Fraudsters and Charlatans (23 page)

Two weeks later, no doubt refreshed from their holiday, Benson and Kurr were back in London. They had a meeting on 19 October with Inspector Meiklejohn, who had been thinking, as usual, of himself. He had come to the conclusion that he knew enough about Kurr and his business to demand a very substantial settlement, and so he asked for £2,000. After some wrangling, the sum of £500 was agreed, but the only cash available was in the form of £100 Clydesdale banknotes. While these were not numbered, they were sufficiently rarely seen in England to attract attention as soon as anyone presented one to a bank.

Meiklejohn, with careless self-confidence, began at once to change the notes, one in Manchester and one in Leeds, where he supplied his own name to the banks. The Leeds police wrote to Scotland Yard, but the letter went straight to Druscovich, who burnt it. Benson was furious with Meiklejohn, who claimed that he was a personal friend of the Chief Constable of Leeds and could get out of any trouble simply by writing to him.

The conspirators, now believing they were in the clear, started to plan the next stage of the swindle, and accordingly, early in November, moved their centre of operations to the Bridge of Allan in Scotland, where their Clydesdale notes would not be so noticeable. This was at the suggestion of Meiklejohn, who originated from the nearby village of Green Loaming and offered to introduce them to Mr Monteith, the bank manager there. Before they left they saw Druscovich, who warned that someone had mentioned Kurr's name to Abrahams. They pacified Druscovich with £100 and some jewellery for his wife.

Kurr (who was now calling himself Captain William Gifford), Benson (under his alias of G.H. Yonge) and Meiklejohn stayed at the Queen's Hotel, where they enjoyed convivial dinners and made plans. On Meiklejohn's recommendation, Monteith was happy to open accounts for Yonge and his associate, and accepted their Clydesdale notes. Kurr's new paper was called the
Racing News
. Soon, Brydone's presses were busy again.

In London, meanwhile, Abrahams was continuing his inquiries. Finding that the Scotland Yard officers were not pressing matters as fast as they should, he decided to engage private detectives, much to the alarm of Druscovich, who complained to Williamson that the latter were hampering his own inquiries. Abrahams decided to offer a reward of £1,000 for the apprehension of the fraudsters, still with the only names he was aware of, and on 8 November his advertisement appeared in newspapers and was circulated to banks and police stations. At last his efforts paid off. William Rayner, the Shanklin postmaster, saw the advertisement and recognised the description of the wanted man as Mr Yonge of Shanklin. On hearing this, Abrahams ordered that any letters arriving in Shanklin should be watched.

On 10 November Druscovich was ordered to go to the Isle of Wight, and on the same day an informant sent an urgent telegram to Kurr, warning him that if Benson was in Shanklin he should be told to leave at once. The telegram was followed up with a letter. Since Benson was in Scotland, Kurr was not worried. Before Druscovich could set out, however, further news arrived at Scotland Yard that necessitated a change of plan. A cheque from the Royal Bank of London had been cashed in Edinburgh and traced back to Brydone, who had, it seemed, helped himself to his own handiwork. When the police raided the print works, they found 1,000 copies of the
Racing News
and a pile of fake cheques. They promptly seized the material and the plates.

Meanwhile, Abrahams's watch of the Shanklin letters had intercepted correspondence between Benson's servant at the Bridge of Allan and a maid in Shanklin. Abrahams went to Scotland Yard with the news. Soon, Williamson was reeling from another shock. The Edinburgh police had wired him to confirm the presence of Yonge and Gifford at the Queen's Hotel and revealed that Meiklejohn (who had booked in under his own name) had been with them. Druscovich, who had not yet set out for Shanklin, was ordered to go to Scotland instead. Both the initial and the altered plan had been revealed to as few officers as possible. At 7 p.m that evening Clarke and Palmer met at a Masonic dinner. At 8 p.m. an anonymous wire was sent to Benson and Kurr. ‘D is coming down tonight, let Shanks [i.e. Benson] keep out of the way.'
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A letter was also sent on a piece of blotting paper. It said: ‘Keep the lame man out of the way at once.'
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The writing was never identified, but Kurr later asserted that Clarke told him he had written it. The men packed their bags, Benson heading south. Kurr, who remained in Scotland, sent a telegram to Palmer's home asking for full details of Druscovich's movements, and received a reply that evening. The letters did not arrive at the hotel until the men had left and remained there for several days in the charge of the landlord.

