Talk:Great Train Robbery (1963)

WikiProject British Crime

 * For those interested, a WikiProject regarding crime in Great Britain has been proposed. MadMax 19:16, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Disambig
Err, I'm pretty sure that the Jimmy White involed in this wasn't the snooker player Jimmy White which is where you end up if you follow the name link.

1903 film
There's also a 1903 film of the same name. I read somewhere that it's the first film to use a narrative style. Someone should make a page about that film. I don't know enough about it, or else I would.


 * That whould be at The Great Train Robbery (1903 film)! 68.39.174.238 17:36, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Mills
The attack caused bleeding and Mills never returned to sausage.
 * The article on Jack Mills says that he did work occasionally after the attack. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.97.194.200 (talk) 16:45, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

hvnvnvnvnvnvnvn ncncmxxmx,x,x,xx,x,x,x,x, — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.159.68.62 (talk) 12:16, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Numbers
The numbers don't seem to add up here. A "15-member gang" stole the money, of whom "three members of the gang never [were] to be arrested or identified", but "thirteen of the gang members were caught". If 13 were caught, and 3 escaped, that makes 16 and not 15. --Gwern (contribs) 14:42 29 January 2007 (GMT)

That could refer to "Stan Agate" who was never identified or caught, but was also not a member of the gang. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.145.13.74 (talk) 18:54, 7 March 2010 (UTC)

Also number of bags left behind is inconsistent. In one part 'All but 7 of 128' were taken. In another part "8 out of 126 bags were not stolen". No source is given for the first figure and I don't have access to the source for the second, but it would be nice if someone could resolve it.. 24.134.160.118 (talk) 08:23, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Crichton's The Great Train Robbery
Previously, this incident was cited as the basis of the book. While it may be inspiration, the book dealt with a train robbery in victorian England.

Members of the gang
Who are some of the members of the gang of The Great Train Robbery?Tama-Wama-Cally! 03:40, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Frank Williams?
Is this the guy that owns the racing team or some other Frank Williams? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.0.4.150 (talk) 18:08, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Stan Agate?
Stan Agate's participation in the robbery was Ronnie Biggs's only task ? Doesn't make much sense...

Ronnie Biggs
Article doesn't explain how Ronnie Biggs was imprisioned

"Their Shoes Are Ready..." - a piece of trivia
Sometime in the 1990's, a documentary interviewed staff at a London shoe shop. No ordinary retailer: this was a small shop - whose name escapes me - known for hand-crafting *very* expensive shoes for aristocrats and celebrities. The secret, they said, was making a wooden model to the exact measurements of the customer's foot.

A store room contained large racks of wooden feet; the camera showed sets labelled King so-and-so, Lord so-and-so.

The employee then said: "oh, and we also have moulds of the feet of some of the Great Train Robbers... if they would like to come rouund, we think their shoes are ready...".

Partly trivia and citation needed - but if true is *possibly* an interesting insight: "we're suddenly rich - our first act is to buy shoes only the rich can afford..."

86.25.122.108 (talk) 19:45, 6 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Don't know anything about the Great Train Robbers, but the shoe shop sounds like Lobb's (John Lobb).109.158.241.79 (talk) 11:30, 24 March 2014 (UTC)

No ban
The fact that two other men were hit with coshes shows that the allegedly extant ban on violence never existed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.30.71.244 (talk) 16:18, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * The assistant train driver, Whitby, apart from being thrown down the bank and hand-cuffed to Mills, seems to have been unhurt. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.27.11.202 (talk) 16:55, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Possibly, the robbers avoided firearms, out of fear of the death penalty. Their opponents were expected to be unarmed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.97.194.200 (talk) 12:47, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

Spelling
The spelling of "Sonnenbichel", "Hindeland" and "Allagaen" should be studied by experts.
 * It has improved now.

