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The Great Train Robbery was the robbery of £2.61 million from a Royal Mail train heading from Glasgow to London on the West Coast Main Line in the early hours of 8 August 1963 at Bridego Railway Bridge, Ledburn, near Mentmore in Buckinghamshire, England.
Richard Turpin was an English highwayman whose exploits were romanticised following his execution in York for horse theft. Turpin may have followed his father's trade as a butcher early in his life but, by the early 1730s, he had joined a gang of deer thieves and, later, became a poacher, burglar, horse thief and killer. He is also known for a fictional 200-mile (320 km) overnight ride from London to York on his horse Black Bess, a story that was made famous by the Victorian novelist William Harrison Ainsworth almost 100 years after Turpin's death.
The Bow Street Runners were the law enforcement officers of the Bow Street Magistrates' Court in the City of Westminster. They have been called London's first professional police force. The force originally numbered six men and was founded in 1749 by magistrate Henry Fielding, who was also well known as an author. Bow Street Runners was the public's nickname for the officers although the officers did not use the term themselves and considered it derogatory. The group was disbanded in 1839 and its personnel merged with the Metropolitan Police, which had been formed ten years earlier.
A highwayman was a robber who stole from travellers. This type of thief usually travelled and robbed by horse as compared to a footpad who travelled and robbed on foot; mounted highwaymen were widely considered to be socially superior to footpads. Such criminals operated until the mid- or late 19th century. Highwaywomen, such as Katherine Ferrers, were said to also exist, often dressing as men, especially in fiction.
Louis Jeremiah Abershawe, better known as Jerry Abershawe, or Abershaw, was a notorious English highwayman who terrorised travellers, mostly along the road between Kingston upon Thames and London, in the late eighteenth century.
John Nevison, also known as William Nevison or Nevinson, was one of Britain's most notorious highwaymen, a gentleman rogue supposedly nicknamed Swift Nick by King Charles II after a renowned 200-mile (320 km) dash from Kent to York to establish an alibi for a robbery he had committed earlier that day. The story inspired William Harrison Ainsworth to include a modified version in his novel Rookwood, in which he attributed the feat to Dick Turpin. There are suggestions that the feat was actually undertaken by Samuel Nicks. The TV series Dick Turpin had an accomplice of the highwayman, Nick, who earned the nickname Swiftnick.
Jonathan Wild, also spelled Wilde, was a London underworld figure notable for operating on both sides of the law, posing as a public-spirited vigilante entitled the "Thief-Taker General". He simultaneously ran a significant criminal empire, and used his crimefighting role to remove rivals and launder the proceeds of his own crimes.
The Brink's-Mat robbery occurred at the Heathrow International Trading Estate, London, United Kingdom, on 26 November 1983 and was one of the largest robberies in British history. £26 million worth of gold bullion, diamonds, and cash was stolen from a warehouse operated by Brink's-Mat, a former joint venture between US security company Brink's and London-based company MAT Transport. The bullion was the property of Johnson Matthey Bankers Ltd. Micky McAvoy and Brian Robinson were convicted of armed robbery. Most of the gold has never been recovered. Lloyd's of London paid out for the losses, and several shooting deaths have been linked to the case.
Robert Snooks was the last man to be executed in England for highway robbery, on 11 March 1802. Born in Hungerford in Berkshire, he was christened as James Snook on 16 August 1761. The fact that his name is commonly quoted as Robert Snooks is perhaps due to a corruption of his identity as the "Robber" Snook.
James Allen (1809-1837), also known as George Walton, Jonas Pierce, James H. York, Burley Grove, was a Massachusetts, United States highwayman in the early 19th century.
In archaic terminology, a footpad is a robber or thief specialising in pedestrian victims. The term was used widely from the 16th century until the 19th century, but gradually fell out of common use. A footpad was considered a low criminal, as opposed to the mounted highwayman who in certain cases might gain fame as well as notoriety. Footpads operated during the Elizabethan era and until the beginning of the 19th century.
John Francis was one of a party of bushrangers who held up the Melbourne Private Escort Company's regular escort of gold from the McIvor diggings at Heathcote, Victoria and Kyneton on the morning of 20 July 1853. At least six men were involved, five of whom including Francis and his brother, George Francis, were apprehended. His brother committed suicide while in custody, but by turning Queen's Evidence, Francis escaped punishment and the other three companions were hanged.
Joseph "Blueskin" Blake was an 18th-century English highwayman and prison escapee.
John "Jack" Rann was an English criminal and highwayman during the mid-18th century. He was a prominent and colourful local figure renowned for his wit and charm. He later came to be known as "Sixteen String Jack" for the 16 various coloured strings he wore on the knees of his silk breeches among other eccentric costumes.
"Captain" James Maclaine was an Irish man of a respectable presbyterian family who had a brief but notorious career as a mounted highwayman in London with his accomplice William Plunkett. He was known as "The Gentleman Highwayman" as a result of his courteous behaviour during his robberies, and obtained a certain kind of celebrity. Notoriously, he held up and robbed Horace Walpole at gunpoint: eventually he was hanged at Tyburn.
Henry Simms, known as Young Gentlemen Harry, was a thief and highwayman in 18th-century England who was transported to Maryland for theft, but escaped and returned to England, where he was eventually executed for highway robbery.
Isaac Darkin, who also used the alias Dumas, was a notorious highwayman in the eighteenth century.
Henry Beresford Garrett (c. 1818 – 3 September 1885) was a habitual criminal who served prison sentences in England, Tasmania, Victoria and New Zealand. Born Henry Rouse, he used a number of aliases including 'Long Harry' and Henry Beresford Garrett.
Everet v Williams [1725] is an English court case dating back to 1725, regarding the enforceability of contracts to commit crimes. In this case, the contract was to share the spoils of armed robbery, which the court refused to uphold.
William Spiggot was a highwayman who was captured by Jonathan Wild's men in 1721. During his trial at the Old Bailey, he at first refused to plead and was therefore sentenced to be pressed until he pleaded. This was called Peine forte et dure. He was later executed, after a second trial when he pleaded not guilty, on 11 February 1721 at Tyburn, London.
References
- 1 2 Barbara White, "'Stand and Deliver': Bath and the Eighteenth-Century Highwayman" (PDF), Bath History, vol. 13, no. 2, pp. 29–49
- ↑ A Student of the Inner Temple (1804). The Criminal Recorder: Or, Biographical Sketches of Notorious Public Characters. Vol. 2. James Cundee, Ivy-Lane.
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