Kurr wired Druscovich to meet him at Caledonian Station. ‘Important. Come immediately on receipt of this.'
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Druscovich arrived on 11 November and Kurr offered him £1,000 not to go to the Bridge of Allan, but the detective said he had no choice. ‘He was more like a madman than anything else,' said Kurr later. ‘He kept saying “Cannot I take him [Benson] and afterwards let him go?” '
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Benson later observed that he had no intention of trusting himself to Druscovich.

Kurr went back to Derby while the talented and usually dynamic Druscovich continued the investigation, which – and this must have pained him deeply – he had to carry out as badly as possible. He dawdled for half a day and did not go to the Bridge of Allan until the afternoon, then sent a wire to Williamson saying that the men had left just before he got there. He had a watch kept on the printer's, knowing that the gang would not come near the place, and tried to convince the police at the Bridge of Allan that the meetings between Meiklejohn, Yonge and Gifford were of no importance, then sent them off on a false trail. Finally, when he returned to Edinburgh, without collecting the vital letters, he found two telegrams awaiting him from Abrahams, who was now deeply impatient with his lack of progress. Abrahams's investigations had established that Mr Yonge was the Harry Benson who had defrauded the Lord Mayor in 1871, and urged that his description should be circulated to all ports. ‘You should get hold of their letters,' he instructed impatiently. ‘What are you doing?'
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The gang next met in Derby. Kurr was anxious to retrieve the £3,500 deposited in the Scottish bank, but Meiklejohn was unwilling to go, so Murray (who had slipped back into England under an assumed name) was instructed to take his place. It was imperative that the easily identifiable Benson get out of the way, and so he sailed for Dublin.

In Scotland, a weary and ill Druscovich was obliged to collect the letters, which, he saw to his relief, did not implicate him. Returning to London on 17 November he handed them to Williamson. The superintendent was by now a very anxious man. His star officer was suspiciously lacking in drive and efficiency, and Meiklejohn had met the wanted men. When Williamson read the letters, he must have been thunderstruck. Not only did they describe the confidential orders given to Druscovich, but one letter was very obviously in the handwriting of an officer who so far he had not suspected at all, Inspector William Palmer, a solid hardworking man with twenty-two years in the force.

The letters were passed on to the Treasury Solicitor, and Williamson was asked to obtain formal reports from Meiklejohn and Druscovich, explaining their actions. Meiklejohn responded that he had gone to Scotland to inquire about a missing portmanteau, and met the fraudsters by chance. Believing the men to be respectable, he had introduced them to the banker, which he very much regretted. Druscovich's report stated only that the men escaped just before he arrived because they were elusive. Williamson, unable to take his own senior officers into his confidence, was obliged, while inquiries continued, personally to take on as much of the work of the department as he could. The only man he trusted was Clarke.

Benson, unwilling to go America as advised, sent his servant there, instructing him to send letters and cables when he arrived to give the impression that he, Benson, had gone, while in fact he returned to England and met Kurr. Kurr was a worried man, and to foil the ongoing investigations devised a new plan together with an associate, Henry Stenning, who was staying at his house. The two were of similar build, and exchanged clothes to make identification more difficult. On 28 November they learned that Murray's attempts to retrieve the money had led to his arrest, although he had been released on a technicality and was back in London. There he had managed to change two Clydesdale notes, but when he tried two more the next day the money-changers, knowing that the police had issued warnings about such notes, held on to them.

Kurr decided to employ a solicitor, Edward Froggatt, who was recommended not so much for his legal acumen as for his willingness to assist with fraudulent transactions. Froggatt, who soon realised that the money they were so anxious to change was not honestly come by, offered to get in touch with some friends who would look after it for a commission. Soon afterwards, Benson, Charles Bale and Frederick Kurr sailed for Rotterdam, where Benson booked into a hotel as George Washington Morton.

In London, Kurr felt that the 15 per cent commission demanded by Froggatt's friends was too steep, so Murray contacted another man, Savory, and a meeting was set up to arrange the transaction on 29 November. Unknown to Murray, Savory was an informant, and had invited others to the meeting: the police. Murray was arrested and Froggatt was sent to defend him. At their interview Froggatt pointed out dryly that Murray should have accepted the 15 per cent.

