Part 38

This discovery, and the still pending investigation of the circumstances of the robbery in Cheapside, created so much alarm in his mind, that he determined to emigrate to New South Wales, taking with him all his property. His arrangements were commenced, but his wife, whose fears pictured to her the sailing of her husband with her rival, and her own abandonment in England, most strongly opposed the plan. Ikey, however, persisted in carrying out his expressed intention, when his apprehension at his Islington abode effectually prevented the fulfilment of his plans. The charges preferred against him were those of receiving stolen goods, and Ikey was committed to Newgate for trial. Property, it was said, to a very large amount had been seized, amongst which many articles which had been stolen were identified. Whilst awaiting his trial, a plan of escape was concocted, which was completely successful, and which was conducted in the following manner:--

It is a part of the law of the land, that every prisoner who is in custody, no matter what his offence, is entitled to apply to a judge of one of the superior courts, to be admitted to bail. The application is made for a writ of _habeas corpus_, upon which the prisoner is taken from the prison, where he is confined, before the judge, in whose presence the matter is to be argued. Solomon's friends determined to adopt this course, and the application being made, the writ was granted, and a certain day was fixed for the argument. The prisoner, in obedience to the writ, was sent in the custody of two officers to Westminster, and as the trio passed Bridge-street, Blackfriars, it was proposed that they should have a coach. The proposition appeared to be anticipated by a man, whose vehicle was near the head of the rank, and his carriage was immediately engaged. The three men entered it, and were driven to Westminster, but when they arrived there, the judge was found to be engaged. An adjournment took place to a neighbouring public-house, and while there, Mrs. Solomon joined the party with one or two friends, and brandy and water was speedily introduced in abundance. The turnkeys were not sparing in their libations, but were interrupted in their orgies by the announcement that the judge was ready. The argument took place, the bail was refused, as it was known it would be, and a second adjournment to the public-house took place. One more glass was swallowed, and Ikey, his wife, and the two turnkeys, once more entered the vehicle. A short ride threw Smart, the head turnkey, into a species of stupor; and in Fleet-street, Mrs. Solomon was so affected by her husband's danger, as to fall into fits. Solomon entreated the under turnkey, who still remained awake, not to take him to prison, until he had set his wife down at a friend's house, and this request, being probably backed by a fee, was granted. The coach, which it is almost needless to say was driven by one of Ikey's relations, proceeded to Petticoat-lane, and there pulling up at a house, the door was suddenly opened. Ikey popped out, ran into a house, the door of which stood open, but was closed immediately after him, through the passage, into a house at the back, and again through an interminable variety of windings, until at length he was lodged in a place of security. The turnkey was almost as stupified as his fellow at this surprising disappearance of his prisoner, and Mrs. Solomon having speedily recovered from her fits, the two jailors were left to find their way back to Newgate, and to tell their tale at their own leisure. The turnkeys, it is almost needless to say, had been drugged.

This escape was so admirably conducted, that all traces of Solomon were lost, and notwithstanding the most strenuous exertions of the police, no tidings of him could be obtained. For two months, it appears, he lay concealed at Highgate, and at the expiration of that time he found means to quit the country in a Danish vessel for Copenhagen, from whence in about three months he proceeded to New York.

