GREAT Train Robber Ronnie Biggs, former Redhill resident and borough council employee, has died, aged 84, 50 years after his arrest for the crime at his home in Alpine Road.
Ronald Biggs, at the time of the 1963 £2,631,784 raid on a mail train in Buckinghamshire, lived in Redhill, almost opposite the Holmethorpe Industrial Estate, in a modest semi in a working class area of town.
Born in Lambeth, he became involved in petty crime at a young age and spent a time in Wormwood Scrubs where he met and became close mates with fellow train robber Bruce Reynolds.
On leaving jail he took up carpentry and stayed with "a pretty tough lady" at Merstham, called Ivy, a friend of Reynolds, who, when visiting her, turned up in a "ritzy sports car".
In 1958 he worked on Redhill building sites but left for work as a chippie in London. While commuting from Redhill he met 17-year-old Charmian Powell on the train. She was the daughter of the headmaster at Reigate Parish School, London Road, Reigate, and lived with her parents in the school grounds. It was in the classrooms of this school that Biggs and Charmian got involved in amorous activities. They married at Reigate Register Office in 1960.
Ron was involved in a petty crime spree in the South West in 1958 and was jailed for two years. He was released in time to celebrate the new year of 1960 and Charmian was waiting for him outside Wandsworth. They stayed in a hotel and next day came to Redhill seeking accommodation, while staying with friends John and Violet Goldsmith.
The book, Surrey in the Sixties, notes that Biggs soon obtained work with Reigate Borough Council as a carpenter.
In his autobiography, Ronald Biggs, Odd Man Out (Bloomsbury 1994), he writes of the council job: "Not very well paid but plenty of tea and sympathy with the housewives". He writes that they rented a small flat, planned to get married but Charmian's father was against it.
Ronnie soon changed his job to working for an elderly Redhill building contractor by the name of Sid Budgeon. He worked overtime because his wife was expecting, and Nicholas Grant Biggs was born on July 23, 1960 at Redhill County Hospital.
"His proud and happy parents wheeled 'His Nibs' [his son] through the streets of Redhill in an enormous plum-covered baby carriage."
In April 1962, Ron and "Charm" had drinks with her old school pal Janet, and her husband, Ray Stripp, resulting in Ronnie and Ray forming a partnership, Biggs and Stripp, employing ten labourers and operating from the address at 37 Alpine Road.
Ron and Charmian's second son, Christopher Dean, was born on March 24, 1963, putting a strain on the household budget. Ronnie was tempted back to crime when approached by Bruce Reynolds who offer him a £40,000 cut if he were to take part in a job, "enough to buy four new four-bedroomed houses in the best part of Reigate," wrote Ronnie in his book.
Biggs knew of an un-named Redhill train driver whose house he was working on in Redhill. "While watering plants in his garden, the plan of action was discussed and the train driver agreed to take part", Biggs states.
Local rumours have persisted about this and the Surrey Mirror has on more than one occasion been furnished with a name of the said British Rail employee but as he was never charged, we will not be giving further details. The railway employee named locally died a few years after the train raid.
After the train robbery on Thursday, August 8 1963, Biggs arrived back home in Alpine Road with Reynolds and they put down two kit bags on the kitchen floor which Charmian learned were full of cash. While he had been away, his brother Jack had died of a heart attack and the police were looking for Ronnie on "a tree felling job in Wiltshire".
Next morning the money was tipped on to the bedroom floor. The sum of £40,000 of blue £5 notes in one suitcase and £30,000 in mixed notes in another and more in a holdall. Minders later looked after the proceeds.
Surrey in the Sixties tells how Ronnie celebrated with an Indian meal in Soho and some window shopping.
A pick-up truck later removed £60,000 from the house. Some £40,000 was later taken unwittingly by a cab driver to Horley and handed to another minder at a pub. Both minders received £5,000. Then, back for a celebratory drink in Redhill, Biggs noted the bar girl checking the numbers of notes to make sure they were not from the robbery!
Some days later, one of the robbers was arrested in Bournemouth. And then £100,000 from the raid was found in Redlands Wood, at Coldharbour, Dorking, by Mr John Ahern whose motorcycle had overheated a few yards away from the trees. He thought someone had left the remains of a picnic, investigated, and, unzipping a holdall, discovered it stuffed with £1 notes. Police were on the trail. A further £30,000 cash was discovered in a caravan at the Clovelly site, Box Hill, concealed behind panelling. This was robber James White's hideaway.
The Chief Constable of Surrey attended the raid on the caravan which had red checked curtains, and had been recently vacated by a young pair with a white toy poodle.
Police also raided a retail outlet at Molesey near Hampton Court and made arrests in connection with the inquiry.
The rest is history. Biggs was arrested at Alpine Road, Redhill, by officers including young Sgt Jack Slipper – later Detective Superintendent Jack Slipper. He and colleagues had ripped up his floorboards in the hunt for cash. Some of the proceeds of the robbery had been put in the kitchen stove fire and the ashes scattered on the rosebeds in the garden. The un-named Redhill train driver was never caught but Slipper years later told Biggs that inquiries had been made amongst railway staff. Three members of the gang remain undetected.
Biggs escaped from Wandsworth jail on July, 8 1965, little over a year into his 30-year jail term for his part in the robbery. He was chased all over the globe by detectives, but eventually enjoyed many years of freedom in Brazil where he had a native son which prevented his extradition. Charmian moved to Australia. Her father tragically took his own life in the Castle Grounds, Reigate, in the mid 70s. It was said that he was depressed by all the shame that had been brought on the family by his son-in-law.
In last year's TV series, "Mrs Biggs" told how Ronnie had led her into a life of crime and how, during a raid on a shop, she was once the getaway driver.
In an earlier television programme, screened more than a decade ago, Charmian described how her husband had pressurised her to steal £200 from a cash float at Reigate Parish School.
Biggs voluntarily returned to Britain in 2001 and was re-imprisoned but was released on compassionate grounds before his 80th birthday. He had been in poor health and living in a care home for the past few years.
He once told a reporter that while in exile in Rio de Janeira his one wish that he could be back in Redhill, playing a game of backgammon with his pals in the Red Lion, Redhill.