Parole/remission
The statement that "there was no parole system in place and prisoners served the full term" seems to be in need of revisiting – the Guardian at the time referred to remission taking 25 years down to 16 or so. They obviously were released – perhaps there needs to be more research on this? Billwilson5060 (talk) 09:32, 20 November 2012 (UTC)
 * The current Parole Board for England and Wales was introduced in 1968. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.143.239.144 (talk) 11:22, 10 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Possibly, there was remission for good behaviour of one third of the sentence in force before 1968. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.143.239.144 (talk) 11:36, 10 September 2013 (UTC)

999 calls
This text moved from main page where it had been inserted after the main article:

Additional Comment I wonder if I can add to this incident which might help to complete the tale. From 1955 to 1965 I was a constable with the Bedfordshire police. For a time (1959) I was a beat bobby at Leighton Buzzard. During the night shift an unmarked Ford Consul was used as the crime car to patrol the streets of the town.

The crime car was occupied by both a uniformed Constable and a Detective Constable. The river Ouzel marked the Bedfordshire and Buckingham county boundaries beyond which lay the town of Linslade. During the quiet hours in the middle of the night when on patrol the crime car crew would cross the river bridge to Linslade, turn left where a telephone kiosk was situated, drive a short distance along this road and turn right to stop beneath a railway bridge at a country lane.

While I cannot today (June 2013) be certain as I have been away from the area since 1960 this bridge may have been the one where the robbery occurred but I stand to be corrected; it was certainly similar.

Early in 1960 I was transferred to Luton where I served as a beat Bobby until I resigned in 1965. British Telecom (in the days of the electro-mechanical switchboards) had a regional exchange called Telephone House near the centre of Luton. The exchange took emergency treble-nine calls from a large catchment area including Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire and passed them to the appropriate service. All treble-nine calls within the region were passed to Luton police. To my knowledge the night staff at Telephone House was manned by two men.

Luton police station had its own switchboards, three of the plug-in types operated by three civilian females from 8am to 8pm after which a constable would operate them throughout the remainder of the evening and night. Those switchboards were large units regarded today (2013) as antiques. Situated on a wall close to the units was an alarm bell and on the main switchboard was a red light; both the bell and the red light would operate whenever a treble-nine call was received. Typically police stations receive numerous nuisance calls from disturbed types when it can be difficult not to treat the caller with a degree of disdain.

This then is the backdrop to my story. On Wednesday night 7 August 1963 I was detailed to operate the switchboards at Luton police station. After midnight (8 August) the exchange, as usual, became quiet. In the station in addition to myself was Sergeant Michael Kean, popularly known as Mick who was in the Enquiry Office; he  had previously been an army sergeant during WW2; he was a little on the obese side; rolled and smoked his own cigarettes; and had an acute sense of black humour. The duty Inspector was patrolling the town in a car making contact with the other constables. The only communication those bobbies had with the station was through either a police box,police pillar, or public telephone box.

Some time after three in the morning (I cannot now recall the exact time) the treble-nine bell rang at the switchboard and the red light flashed. I plugged the phone into the appropriate socket and the male on nightshift at Telephone House said, "I think we have a right one here!" Replying, I said, "Okay, put him through." The voice at other end was high-pitched from an excited man who had difficulty explaining himself which was typical of many nuisance callers. He said, "The coach has been held-up and millions stolen." Remember this type of crime had never before occurred in Britain although it was a regular feature of American Western films; remember too that police stations frequently received nuisance calls. I suggested to the caller that probably he had been watching too many Western films to which he became more excitable. I bantered with him at the same time chuckling to myself I contacted Sergeant Kean in the enquiry office and put the caller through to him. I kept the line open and listened.

Mick, with his wicked sense of black humour, found the caller's tale hilarious and ragged him about it. In the process the caller tried to say that the night mail train had been held-up to which Mike retorted, "At gun point presumably; it's a hold-up mate, stop the train!" Simply, neither the sergeant nor myself could believe this man. He told us that he was a postman on the night mail train from Scotland to London and a gang held-up the train and robbed it of millions of pounds yet still his story was not believed; those crimes just never happened.

He said that he managed to escape and made his way to a farm house where he awoke the farmer and his wife, neither of whom believed him. At this point the treble-nine alarm rang again. I plugged into the call and it was the operator from Telephone House who said, "Listen to this guy!"

