Philanthropist and Forger.

Observer, Volume 9, Issue 524, 5 January 1889, Page 7

Philanthropist and Forger.

llpi 0 many of the present generation, the E f\%, s } or * o£ tJl ° reat Northern JRailway )\. ' frauds may be new. Here is a brief history o£ .Redpath, the Philanthropist and Forger. Leopold Bedpath seems to have been one o, those fortunate individuals whose plausible man, \ ncrs disarm investigation into their antecedents I With apparently nothing to recommend him beyond a fair education and some intelligence, he obtained a position which would be coveted by a good many young men of irreproachable character and Jirsi-rale ability— that of clerk to tho Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company. Previously to this time he had filled the post of clerk to a solicitor at a paltry salary, but ho soon adapted his mode of iifo to his improved position, for we find him on Ins marriage obtaining furniture to the amount of £(500 on credit. Ai'ler .some years' service with the Peninsular j and Oriental Company, lledpath determined to embark in business on his own account, and simultaneously began to rear for himself ihat pedestal of «i ham philanthropy which lenders his career especially remarkable. .Like his contemporary liobson, Hedpath was never at a loss for ready money. Unlike -Rob?on, however, he spent but a small portion of it in selfish pleasure. Ttobson squandered his gains upon himself; P.edpaih dispersed niy, ostentatiously, it is true, to the poor and needy. £i< charitable was he with the money of his creditors that after he had been in business For three months he failed, with debts to the amount of £5,000 and no assets worth noting. The friend of the widow and orphan was crushed, but not broken. }.lis house and furniture were foUI, his business was at an end, his commercial chaiacter was shaken, but he was not by any means ruined. The f;>?:t of his bankruptcy did not prevpn;. Lite Brighton Railway Company from giving .Utiipath a rc-J-puni-ib'.e pust in their cilices on his application, or from testifying to his moral character s\nd eoi-'smc-reiai capabilities when a few jc-ars later lie was appointed registrar's assistant in {ho odicefj of the Great, Northern .Railway Company. Very soon after this improvement in his position his prosperity advanced by leaps and bounds. The small house which ho had occupied since his failure would hold him no longer, and he. took a spicuciirt West Fn<i mansion ;it a rental cf Jt" 100 a year. I The benevolence of his disposition increased with his capabilities for exercising it. Ladies canvassing for charities 1 , Loid Mayors raising j funds to help the sufferers fvoin great public calamities, looked for the subscription of Leopold lledpath as a matter of course. He was a hie governor and one oi tho managing committee oi that noble institution Christ's Hospital, a governor cf the St. Ann's Society, and a subscriber to iho Patrio'.ic Fund. It is said, too, that not nil his bounty was dealt with ostenta-tion---that 3->e was known to have sought the individual Etrnggler. the poor widow, the brokendown nun, and to have administered encouragement and practical relief with something very like the spirit of true benevolence. ! Whether the philanthropy was spurious or j no!, ihe fact remains that, the philanthropist was a persistent criminal. With the one hand Redpath—now promoted (o be registrar of the Groat Northern Jiailway Company — was showering ! forth fhe stream of charily, with (he other he was replenishing the supply from the coifers of his employers. To render intelligible the plan upon which he plied his felonious lingers, it is necessary to explain thai, several kinds of Great Northern stock bearing different rates of interest were in e:\istence, and thai the calculations ! necessary to deieimine the dividend on the I various kinds of stock weio often e>f such an j intricate nature ns to puzzle anyone who was less well acemaintcd with the matter than the regittiar. Bedpath made a practice of mamuaciurit.y ! artificial stock. He executed a deed of transfer ] and forged the signature of a suppositions person, i made the transfer to his own name, and sold the document through his brokers. He was obliged, of course, to enter the transaction in the register i of the company, and in order to discourage investigation lie usually appended the letters 0.13,, signifying that the account was brought forward from an old ledger. Some other devices of his j were a little more complicated, but forgery was i a feature in each, and so cunningly was it accomj pJished that three years after the systematic frauds had been in practice one of the mest eminent linns of actuaries in tho Kingdom expressed its admiration of the care and accuracy with which the books of the company wore kept. An accident hastened the Nemesis which ultimately overtook the forger. The directors of the company had for some time been puzzled by the discrepancy between the sum on which they were paying dividends and the amount of their subscribed capital, but they entertained no suspicion of the honesty of their clerks. One day, however Mr Denison, the chairman of the company, was i conversing with a nobleman at a railway station, I when Bedpath happened to pass by. The chairman bowed with dignity to his subordinate. The nobleman was much more cordial, grasping the registrar's hand and chatting as familiarly to him as an equal. Mr Denison was a little surprised. 'Do you know Mr Bedpath?'* he asked his noble companion, ' Know him ?' was the vaply, ' He's one of my most intimate friends.' And he went on to tell his astonished listener of Eedpath'a sumptuous dinners, of his handsome mansion in town, his extensive river-side estate at Weybridge, and his princely liberality. A strange light dawned on Sir Denison's mind as to the problem which had for so long puzzled the directors. He thought of Bobson and the Crystal Palace frauds, and he determined forthwith to order a complete investigation of the books of the company. . I The investigation, began on November 15, j 1850, just a fortnight after Bobson's conviction, j Two days afterwards Redpath entered the room ! in which the accountants were engaged, and ' asked what they were doing. 'We are going,' said fcliß chief aecotmtant, « to investigate all the books since the commencement of the company.' ltedpalh made som petulant remark and left the

room. He then summoned a ticket-collector &n<s sent him to the bank for the title-deeds of his houses and other securities, and directed the man to bring them to his West End residence. The messenger, however, misunderstood his instructions. He took the securities to the office, and not, finding Kedpath there, delivered the securities to the officials oE the company. Meanwhile the forger was flying to Paris, but — possibly because through the error of his messenger he was without funds— he determined to give himself up, and telegraphed to say lie was. returning. He was arrested a few days after* , wards at an hotel in London, but there is little doubt that he would in any case have surrendered, As the investigation of the company's books proceeded it was discovered that thousand after thousand had been misappropriated by this ingenious criminal. The total amount of artificial stock that he had created was no less tbaa. £187.000, all of which he had sold for his own benefit, and upon all of which the cempany had been paying interest and dividends. The effect oi" thin gigantic fraud was to raise the nominal capital of the company to an amount considerably greater than that permitted by its Parliamentary powers. Counsel advised Die company thai until they obtained enlarged powers from Parliament they must pay no dividend upon the excess capital, and that since the fraud had been perpetrated in such a manner that it was impossible to distinguifh original stock from that created by ' Hpdpat'n, they must pay no dividend whatever. Thus the holders of the artificial slock were not • the only sufferers from the delinquencies of the i Forger. Kedp&th was tried at the Central Criminal j Court on January 1 5, l.sr>7. He was defended by Mr Sergeant Parry and Mr Tindal Atkinson; Mr Sergeant ."IJallantine, Mr Bodkin, and Mr Ct (Yard representing the prosecution. He pleaded not guilty, bin after hearing the evidence, the jury, without leaving their box, convicted him of forgery, ami he was sentenced to transj portntion bi'vuml (lie peas fi»r the term of his j nuturrtl iii'e.