Ever active in "turning a penny," he was soon engaged in his old trade in forged notes, which was here carried on to a great extent. He became convinced, however, that he could make money by other means also, and he wrote to his wife, desiring her to send him a quantity of cheap watches, which he had good reason to believe would turn to good account. In this letter, according to his own statement, he charged his wife to send him none but "righteous" (honestly obtained) watches, and not to touch one which had been got "on the cross;" but it appears she did not act up to his advice, for she was found guilty of receiving a watch knowing it to have been stolen, which turned out to be one of those which she was about to ship off to the new world to her husband, to be employed by him in his new speculation. For this offence she was sentenced to be transported for fourteen years; and, in obedience to her sentence, she was conveyed to Van Diemen's Land. Ikey, in his account of this affair, does not scruple to assert, that his wife had in truth been guilty of no offence whatever; and he seeks to confirm his assertion by relating the circumstances under which the watch was obtained. He declares that there were some persons in England who had been so enraged at his escape, as to be determined to revenge themselves upon him by every means in their power. With this view they sought to tamper with one of his relations, then in custody, in order to procure the entrapment of his wife in some supposed illegal transaction. Mrs. Solomon at this time was engaged in the purchase of the watches for her husband, and she consulted some of her friends upon the best means of procuring them. The imprisoned relation about this time was set at liberty, to carry out his scheme, and he being applied to, produced and sold to her the very watch for the possession of which eventually she was convicted. How far this is true, as regards the individual referred to, we cannot say; but we believe it to be impossible that villany so gross as that which he imputes, could be connived at by any person holding a responsible public situation in the police.

Ikey, it seems, upon hearing of his wife's misfortune, found himself the object of suspicion where he was, and he determined that he would follow Mrs. Solomon; and, having assembled the family at Hobart Town, endeavour to alleviate her sufferings. In this place he proposed to strike out some new pursuit for their support; but he never imagined that the laws of England would pursue him in the very place to which he was about to proceed as a refuge from them.

Upon his arrival at Hobart Town he lived for some time in comparative decency, having opened a general shop, which he conducted with much profit, and having also purchased a public-house, which he let to another person. But he soon found that his dreams of future security were not to be realised. An order arrived from England for his apprehension, and he was hurried off by the next vessel sailing for London, to take his trial for the numerous offences with which he was charged. He had just time to transfer his property to his son before he sailed, and at length, on the 27th of June 1830, he was once more lodged in Newgate, where he was confined in the transport yard, which was considered the most secure place in the prison.

At the following Old Bailey sessions he was indicted upon eight different charges, and his trial came on on Friday, the 9th of July 1830. His conduct throughout was remarkable for great firmness, which was increased by his being acquitted on the first and second days upon five of the indictments preferred against him. On the following Monday he was again placed at the bar, and then, on the sixth and eighth charges, verdicts of Guilty were returned. The verdict on the seventh indictment was one of Not guilty, owing to the absence of a material witness in India.

A point of law was raised as to the propriety of these convictions, and the prisoner was remanded, in order that the matter might be discussed before the superior judges. Solomon was kept in suspense during a period of ten months; but at length, on the 13th of May 1831, he received an intimation that the opinion of the judges was against him, and sentence of seven years' transportation was passed on each indictment.

Upon this sentence he was conveyed to the hulks, and, on the 31st of May 1831, he once more sailed from Portsmouth. In obedience to an order made upon a petition which he had caused to be presented at the Home Office, he was conveyed to Hobart Town, where his family was, instead of to Sydney; and, upon his arrival at that place, he found his son still carrying on the business which he had commenced. By good conduct, Solomon eventually obtained for himself the rank of overseer of convicts, and we believe that he still retains that situation.

Some anecdotes of the mode in which he conducted his business in London will not be uninteresting, exhibiting as they do the general habits of receivers of stolen goods.