The voice was composed and what was said went something like this, "I am a post office worker on the night train from Scotland to London and you might have difficulty believing this but it has been held-up and robbed. All my mates were forced to lie face down on the floor and as the robbers left they said, don't move for at least half-an-hour. After about twenty minutes I escaped and went to a farm house but could not raise the occupants so stole their bike and cycled to this telephone kiosk; it has the name Linslade marked on the phone; oh, and, what shall I do with the bike?" "Hold on a minute." I said.

I interrupted sergeant Kean who was still bantering with the first guy and said, "Try listening to this other guy sergeant; it sure sounds genuine!" Linslade was then in Buckinghamshire which was outside the jurisdiction of the Bedfordshire police but nonetheless I was instructed to call-in all the beat constables and to inform HQs at Bedford and also the superintendent Almost immediately all lights on the switchboard and the adjoining one were flashing and all police boxes and pillars around the town would have been flashing. For around the next half-hour the switchboard was lit-up like Blackpool illuminations and there was a hectic scene as I tried to connect and reply to the incoming calls. About every five minutes the caller from Linslade would phone back and enquire what he should do with the stolen bike? After a number of calls from him, and being frustrated amidst the pandemonium, I replied, impolitely, "Stick it where the sun seldom shines!" Or words to this effect. I guess it must have burst his bubble about the image of Bobbies.

When the other constables arrived from their beats they were immediately taken by car to the scene leaving myself and sergeant Kean in the station where stillness reigned. When the early shift arrived at 5.30am for duty they too were transported to the scene when again the station remained empty except for sergeant Kean and myself. At 8am the female switchboard operators arrived when I was able to go off-duty but had the odd feeling that I missed the excitement!

Before concluding this tale here are some considerations. When the arrest of the gang members began and prior to this incident when any other member of the gang was arrested or the sum involved increased all concerned were returned to Court where the charges would be updated. When the amount reached the £2.5 million the Judge, in his wisdom, made the ruling, for expediency presumably, that the amount stolen remain at £2.5 million and so prevent the repetitive returns to Court and this sum has gone into recorded history.

It was later estimated that the amount involved was probably in the region of £6.25 million but the problem of calculating the exact amount could not be determined as the money was old or damaged notes that were being sent to London to be burned. Apparently no record was kept of their numbers. Furthermore, it will probably be appreciated that whenever there is cash that is unaccounted and circulating that there are always 'sticky-fingers' around making the total sum stolen indeterminable.

Other crimes of equal tenacity and gravity have since been executed and forgotten but if Ronnie Biggs had not made his daring escape from secure custody and remain at large for so long this incident too may have been forgotten. Saying that Ronnie Biggs only took a small part in the operation and yet he also managed to gain early release from prison after his surrender, then, to imply that he was only a small-time crook, sounds ridiculous! He was quite a character. Robert Park↵56 Cortachy Crescent↵DD8 4TP Thetiesthatbind (talk) 23:54, 20 December 2013 (UTC)  paragraph editing as tldr otherwise

Picture of Bridego/Train Robbers' Bridge
At 17:18, 14 July 2013, I made an edit to delete the old photo and caption of Bridego Bridge and insert 2 new photos: one like the original but showing the bridge in 2013, and one showing the Network Rail plaque designating the bridges "official" name. The original photo was not contemporary to 1963 and the bridge has changed appearance since both 1963 and the photo. In a related edit at 16:16 I also inserted some text to refer to the new "official" name. I annotated that edit "Bridego Bridge now known as Train Robbers' Bridge". At 18:25, 18 July 2013,‎ Sealman reverted the picture edit with comment "RV Image substituted without explanation by one entitled 'Rain Robbers' Bridge'". Having now fully explained the replacement of the photograph I revert Sealman's edit. The title of the new photo "Rain..." vice "Train..." (from Wikipedia Commons) is an unfortunate typo. Spborthwick (talk) 06:31, 23 July 2013 (UTC)

