KISSED HER HAND

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23339, 6 May 1939, Page 2 (Supplement)

KISSED HER HAND

"Precious Pair of Rogues" Imitate Old-time " BULLDOG ARTHUR," known to the police as £5 Arthur John Cox, is back behind bars. He was sentenced at the Old Bailey, London, lately, to four years' penal servitude. The sentence means six years. ' He has still two years' " ticket-of-leave " to serve.

SENTENCED with Cox was James Horn, "Flash Dickie." The pair's criminal partnership was established in schoolboy days. Horn received three years' penal servitude. Both pleaded guiltv to breaking and entering, and, according to the stories told, old-time highwaymen were no more gallant than this precious pair. "Don't Be Alarmed" Cox told one woman into whose bedroom he tiptoed in early morning, "Wo don't propose to hurt you, tady. Just show us where your jewels are. Horn said to one of his women victims, "Don't be alarmed." He kissed her hand after robbing her. "Bulldog Arthur" and "Hash Dickie " started their criminal ways as mastermind and lieutenant of a children's gang which terrorised East End of London shopkeepers. Borstal sentences, prison sentences, and various penal servitude terms broke up the partnership periodically, but whenever tho pair teamed behind bars or outside, trouole followed. ' After his release from Borstal, Cox was a "cow nurse" 011 cattle-boats, and a deck hand with North Sea fishing HER LIFE RUINED MOTOR CRASH VICTIM FACE LIKE A MASK "DISTRESSING TO LOOK AT"

trawlers. From the former lie gathered the ideas of the worst haunts of Rio and Buenos Aires. A 12 months' sentence at Gloucester Prison in 1921 for housebreaking preceded his acquaintance with Dartmoor in 1923. Hero the "Bulldog" renewed acquaintance with a boyhood friend, Guy Browne, slayer of Constable Gutteridge. On August 7, 1924, he led the sensational "Bog Break," the biggest escape plot in British convict prison history. Planned for months, the escape was to be general bv men working in j the bogs and quarries during dinner. But "Bulldog" made his dash before! the prearranged . signal. Four others! followed, and tho five broke through the guards. The rest of the gangs were lined up at carbine point. Four of the.fugitives were captured within a few hour.s. "Bulldog" was the last to surrender. He held off his armed pursuers using granite boulders as ammunition. "Canary Dress" Six months' "canary dress"—loss of six months' remission, and the wearing of the hideous black and yellow garb of an escapee, solitary confinement and bread and water for a lengthy period —was Cox's sentence. Following a brief spell of liberty after the sentence "Bulldog" returned to Dartmoor for three years, fori burglary and possession of a pistol. On! his release he again met Horn. Their association ended at tho Old Bailey in .October, 1930, when he received ten years' penal. Horn at the next sessions received three years, i The pair' had been engaged on an extensive robbery tour in the London suburbs. Both were armed, using fast cars and utilised country barns and stables as repositories for their stolen proceeds. A constable hiding in a hedgerow at Woking watched Horn drive up to one of the "caches." The officer pounced on him. and Horn drew a pistol, but it discharged harmlessly. Special Strong Cell' f r "Bulldog" was challenged by a police sergeant at Lee, in the early hours of the morning. His answer was a fusillade of revolver shots at pointblank range. He was finally cornered in a garden. At his trial he declared, "My one object when 1 come out will be to shoot policemen." Cox was in solitary confinement in a special strong cell when the mutiny burst over Dartmoor. Confederates released him. Horn was one of the ringleaders. At the Prinretown trial he received 21 months' consecutive imprisonment. Cox was transferred to Parkhurst after the mutiny to become the "terror" of the island gaol.

face had beoome- "paralysed and mask-like" after injuries suffered in a,road accident, at Birmingham Assizes. She is Miss Jessie Elizabeth Scott, of Stourbridge. Worcestershire, and when he discussed her appearance Mr. Justice Oliver asked her to leave the court. He termed the task of assessing the value of the appearance of a girl of her age as "dreadful." and added: "Anyone who has seen this poor young woman talking, trying to smile, presenting on that side of her face a terrible mask-like appearance which is most distressing to look at, must realise that unless there is some reasonable assurance that she will recover, it is going to affect the whole of her life, and to a great extent is going to ruin her Marriage Unlikely "It is difficult to think that she has any chance of getting married, although she must have been very nice-looking before this happened. Jt will lie on her life like a dreadful shadow."

Miss Scott, who is the daughter of a Stourbridge clothier, received her injuries on May 31, 15)38, when she was knocked down by a car driven by Mr. John Robert Henry Perry, of Larkhill, Pedinore, Worcestershire, against whom damages were awarded. For Miss Scott, Mr. J. F. Burke said that her injuries included a fractured skull and a fracture near the ear.