It may be admitted, as an established fact, that no man who does not possess very considerable connexions can attempt to carry on the business of a "fence" with success. An acquaintance and co-partnery with persons residing at the out-ports, and with the itinerant dealers in jewellery, travelling inland, are necessary to enable them to put off the proceeds of their dishonest dealings; for while by the former, bank notes, and other property, the identity of which cannot be destroyed, can be despatched abroad, by the latter, watches and other articles of trifling value can be distributed among towns and villages in remote districts, from which it is unlikely they will ever find their way to the great mart of London, where they can be recognised. Diamonds, and other valuable stones, may be taken out and re-set according to another fashion, while the settings are destroyed; but in most instances receivers admit no articles into their houses until they are satisfied that they cannot be recognised. In the first of these respects Solomon was amply provided with associates, and he was too good a judge in most cases to permit any possibility of detection to arise. When a large robbery was contemplated, he was always apprised of it, and the place and time were fixed at which he should go and look over its produce. The first thing he said when he met the parties was, "Now I am to offer you a price for these things; first assist in removing all the marks, and then I will talk to you." When the goods consisted of linen or cloth, every means of identification was removed; the head and fag ends being cut off, and occasionally the list and selvage, if they were peculiar. The marks on the soles of boots and shoes were obliterated by hot irons, and those on the linings were as speedily removed by their being cut out, and others placed in their stead. After this, he found no difficulty in vending every species of property which could be converted into apparel, to the numerous ready-made, and slop-shops, in which trade so many Jews are engaged. Watches of great value, which could find purchasers only in large towns, were either metamorphosed by skilful hands, or sent to the continent. If a watch were valuable for its works more than its case, the interior was soon entombed in another. A boot and shoe-maker, some years since, in Princes-street, Soho, was, in one night, robbed of his stock, value 300_l._; the whole was carried away in sacks in coaches, and the next morning found its way, before twelve o'clock, to the premises of our hero. By threats and offers to one of the coachmen, who happened to be recognised by a servant in the neighbourhood, as having been at the door the night before, he was induced to give

[Illustration: _Doing a Jew._]

information of the place to which the goods had been conveyed. The shoemaker sent a man to watch the premises, while he went to seek for two officers; the man was in time to see the goods removed to the house of Solomon. When the shoemaker and the officers arrived they entered the premises, but Ikey defied them to touch an article, so carefully had the marks been removed. The shoemaker was compelled to admit that he could not swear to them, and at once saw that he stood no chance of procuring the restoration of his goods. Solomon then said that he had purchased them fairly, but, out of mere compassion for his loss, whether the goods had been his or not, he would sell them for the price which he had paid for them. The robbed man was glad to accept of these terms, and it cost him upwards of one hundred pounds to re-stock his shop with his own goods.

Solomon was allowed to be a most ready and superior judge of the intrinsic value of all kinds of property, from a glass bottle to a five hundred guinea chronometer; how it could be disposed of, and what was the value thieves generally estimated it at. He established among the rogues a regular rule of dealing, which is continued to this day, namely, to give a fixed price for all articles of the same denomination. For instance, a piece of linen was in his view a piece of linen, whether fine or coarse; the same with a piece of print, a silver watch, or a gold one: taking the good, as he used to tell the young and inexperienced thief, with the bad vons. By this plan he sometimes obtained very valuable watches at a moderate rate. He, however, outbid all his opponents in the purchase of stolen bank-notes; this he was for a long time enabled to do, in consequence of his connection with Jews in Holland. All stolen bank-notes which come into the hands of those who buy them, are sent to the Continent, to pass in the way of purchases through some regular mercantile house, when they find their way, by remittances to London houses, into the Bank, where they must be paid. The price given by Solomon for large notes, was 15_s._ in the pound; and he calculated that on an average he could send them their circuit of safety for 1_s._ in the pound: thus securing for himself 4_s._ profit on each 20_s._, that is twenty per cent., and this is now the regular price for stolen notes with the London fences.

At the time of Solomon's apprehension his chief store was in Rosemary-lane, and he was reported to have had goods of the value of 20,000_l._ then collected there. A very great proportion of this property was seized, and Solomon bitterly complained of the manner in which he was deprived of his goods. A great portion of the articles were restored to their owners; but as late as the year 1832, a considerable amount was sold, which was avowed to have belonged to this notorious offender.

WILLIAM GILCHRIST, GEORGE GILCHRIST, and JAMES BROWN.

TRIED FOR A COACH ROBBERY.

