FAMOUS FRAUDS.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XII, Issue XXI, 26 May 1894, Page 484

FAMOUS FRAUDS.

BY

WILLIAM FRANCIS.

LEOPOLD RED'PATH : PHILANTHROPIST AND FORGER. There’s not a crime But takes its proper change out still in crime, If once rung on the counter of this world. Let sinners look to it. E. B. Browning.

EOKGE STEVENSON, the great engineer, was often called upon to pass an opinion upon newly-invented machines. On one such occasion he listened kindly and courteously to the inventor’s somewhat lengthy and profuse praise of his work, but when words failed the voluble gentleman, and be paused, as he supposed, to hear his own opinion, Stevenson quietly and quaintly remarked, • It won’t pay, sir 1 It won’t pay, sir !’ The above incident, or rather the closing words of it, came forcibly to our mind when we read the intelligence that the arch robber of our generation, Jabez Balfour, was at last in the hands of justice. At last the ex M. P. has learnt by bitter experience that fraud won’t pay. And this, as we shall endeavour to show in these sketches, is the lesson to be gained from an examination of aV the frauds of the past, whether they be the literary forgeries of Ireland and of Chatterton or the commercial forgeries of Redpath, Robson, Roupell, and others. Some years ago there might have been seen in one of the offices of the Great Northern Railway Company two young men whose names were destined to be associated with two gigantic frauds. These were William James Robson, who robbed the Crystal Palace Company of £27,000, and Leopold Kedpath, who robbed the railway company above named out of a quarter of a million sterling. Although these two worthies maintained through life a

close friendship, they were men of somewhet opposite tastes. Robson was a fast young man. He was bent upon ‘seeing life,’ and resorted to questionable places of amusement. Not so his friend Redpath, whose literary and artistic tastes caused him to gather around his table men distinguished in the world of art and letters, and whose natural generosity made him a frequent and liberal contributor to all the philanthropic and religious institutions brought under his notice. Both Robson and Redpath, however, had this in common a love of display, and it was the gratification of this passion which undoubtedly landed both in the felon’s cell. On attaining his majority Redpath quitted the office of the Great Northern Railway Company and entered the services of the Peninsular and Oriental Company. Then taking to himself a wife he set up an establishment at Blackheath in a most extravagant style, and in a few months gained for himself a considerable reputation as a philanthropist and religionist. His career at Blackheath, however, was not of long duration. His house had been furnished on credit by Mr Fox, and this gentleman becoming impatient, made Redpath a bankrupt. Then it was discovered that the name of Redpath was in other tradesmen's books besides those of Mr Fox, that his debts amounted to £5 000, and that when his effects were sold his estate would only realise two dividends—one of Is 6d, and the other of Is. This was in 1840

This unfortunate start did not prevent Redpath gaining a position of trust. in the Brighton Railway Company, nor did it prevent that Company a few years later from recommending him to a position of trust in the service of the Great Northern Railway Company, viz , the office of registrar of shares and transferer of stock. No sooner had his circumstances improved, however, than his taste for elegance and his love of display again developed themselves. He took a house in Chester Terrace, the rental of which was £4OO a year, and furnished it with such magnificence that the furni-

ture alone was estimated to be at least worth £35,000. He also purchased an estate at Weybridge. on which stood an elegant mansion called Messelington House, and which he furnished in style of the greatest splendour. Pictures by first-rate artists, jewellery of the most costly description, and plate of the greatest abundance were found in bis mansion by an officer sent by the Secretary of State, when the defalcations of itsowner became known. In this palatial residence ten servants were engaged, including, in addition to the ordinary class of domestics, a fisher who kept his punt in the river (Weybridge being a great fishing station). A coachman and a courier were specially employed by bis master on his continental travels. In the stables and outhouses stood four sleek horses, a brougham which cost a hundred and eighty guineas, a basket carriage, a fishing punt, and other things required to gratify the tastes of the owner of Meseelington and his friends. Indeed, he denied himself nothing which money could purchase if he had set his heart upon it. We are told, for instance, that during one of his visits to Paris bis attention bad been called to a very beautiful antique model in silver of Leda and the Swan. He desired to become its possessor. So did no less a personage than Napoleon 111. The Emperor offered £7OO for it ; the railway clerk offered £750, and so the coveted ornament found its way to Messeliugton JHouse. It may be mentioned in passing that Redpath was as well known in Paris as in London, and that bis weekly bill at the Windsor Hotel in that gay city averaged £lOO Redpath manifested the same lavish expenditure in all his givings to individuals and to institutions. Rjbson, the Crystal Palace worthy, expended princely sums, but always on himself ; Redpath, on the other hand, expended princely sums on others. There seemed to be, indeed, no limit to his generosity. On one occasion, at one of the theatres which he frequently visited, he went behind the scenes, and walking up to one of the actors, thus addressed him : * My dear fellow, you never take a benefit, and I have no opportunity of showing my appreciation of your character as a man and your talents as an actor as I wish to do ; do me