Soon afterwards, Kurr received very disturbing news. Benson, who must have been aware that, while a Clydesdale note was a rarity in England, it was virtually unknown in Rotterdam, had tried to change one at his hotel. On 3 December he and his companions were arrested. Kurr at once held an emergency meting with Meiklejohn and Froggatt, where they hatched a plan. A telegram was sent addressed to ‘Chief of Police, Rotterdam, Holland':

Find Morton and the two men you have in custody are not those we want. Officer will not be sent over. Liberate them. Letter follows.

Williamson, Superintendent of Police, Scotland Yard
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Fortunately, the Dutch police decided to wait for the letter, which did not arrive. Instead, Druscovich was sent to Rotterdam with five other officers to apprehend Benson, and was obliged to wait there for the lengthy extradition proceedings to be completed. Before he departed he suggested that Kurr's house be watched. Kurr had been a suspect for some time, although he had kept so far in the background that it was hard to obtain evidence against him, and so Druscovich may well have felt safe in making that suggestion.

Froggatt also went to Rotterdam to try to bribe the Dutch authorities with £50. In this he was unsuccessful, but he learned that a French directory used by Benson to select victims and annotated in his writing had been left at an address in Hackney, and so he rushed back to England to try and get hold of it. He was too late: it was already in the possession of the police.

Kurr, who judged every man by his own dishonest standards, decided to see if Abrahams was willing to come to a compromise arrangement, and wrote him an anonymous letter, which the solicitor very wisely ignored. Kurr's eagerness to pay off Abrahams gave Froggatt a chance to make some money. He arranged for an accomplice called Sawyer to pose as Abrahams's agent, and arranged a meeting with Kurr for 31 December, when £3,000 was to be handed over, supposedly to square Abrahams and persuade the Comtesse to give up the prosecution.

The meeting did not take place. On 30 December Mr Flintoff told the police that he could identify the man who rented his offices at Northumberland Street. Consequently, a warrant was obtained for Kurr's arrest, which on the following day Williamson handed to 29-year-old Detective Sergeant (later Chief Inspector) John George Littlechild, warning him to keep the nature of the mission secret, even from his colleagues. Littlechild was puzzled, but did as advised, although he was sensible enough to take a trusted associate with him.

That evening, as three men, including Kurr and Stenning, emerged from Kurr's house, the watching detectives closed in on them and gave chase. Littlechild made after Kurr, but Stenning tried to trip him and then seized him around the body. Fortunately, Littlechild had armed himself with a stout blackthorn cudgel, and a blow on Stenning's head sent the man reeling. The detectives then darted off after their main quarry. Kurr suddenly turned, and Littlechild found himself looking down the barrel of a revolver. ‘For Heaven's sake, don't make a fool of yourself,' he said. ‘It means murder.' Kurr, suddenly realising what he had been about to do, replied ‘I won't', and meekly allowed Littlechild to arrest him.
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Languishing in his cell, he was alarmed to see Flintoff come in and confidently identify him. Sending for Froggatt, the two quickly cooked up a new plan to get Kurr off the hook. Stenning was sent to persuade Flintoff to change his evidence, but without success. As Flintoff came to court, Froggatt was waiting for him at the door. He told him that Kurr was ‘a good fellow, a Freemason in distress',
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and offered him £50 to declare that his identification was a mistake. But the only mistake was made by Froggatt: a Freemason's obligation to his brethren does not extend to helping them evade the law. Flintoff refused the bribe and identified Kurr in court. Froggatt and Kurr then had him prosecuted for perjury, a ploy that failed.

Littlechild was in court to hear the evidence, and spotted the familiar face of Stenning, who was promptly arrested. As he was seized, Stenning attempted to destroy a paper, which was taken from him. It was the details of an escape plan that he had been intending to pass to Kurr. Stenning was ultimately jailed for a year.

While all this was happening, Druscovich was waiting unhappily in Rotterdam for the extradition proceedings to be finalised. He received a letter there from Williamson. A Leeds police officer had visited the superintendent and mentioned the letter sent six weeks previously. Unable to find it, Williamson wanted to know if Druscovich had seen the letter. Druscovich replied that he knew nothing about it.