 1.
- "Three Hundred Pounds Reward". The Morning Post. 21 May 1855. p. 1.
- "Three Hundred Pounds Reward". The Shipping and Mercantile Gazette. 21 May 1855. p. 5.
- "Three Hundred Pounds Reward". The Times. 22 May 1855. p. 8.
Websites
- Clark, Gregory (2020). "The Annual RPI and Average Earnings for Britain, 1209 to Present (New Series)". MeasuringWorth. Retrieved 4 June 2020.
- "Convicts and the British colonies in Australia". Australian Government. Archived from the original on 1 January 2016. Retrieved 3 January 2017.
- "Edward Agar". Old Bailey Proceedings Online. October 1855. Retrieved 19 June 2020.
- "Edwin Fox Hull and Anchor Windlass". Heritage New Zealand. Retrieved 3 January 2023.
- "The Great Gold Robbery, 1855". British Transport Police. Archived from the original on 25 June 2020. Retrieved 28 May 2020.
- "The Great Gold Bullion Robbery (1960)". British Film Institute. Archived from the original on 17 May 2022. Retrieved 27 February 2021.