the pleasure of accepting this slight acknowledgment of my opinion of you,' and then he thrust a cheque tor £5O into the astonished actor’s hands. On another occasion when the bookkeeper of the Haymarket Theatre died leaving a widow and seven children totally unprovided for, an appeal was made to Redpath to assist in getting one of the children into the St. Anne’s Society Asylum. This appeal was not in vain, for the next day the friend of the orphan and the widow sent the requisite number of proxies to secure the election. Most of the London institutions which are supported by voluntary contributions have an annual dinner, and on these festive occasions Redpath was seldom conspicuous by his absence. Indeed, be frequently gave £5O and £lOO in order that the dinner might be served in a more splendid style. He did this at the first dinner at which the Duke of Cambridge presided on his return from the Crimea. At the same time in the subscription list were found the names of Leopold Redpath, Esq., £5O, and Mrs Redpath, £5O. But even this was not the limit of his generosity on this occasion, for during the evening he banded in a cheque for £l5O. as the donation of a citizen who admires the character of His Royal Highness the Duke of Cambridge, and who wishes to congratulate His Royal Highness on his return from the Crimea.’ It is a matter of considerable surprise that such lavish expenditure did not excite suspicion on the part of his employers. His salary of £5OO a year certainly did not cover his expenditure, and the question—Where did the cash come from to enable their subordinate to he so princely in his generosity and so lavish in his display ? could not, one would think, but force itself upon the minds of his superior. It did not do so. however, and they continued to impose implicit trust io their registrar until an accidental occurrence brought to light the forgery and the fraud. One day the chairman of the Great Northern Railway Company, Mr Dennison, was conversing with a nobleman at a railway station when Mr Redpath happened to pass by.

The chairman bowed with dignity to his subordinate, but the nobleman greeted him with great cordiality, grasping the registrar’s hand and chatting as familiarly to him as if be had been his equal. Mr Dennison was not a little surprised at this. *Do you know Mr Redpath ?’ he asked his noble companion. * Know him ?’ was the reply. *He is one of my most intimate friends,’ and then the nobleman went on to tell of his good dinners, bis princely liberality, his grand house in town, and his riverside estate at Weybridge. Now for some time the directors had been puzzled by the discrepancy of the sum on which they were paying dividends and the amount of their subscribed capital, but they entertained no suspicion of the honesty of the clerk. This incident, however, set Mr Dennison thinking. He thought of Robson and the Crystal Palace frauds, which had just come to light, and he determined at once to order an investigation of the books of the Company. The investigation began on November 15th, 1856. Two days after Redpath entered the room in which the accountants were engaged and aaked what they were doing. ‘We are going,’ said the chief accountant, ‘ to investigate all the books from the commencement of the Company.’ Redpath took the hint and fled to Paris. A very slight examination of the books made it clear to the directors that the man in whom they had placed such implicit confidence had been systematically robbing them for a long time. An application was made to the Home Secretary (Sir George Grey) at once, and a warrant was issued for his apprehension. The warrant was entrusted to an officer who traced Redpath to a house in Paris. But the forger receiving a telegram from a friend to the effect that an officer was on his track, returned to London and gave himself up to justice. After several preliminary examinations he was committed to take his trial at the Central Criminal Court, together with bis clerk, a young man named Kent, who was supposed to be implicated with him in his frauds. The trial came on before Mr Baron Martin and Mr Justice Wills on Friday, the 15th of January, 1859. He was defended by Mr Serjeant Parry and Mr

Tindall Atkinson, Serjeant Ballantyne, Mr Bodkin, and Mr Gifford representing the prosecution. The evidence of the prosecution showed that in order to support his assumption of being a person of considerable means, with a town residence in Chester Terrace and a villa at Weybridge, the prisoner had altered the sums standing in the names of the stockholders to much larger amounts, and sold the fictitious stock on the market, forged the name of the supposed transferer, and passed the sum to the account of the supposed transferer in the register, either attesting it himself or causing it to be attested by Kent. One of the instances of forgery given at the trial may be quoted here, as it shows clearly the method by which Redpath obtained his supplies of cash. In this case Redpath had effected a forged transfer of stock for a non-existing person—John Morris, of Menningbrow—which was attested by the signature, ‘ Timothy Shaw ’ — a non-existing witness. As there were no such persons as John Morris and Timothy Shaw, this account was altogether a mere creation of Redpath’s fraudulent brain. But it was entered into the company’s books as real, followed by the initials ‘O B. 197. B ” —which, being interpreted, meant that a similar account would be found in the old books of the company at page 179, consisting of B stock. The reference, of course, like all the rest, was fictitious, yet Redpath drew the dividends as they became due and quietly put them into his own coffeis. It was believed that he realised no less than £lO,OOO by forgeries under the name of Morris alone. The amount which Redpath altogether appropriated by this system of forgeries and fraud reached about a quarter of a million sterling. After hearing the evidence, the jury without leaving their box, convicted him of forgery, and he was sentenced to transportation beyond the seas for the term of his natural life. The case against Kent was abandoned, as it appeared he was not aware of the fraud, but had been the victim of a well conceived plot on the part of a superior officer.