The Great Train Robbery Read Online Free Page B

passed on ‘the message’. Discussion did not further clarify the informant’s story – i.e. whether ‘the brother’ was also a Post Office employee in view of the two shares of money; whether the message was passed direct to Goody or to Brian Field; whether, if ‘the brother’ was an Irishman, the man on the train was also Irish or a step brother. It was suggested to Mr Hatherill that ‘the brother’ might have been a railwayman who had assisted with the possible sabotage of the HVP van and Mr Millen – who was, apparently, also present when the informant was seen – said that although there was no information about a railwayman, he would not entirely discount such a possibility. It was generally assumed by Police that the information from the ‘man on the train’ had been passed on by telephone but I explained at once that on the 9 August I had taken steps to trace and check every ticketed call made to the London area from stations and towns at which the Up Special TPO had stopped and that the only suspicious call traced was one from Rugby to Wicken, Bucks (pub to pub). There is, however, an STD service from some places on the route. Mr Millen asked us to get out the personnel papers of all 70 odd TPO staff who were on the train that night and then to discuss the problem of concentrating inquiries on any Irishman or officers with Irish names. Mr Millen further said that another clue was the identity of the ‘man on the train’ was that he would be known to Brian Field – i.e. he might have been represented in Court by Messrs Wheater or Field might have been concerned in a house purchase for the Post Office man.
    The build up of HVP sacks did not reach the total of 100 until the Up Special TPO reached Tamworth at 1.23 am and that if any information about loads were given out by a member of the train crew in time to reach Goody by 11.30 pm it must have been at Preston where the TPO stopped at 10.50 pm – or, if given some time latitude - at the next stop, i.e. Warrington 11.36 pm. Even at Warrington, however, there were only 46 HVP bags on board. The train reached Crewe well after midnight and by this time Goody had, apparently, reached the farm. There were only 91 mail bags on board at Crewe. It was clear, therefore, that there was something radically wrong with this information, and it became a question for consideration, as in all ‘informant’ cases, whether when some information can be disproved, other parts of the story could be relied on. One further part of the story did not ring true – i.e. that which deals with the number of officers to be found in the HVP coach by the time the train reached Cheddington. It is, of course, impossible for any man on the TPO to say hours ahead how many officers could be found in the HVP coach. The Inspector on the train has full authority to switch staff to that point and indeed on this very night he sent two additional officers to assist with the heavy load. Mr Osmond and I felt somewhat sceptical about the accuracy of this information but I pushed ahead with IB inquiries on the basis that some latitude might, perhaps, have to be allowed. There were 16 officers on the train that night who could be regarded as Irishmen, particulars of whom have been supplied to New Scotland Yard. Of those, only 10 have one or more brothers, and of the 10 only two would have had normal and free access to the HVP coach – i.e. Mr M R Lyttle, PHG London, who travelled from Carlisle to London and Mr T McCarthy, PHG Glasgow, who travelled from Glasgow to Crewe. IB and Police inquiries have so far failed to direct suspicion to either man but observation is being maintained on their movements from time to time for signs of any lavish spending. 1
    Having had the Friday and the weekend to work on the ‘matters arising’ from the conference, Osmond and Yates returned to Scotland Yard on Monday 2 September where they put to Hatherill the results of their own interim investigation. In