MYSTERY OF THE IRISH GROWN JEWELS

Waipa Post, Volume 48, Issue 3477, 9 June 1934, Page 4

MYSTERY OF THE IRISH GROWN JEWELS

STORIES OF A BYGONE DAY.

FAMOUS CRIMES RECALLED. Some remarkable recollections of famous crimes were told recently by a London journalist in a book published by 'John Long, entitled " Crime from the Inside." The stories are told by a warder, a confidence trickster, and a receiver. One story is about the mystery of the Irish Crown jewels. It is one of the stories told by the receiver of stolen property. He quotes instances of stolen jewels being smuggled out of a watched house in flower-pots carried by a. bogus gardener; of a diamond necklace worth thousands of pounds being smuggled across to Amsterdam in a carton of sandwiches, under the eyes of detectives, by a bogus clergyman.

But his most remarkable story concerns the theft of the Irish Crown jewels in 1907. In the first place, he says, they were taken by a minor official at Dublin Castle and lodged with„a moneylender merely as temporary security for a £IOOO loan. The moneylender's house was burgled, and the thief took them to a "fence " in Whitechapel, who, before he knew what they were, advanced £IOO on account. When the sensational news leaked out none of those concerned dared come forward and confess his share in their disappearance, and it was impossible to dispose of them, although they were estimated to be worth £40,000 Criminals who got to know something of the " fence's " part in the business, and also that he was being closely watched by the police, avoided him like the plague, and he became so poor that he had to beg in the streets. The jewels were never recovered. "If the story I was told is correct," says the narrator, "they can never be recovered, becauise they are now at the bottom of the sea." COINCIDENCES. The long arm of coincidence is often active in crime. The sister of aj warder paying a visit to his prison recognised in one of the convicts the son she believed to be working on a farm in Queensland. A burglar was identified by a warder as the man

who had inflicted fatal injuries on his father. An official of the Prisoners' Aid Society saw in the Strand one night an ex-convict who had been an army officer and the guest of the highest nobility, and even royalty; now " down and out," he was opening a carriage door for a lady and a gentleman coming out of the Gaiety Theatre. They ignored him. He burst into tears.

"Did you see them?" he asked, speaking at last.

" See whom ? " said the mission-

" Those two —the carriage," he whispered in a jerky voice. " I'm glad they didn't tip me, for had they done so the girl might have recognised her father."

Once, when it was announced that a famous prima donna was to sing at a prison concert, one of the convicts pleaded that he should be allowed to remain in his cell. The rea> son was that the. convict, who had been a power in financial circles and entertained lavishly at his town and country houses, had frequently paid that prima donna fees of 200 guineas to sing to Ms guests!' He ; did hot want to risk her recognising him in the audien.ee.

BAD LUCK. There are many instances of surprise captures. A jewel thief was returning home on a buis with a stolen necklace in his pocket when an irate woman suddenly accused him, quite unjustly, of having stolen her purse. She would not be appeased, and a policeman was called. During the search at the station the necklace was found—and the woman remembered she had left her puirse by a washing-basin in a West End store ! -- •'•■'•

Another thief with a stolen necklace in his pocket was knocked down crossing Whitehall —and the first man to run to assist him was a passing Scotland Yard detective.

There are instances, too, of. extreme ingenuity. The warder was once astonished to observe that a convict, who had been sentenced as " Alfred Jones, commercial traveller," resembled exactly a photograph in an old Illustrated London News, with the caption, "The Hon. Geo. the famous big game hunter, who has gone on a shooting expedition to East Africa." The Hon. George, alias Jones, subsequently confessed to the warder. that he. had; his valet to send in that social paragraph when he was sentenced, and further, to book a cabin in a liner and travel down to it with a vast collection of luggage bearing his master's name ! When the prisoner had served his time he slipped out of England to Africa, and after a suitable interval duly returned from " the wilds." But he did not resume his place in society, fearing he might be recognised bty chance as an ex-convict.. A certain burglar had been a writserver. Promised a sovereign if he could serve a writ on a wily and elusive person, he impersonated his butcher's boy and delivered the writ Snside a sausage!