What is this about?
"Nine of them were sentenced to lengthy jail terms even though one-fifth of the proceeds of their theft was spent on lawyers." That will be because British Justice wasn't based on wealth.A Taxed Mind (talk) 07:31, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Today?
"With careful planning based on inside information from an individual known only as 'The Ulsterman', the robbers got away with over £2.6 million (the equivalent of £46 million today)"

When exactly might "today" be? This should be replaced with some specific date.86.171.118.156 (talk) 21:43, 18 December 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes, simply writing "today" without a date goes against Wikipedia standards. Besides there's no source cited. www.measuringworth.com can be used, but it gives a range of values that differ considerably (£49,310,000.00 to £143,000,000.00). Is there a better site to use? Hopefully someone will fix it.__209.179.93.170 (talk) 22:08, 11 October 2014 (UTC)

Charges
There is no offence in English law of "Obstructing Justice". This is an offence found in a number of US jurisdictions. The equivalent offence in England and Wales is "Perverting Justice" or "Perverting the course of justice" or "Attempting to pervert the course of justice". See Archbold or Blackstone for the various formulations.

So, your call (ie whoever changed my edit back to "obstructing justice"), but I thought wikipedia wanted accuracy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.45.182.9 (talk) 02:22, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Robbery - or theft ?
I've just watched the two newer British films about this event, and the police investigation. Since the offenders stole the money and wasn't armed, howcome it was labeled as "robbery" and not "theft" ? OK the train driver got injured, but still. I don't quetion this article or the title. But what how was British law defining "robbery" at the time ? Boeing720 (talk) 22:45, 27 May 2015 (UTC)

It's not about labelling "robbery" - it's about labelling "armed". The robbers were armed - with coshes.

Regarding merger proposal
I think there is a case for merging Gordon Goody into the Great Train Robbery article as Goody does not appear to be particularly notable in his own right. Quis separabit? 23:27, 3 November 2016 (UTC)
 * Notable information from Gordon Goody is already included in Great Train Robbery (1963). I have therefore completed the WP:MERGE process although no material was actually copied at this time. The statement in the lead of Gordon Goody that his name was "Good" must be a typo as it is not backed up by sources. Shhhnotsoloud (talk) 10:23, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

This bit doesn't make sense?
"On 13 July 1964, the appeals by Lennie Field and Brian Field (no relation) against the charges of conspiracy to rob were allowed. This meant that their sentences were effectively reduced to five years only. On 14 July 1964, the appeals by Roger Cordrey and Bill Boal were allowed, with the convictions for conspiracy to rob quashed, leaving only the receiving charges. Justice Fenton Atkinson concluded that a miscarriage of justice would result if Boal's charges were upheld, given that his age, physique and temperament made him an unlikely train robber. Luckily for him, as the oldest robber, Cordrey was also deemed to be not guilty of the conspiracy because his prints had not been found at Leatherslade Farm.

Brian Field was only reluctantly acquitted of the robbery. Justice Atkinson stated that he would not be surprised if Field were not only part of the conspiracy, but also one of the robbers. The charges against the other men were all upheld. In the end Lennie Field and Bill Boal got some measure of justice, but Boal died in prison in 1970 after a long illness.[55]"

If Boal's appeal was allowed in 1964 - why did he die in prison in 1970?


 * Boal's conviction for conspiracy to rob was quashed, but his conviction for receiving stolen goods was not. Presumably Boal was serving a sentence for receiving when he died. Verbcatcher (talk) 20:13, 4 October 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
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Chapter 'The robbers'
Re #11 Danny Pembroke, something seems to have gone wrong with the last columns: 'Muscle' is listed in a box too early, and the others to the right just follow this erroneous logic. I don't know how to correct this, maybe someone else does?


 * Sorted. Oh, and if you are leaving messages, please sign after your comment by using the four tildes ~, which leaves your name (or IP address) and a date/time stamp. Regards. The joy of all things (talk) 14:02, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

Part of article not correct.
The article states,

"At that period, there was no parole system in place and prisoners served the full term of the sentence".

