Great Train Robbery (1963)
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The Great Train Robbery was the name given to a £2.3 million train robbery committed on 8 August 1963 at Bridego Railway Bridge, Ledburn near Mentmore in Buckinghamshire, England. The bulk of the stolen money was not recovered.
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[edit] Robbery
The Royal Mail's Glasgow to London travelling post office (TPO) train was stopped by tampered signals. A 15-member gang, led by Bruce Reynolds and including Ronnie Biggs, Charlie Wilson, Jimmy Hussey, John Wheater, Brian Field, Jimmy White, Tommy Wisbey, Gordon Goody and Buster Edwards, one of whom was an ex British Army paratroop soldier, stole £2.3 million in used £1, £5 and £10 notes — the equivalent of £40 million (US $74 million) adjusted for 2006 inflation.
Although no guns were used in the robbery, the train driver, Jack Mills, was hit on the head with an iron bar, causing a black eye and facial bruising. The assailant was one of three members of the gang never to be arrested or identified. Frank Williams (at the time a Detective Inspector) claims to have traced the man, but he could not be charged because of lack of evidence. Mills recovered from the attack, but had constant trauma headaches throughout the rest of his life and died in 1970 from leukemia.
[edit] Investigation and capture
Thirteen of the gang members were caught after police discovered their fingerprints at their hideout at Leatherslade Farm, near Oakley, Buckinghamshire. The robbers were tried, sentenced on 16 April 1964 and imprisoned. Ronnie Biggs escaped from prison 15 months into his sentence, settling in Adelaide Australia where he worked as a builder living a seemingly ordinary life. He was tipped off by somebody and moved to Melbourne and later escaped to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, when police found out his Melbourne address. Biggs could not be extradited from Brazil because he had fathered a Brazilian child. As a result he lived openly in Rio for many years, completely untouchable by the British authorities. Charlie Wilson escaped and was living outside Montreal, Canada on Rigaud Mountain. In the upper-middle-class neighbourhood where the large, secluded properties are surrounded by trees, Wilson was just another resident who enjoyed his privacy. Only when Charlie invited his cousin over to meet him in Canada were Scotland Yard able to track him down.
[edit] Aftermath
Despite the attack on Jack Mills, many hold fond memories of the story of the robbery and the escape, and Ronnie Biggs is treated affectionately by some of the British tabloid press. Others regard them with contempt, even though Biggs' role in the robbery was minor, he still received a 30-year prison sentence as did the others.
In May 2001 Ronnie Biggs, aged 71, unable to meet mounting medical costs in Brazil after suffering three strokes, voluntarily returned to England. Biggs was fully aware that he would be arrested and jailed upon arrival. After detention and a short court hearing he was promptly sent back to prison to serve the remainder of his sentence.
The story of Ronald "Buster" Edwards, who fled to Mexico but later surrendered to authorities, was dramatised in the 1988 film, Buster, which starred Phil Collins in the title role. Edwards became a flower seller outside Waterloo Station on his release from prison. He committed suicide in 1994.
One of the post office carriages involved is now preserved at Nene Valley Railway and being restored to operational condition. The train locomotive was no: D326 (later no: 40126). It became somewhat of a celebrity engine though for all the wrong reasons as, apart from the robbery itself, it was involved in a number of serious operating incidents throughout its operational life.[citation needed]
The robbery was investigated by Detective Chief Superintendent Jack Slipper of the Metropolitan Police (widely known in the press as "Slipper of the Yard"), who became so involved with its aftermath that he continued to hunt down many of the escaped robbers in retirement. He was one of those who believed Biggs should not be released after returning to the UK in 2001 and he often appeared in the media to comment on any news item connected to the robbery before his death on August 24, 2005 at the age of 81.
As a direct result of this robbery, the British Railways Rule Book was amended. When stopped by a red signal, train drivers were normally required to contact the signaller by telephone (a procedure that requires leaving the driving cab). Drivers of mail trains were not to leave the cab at signals and were also required to keep the doors locked. These rules remained until the last Travelling Post Office ran on British railways on 9 January 2004.
[edit] In popular culture
- The book The Robbers' Tale by Peta Fordham tells the story. Published by Hodder & Stoughton, London 1965.
- It is also the subject of the book The Great Train Robbery by Michael Crichton Published by Alfred A Knopf, New York 1975.
- The robbery was mentioned in the 1965 film adaptation of Ian Fleming's Thunderball.
- A comedy version of events was staged in the film The Great St Trinian's Train Robbery
- The 1967 film Robbery starring Stanley Baker portrayed events similar to the Great Train Robbery.
- In 1988 Buster Edwards experiences were made into the comedy-drama Buster, starring Phil Collins.
- In 2005, on the Australian Soap Opera Neighbours, Karl Kennedy compared Paul Robinson to Ronnie Biggs.
- A popular skit from the comedy revue Beyond the Fringe starring Peter Cook and Dudley Moore deals with the efforts to catch the criminals behind the robbery.
- In the film Friday the 13th Part 3 there is a poster of the Great Train Robbery of 1963 displyed on the counter in the small grocery store.
