DARING TRAIN ROBBERY.

Taranaki Daily News, 4 July 1924, Page 8

DARING TRAIN ROBBERY.

HALF A MILLION STOLEN. BANDIT SHOT BY COMRADE. Chicago, June 14. A fortune in gold, currency and bullion was stolen from the Chicago-Mil-waukee-St. Paul train that was held up by 23 armed robbers 20 miles north “f Chicago on Thursday night. The tot’d loss is estimated at over £‘500.000. The money was being sent from Chicago to Minneapolis and Seattle banks. The robbers escaped in four motor cars, which were quickly lost in the traffic of the Chicago suburbs. The mail clerks on the train at first refused to open the doors of the express car, bat a fusilade of revolver shots, shot-guns and bombs quickly made a hole through the door. The clerks then surrendered. The robbers, who are believed to have used tear bombs in their attack, spent an hour sorting through the mail sacks and distributing the loot. The thieves were so hotly pursued that they abandoned the nrincipal loot at an automobile picnic ground. Small boys found 31 sacks of registered mail worth more than £400,000. The police state that the name of every robber is known. . The robbery was carried out with tjie greatest precision, the only accident being the wounding of one bandit by another. John Wayne was later discovered to-day in an obscure hospital. He was suffering from shotgun wounds, and being close to death confessed, after the police had found several thousand dollars of stolen money in his pockets, that he had taken part in the crime. On the information he gave t’:;» Chicago underworld is being scoured for the other robbers, Ten arrests have already been made.