This is not correct and the position is slightly complex. The parole system in the UK was set up in 1968 to consider prisoners for early release under licence. This ran alongside the original remission system. Under the remission system, any prisoner sentenced to a fixed term in prison (i.e. not life imprisonment or detention at Her Majesty's pleasure), received an automatic remission of one third of their sentence for good behaviour in prison. Unlike parole, where prisoners are released on licence to be recalled if they break the conditions of the parole, prisoners released under remission were considered to be 'time served', and were released free from conditions or likelihood of recall.

Thus prior to 1968, prisoners could only be released automatically after two thirds of their sentence for good behaviour (not under licence). After 1968, prisoners could be released under licence before the two thirds point if deemed suitable by the parole board prior to their automatic release at two thirds of sentence.

In 1995(?), Michael Howard in his capacity as Home Secretary abolished automatic remission. Howard changed the rules intending that the prison governor could increase the sentence if the prisoner did not behave (a reversal of the reward). However, it was subsequently ruled by the law lords, that prison governors did not have the necessary power granted from the sovereign to imprison people beyond their sentence. This left early release under parole as the only way out of a sentence early.

The bottom line is: that at the time of the train robbers' sentencing, prisoners did not have to serve the full sentence as claimed, but could receive an automatic one third remission of sentence for good behaviour. 86.146.209.237 (talk) 17:47, 11 July 2020 (UTC)


 * Thank you for raising this issue. This BBC source says
 * This supports parts your analysis, although it does not indicate whether the parole system applied retrospectively to earlier offences and sentences. I had added a disputed inline tag to the phrase, but now we have a source to contradict the phrase I will delete it. I will not replace it with a phase discussing remission and parole as I am unclear exactly what rules applied when. This is not discussed in our Criminal Justice Act 1948 and Criminal Justice Act 1967 articles. Verbcatcher (talk) 23:12, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
 * This supports parts your analysis, although it does not indicate whether the parole system applied retrospectively to earlier offences and sentences. I had added a disputed inline tag to the phrase, but now we have a source to contradict the phrase I will delete it. I will not replace it with a phase discussing remission and parole as I am unclear exactly what rules applied when. This is not discussed in our Criminal Justice Act 1948 and Criminal Justice Act 1967 articles. Verbcatcher (talk) 23:12, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

Identity of ‘The Ulsterman’
Accoring to the The Sun newspaper on the 5th Auguest 2023 the identity of the Ulsterman was not a postman called Patrick McKenna. Scotland Yard intelligence have said Gordon Goody identified the Royal Mail mole was Patrick McKenna but the Manchester postie’s family and close associates of the gang say McKenna was a patsy made up by Goody for a book because McKenna would certainly never have had access to the inside information that the gang seemingly used, So Scotland Yard intelligence have said The Ulsterman is Gerald McMorran a Belfast-born former high-ranking Post Office official who held a senior position on the GPO’s security team at the time of the robbery so McMorran, who died in 1999, would know the exact timings of the train and crucially, how much money was on board according to Yard intelligence, the mole dubbed The Ulsterman was introduced to Goody and fellow robber Buster Edwards by bent solicitor’s clerk Brian Field. There was never enough evidence for police to question McMorran or arrest him, and there is nothing in his background to suggest any criminality yet tantalising clues reveal how he was in the frame.

At the time of the robbery he worked in the security unit, dealing with protecting trains and vans from robbery his job gave him access to movements of large sums of cash by rail and road perhaps significantly, gang leader Bruce Reynolds wrote in his autobiography how the insider told Goody and Edwards before the robbery: “When you’ve done this there is another one you can do in Leeds “It involves a van with a driver, his mate and a security guy, You’re looking at three million”. It suggests that as well as trains, the mole had high-level information on movements of cash in Post Office vans, which only a few staff would have done one of them would have been McMorran, the only man from Northern Ireland who worked in the GPO security section. He lived in quiet obscurity in Beckenham, on the borders of South East London and Kent. A Freemason, he showed no signs of obvious wealth but moved back to Northern Ireland after retiring in 1979 and lived in a large lakeside home. There was nothing in his background to suggest any link with any kind of criminality. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dazza20006 (talk • contribs) 19:20, 5 August 2023 (UTC)