The ingenuity of thieves has been frequently referred to in the course of this work, and many instances have been afforded by a perusal of its pages of the extreme perseverance with which the practitioners in this dishonest calling carry on their proceedings. In the case of Huffey White a striking instance is afforded of the laborious determination of men, whose object was to rob the Glasgow bank; in the instance with which we are now about to present our readers no less ingenuity and determination are exhibited than by that case; and the daring effrontery with which the robbery, the circumstances of which we are about to detail, was committed, must strike them with astonishment.

It was on Thursday, the 24th of March, 1831, that this most impudent robbery was committed; and the circumstance of its occurrence was first notified to the public in a Glasgow newspaper in a paragraph, of which the following is a copy, which being compared with the real facts of the case as they were proved at the trial, will sufficiently inform our readers of the remarkable measures adopted by thieves at this time, first to commit robberies, and then so to conceal the real circumstances attending their commission, as to mislead the public and the police as to the persons, or even the description of the persons concerned in the depredation:--"Another of those dexterous tricks in abstracting a bank parcel from one of the public coaches was on Thursday week successfully practised in a somewhat novel manner. The following is an account of the transaction:--The parcel in question, which contained notes and gold to the amount of 5,700_l._, had been entrusted by the Commercial Bank's branch in Glasgow, to be forwarded to the head office in Edinburgh, by the Prince Regent coach, which left Glasgow at noon on the Thursday. The parcel had been put into a tin box, which was, as usual, placed in the boot of the coach, but was missed by the coachman who drives the last stage. It was then found that the stuffing inside had been cut, and a hole made in the body of the coach by piercing it first by a brace-bit, and then cutting out the piece with a saw, by which means the thieves got at the box, which they forced open and rifled of its contents. The paper in which the parcel was packed, with part of one of the notes, were left. After committing the robbery, in order to elude observation, the lining of the coach, which had been cut, was pinned neatly together. We understand that the whole of the inside seats had been taken in Glasgow, four in the name of Mrs. Gordon, and two in the name of Mr. Johnston, but no inside passengers came forward when the coach started. When about three miles from Glasgow, however, two passengers, a man and a woman, were taken up, who continued to travel with the coach until within three miles from Airdrie, and no suspicion was raised against them when they left the conveyance. The notes were principally of the Commercial Bank, and consisted of 20_l._, 5_l._, and 1_l._ notes. A number of them had blue borders of a peculiar description, not generally in circulation, and which will easily be detected. It is said there were about 300_l._ in gold. Immediately on the intelligence of this daring robbery reaching Glasgow, an officer, accompanied by one of the gentlemen of the Branch Bank at that place, set off in the direction of Airdrie in search of the robbers, but hitherto without success. The driver of the coach is quite unable to give any account of the appearance or dress of the man and woman who were in the coach; but we believe the passenger who assisted them out, has been able partially to furnish one." The latter part of this paragraph is peculiarly worthy of notice, for it turns out that Brown was the outside passenger, and he, no doubt, affecting ignorance of the persons within, endeavoured to gull the police by giving an erroneous description of the thieves.

A long and searching inquiry into all the circumstances of the affair took place, and at length, through the arduous and persevering exertions of the Glasgow police-officer named Nish, the three prisoners whose names head this article, together with a man named Simpson, were committed for trial.

During the period which intervened before the inquiry took place before the High Court of Justiciary at Edinburgh, the investigation which had been commenced was carried on by Mr. Nish; but the main evidence at the trial was that of Simpson, who was admitted a witness against his accomplices.

The trial came on at Edinburgh on Wednesday, July the 14th, 1831. It was then proved that the prisoner George Gilchrist was a coach-proprietor residing on the road between Glasgow and Edinburgh; and that being aware of the frequent transmission of money by the coach from one place to the other, he formed the design of abstracting the parcel containing it from the boot, and carrying it off. He communicated his object to his brother, and to Brown and Simpson, as well as to two other persons who were to assist them. The parcel of the 24th of March was fixed upon to be attempted; and in order to render their operations secure from observation, the whole of the inside of the coach was taken for the use of the party.