Thoughts on the Great Train Robbery

Ronnie Biggs, perhaps the best known of the gang that pulled off the Great Train Robbery of 1963, has died in the UK, aged 84. Although Biggs was romanticized in the media, he was disliked by many, including his fellow robbers.

Ronnie Biggs

 

Buster Edwards

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I met one of the train robbers in the early 1980s when I worked for the CBC in London. One of the radio programs  decided to do a where-are-they-now type feature to mark the twentieth anniversary of the heist and rumour was that one of the robbers, Buster Edwards, was living in London. We tracked him down to his new  job – selling flowers from a stall at Waterloo Railway Station so the CBC reporter and I went round for a little interview. He was friendly, Buster was, but not very forthcoming. He did mention, though, that Ronnie Biggs had been “useless”. Biggs’s minor role was to recruit someone who could drive the train a few hundred yards but the guy Biggs found wasn’t up to speed and their best laid plan went off the rails. We finished the interview and as we were leaving, Buster gave me a few daffodils, which was really rather sweet of him.

 

From a crime solving point of view, the robbery investigation contains an amusing little twist. Although the robbers did pass GO and did collect (millions more) than $100, they were done in by a Monopoly game.They had holed up for a few days at Leatherslade Farm where they passed the time playing Monopoly, using the real money stolen in the robbery. When they learned that the police were searching every recently rented property within 25 miles of the robbery scene, they knew it was time to move on. So they washed and bleached every surface in the place to remove all traces of their presence. But they forgot one thing. Yep. The Monopoly set, including the cards and playing pieces, was covered in their fingerprints.  As they were all petty criminals known to police, their fingerprints were on file and the  police knew exactly who they were looking for.  They were caught and arrested soon after.

 

Caught by a Monopoly set

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From a literary and cinematic point of view, many books have been written and several movies made about the Great Train Robbery, including Buster, starring Phil Collins as Buster Edwards. But it you want to go back further in time to a brilliant heist, find a copy of The First Great Train Robbery, starring Sean Connery and Donald Sutherland. It’s directed by Michael Crichton, who also wrote the screenplay based on his novel The Great Train Robbery.