Forgers Of Fivers.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume XXXXVII, Issue 11736, 13 September 1902, Page 5

Forgers Of Fivers.

To "forge a liver" is the ambition of mary criminals, and tUa; it is clone sucicesuuily was recently proved at tue Ontral Criminal Court. The first important.bank-note forger'was a lawyer's, uerk nameu vauguan. tic, however, did his work so clumsily that even his sweetneart, on whom he attempted to foist them, detected the iorgery. i Vaughan was hanged for his ottence on the day tuat was to have witnessed Ins wedding. \ A native of Carlisle, some 20 years afterwards, a copper-plate engraver by trade, tried his hand on forging Bank ot" Scotland notes, and with sucli success, that "he ! came to London, took lodgings in the strand, purchased a good plant, and proceeded to'forge tbe ±;20 Bank of England note. So clever were the forgeries that lie boldly went to the Bank o£ England with >i bundle of his own manufactured notes, and changed them for notes of a higher value. On one of these visits to the Bank he was indiscreet enough to boldly assert that a guinea, the goodness of which had been questioned, was as good as his notes. . The clerk who paid him then closely examined Lin notes, and the next time he presented himself he was arrested, and taken before Sir John Fielding, the bind magistrate of Bow-street. He gave the alias of Hatherson Maxwell, and had he beeii wise enough to have kept a silent tongue in his head he might have escaped, because the Bank of England failed to prove the case against him, their own paper-makers- denying that the watermaik on the Maxwell note could be other than genuine; but'hisi boasting brought to the knowledge of the authorities his journey from Edinburgh, and the passing of the Scotch forged notes. He was then condemned to death.

i The forger who undoubtedly cost the 1 Bank of England the most money tos au olid man named Price, who, in consequence !of the disguise he assumed, was called "old patch." As an invalid he sat in a coach, and calling at lottery offices he was able to pass his forged notes for lotteiy tickets, which he disposed of immediately. He lived iv three different parts of London, had three homes, and three Mrs Prices; and at one home he made the paper, at another the ink, and at a. third he printed the notes. His forgeries were perfect-, andi on moro than one occasion his notes, being for large amounts, were sent to the Bank of England for verification, and returned* by the clerks as unquestionably good. He passed as much as £10,000 worth in a week, and when the Bank offered £200 reward for the arrest of the old muffled man, he simply changed his disguise. Price defied the police for fifty-six years, and even when arrested he contrived to convey a message to Ids "wives" to destroy everything; but one, in her anxiety, failed to get rid of some small plates, which alone would have secured his conviction. Even whilst, in prison he paid the governor of the gaol with a forged £10 note for the food supplied to him. He was known in one year to have had ovei* £100,000, but upon hearing .of the discover- of the- plates ho committed suicide by hanging himself. It is said that when* folded a bank note will bear a weight of 501b., but visitors to the room in the Bank of England where the paid notes are stored for ten years before being burned are allowed to feel how really light the notes are. because a bundle representing £1,000,000 crfn be easily placed in one's coat pocket. In the King's College Museum there are preserved the ashes of £2.000.000 worth of note>\ and it looks just like a small piece of old burned iron. Notes to the value of £40,000,000 were burned once, and tha nsl.es only weighed 12oz. —"1.0.LV