Great Train Robbery (1963) - On The Trail of The Great Train Robbers

On The Trail of The Great Train Robbers

With the other robbers on the run and fled out of the country, only Jimmy White was left in the United Kingdom.

Jimmy White was a renowned locksmith/thief and had already been on the run for ten years before the robbery. He was said to have "a remarkable ability to be invisible, to merge with his surroundings and become the ultimate Mr Nobody." He was a wartime paratrooper and a veteran of Arnhem. According to Piers Paul Read in his 1978 book The Train Robbers, Jimmy White was "a solitary thief, not known to work with either firm, he should have had a good chance of remaining undetected altogether, yet was known to be one of the Train Robbers almost at once - first by other criminals and then by the police". He was unfortunate in that Brian Field's relatives had dumped luggage containing £100,000 only a mile from a site where White had bought a caravan and hidden £30,000 in the panelling. In addition, a group of men claiming to be from the Flying Squad broke into his flat and took a brief case containing £8,500. Throughout his three years on the run with wife Sheree and baby son Stephen, he was taken advantage of or let down by friends and associates. On 10 April 1966 a new friend recognised him from photos in a newspaper and informed police. They arrested him at Littlestone while he was at home. He only had £8,000 to hand back to them. The rest was long gone. He was tried in June 1966 at Leicester Assizes and Justice Nield sentenced him to only 18 years' jail (considerably less than the original terms of 30 years).

Charlie Wilson took up residence outside Montreal, Canada on Rigaud Mountain in an upper-middle-class neighbourhood where the large, secluded properties are surrounded by trees. Wilson lived under the name Ronald Alloway, a name borrowed from a Fulham shopkeeper. He joined an exclusive golf club and participated in the activities of the local community. It was only when he invited his brother-in-law over from the UK for Christmas that Scotland Yard was able to track him down and recapture him. They waited three months before making their move, in the hope that Wilson would lead them to Reynolds, the last suspect still to be apprehended. Wilson was arrested on 25 January 1968 by Tommy Butler. Many in Rigaud petitioned that his wife and three daughters be allowed to stay in the Montreal area.

Bruce Reynolds was the last of the robbers to be caught.