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CLASSIC: The Forty Elephants: London’s All-Female Jewel Thieves · Ridiculous History

0:00
Speaker 1: You know how you sit around some days and you're
0:03
Speaker 1: thinking I should be a jewel thief. But I can't
0:06
Speaker 1: be a jewel thief on my own I need it.
0:08
Speaker 2: But yeah, man, you know I think about that all
0:10
Speaker 2: the time. Yes, yeah, about when I'm sitting around. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
0:12
Speaker 2: as long as I could be the bag man, that's
0:14
Speaker 2: all I'm saying.
0:14
Speaker 1: We've got a weird group chat for sure. This classic
0:19
Speaker 1: episode is from twenty eighteen where we got super into
0:25
Speaker 1: one of the coolest crime stories out there in London
0:31
Speaker 1: and the coolest crime cruise out there in London that
0:34
Speaker 1: would not have had us as members because they were
0:36
Speaker 1: no boys loud right, the forty Elephants, all female jewel thieves.
0:42
Speaker 2: Let's jump right into.
0:48
Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome to the show,
1:17
Speaker 1: Ridiculous Historians. Let's start today's episode off with a question,
1:21
Speaker 1: a favorite topic of conversation for those of us here
1:24
Speaker 1: at how stuff works when we're just hanging out off
1:26
Speaker 1: the air. Have you ever wanted to perpetrate a heist
1:32
Speaker 1: like Ocean's eleven style? And if so, did you ever
1:35
Speaker 1: envision yourself having a specialty? You know, how all the
1:38
Speaker 1: heist teams always have their specialists, right.
1:41
Speaker 2: Well, I've always wanted to be the bag man.
1:44
Speaker 1: The bagman? Yeah yeah, what does that entail? It's the
1:48
Speaker 1: coolest title. Yeah, it's up there. The bag man generally,
1:52
Speaker 1: And someone write in and correct us if I'm off
1:54
Speaker 1: base here, but the bagman generally is a term describing
1:57
Speaker 1: the person who, actually, when you're physically stealing currency or
2:02
Speaker 1: jewelry or precious metals, the person who physically holds the bag.
2:06
Speaker 2: You see, I'm known for my grip? Is that true?
2:09
Speaker 2: Oh yeah? Oh yeah, they say Noel Brown, that kid's
2:12
Speaker 2: got a good grip.
2:13
Speaker 1: They usually refer to me Ben Bollen in my past
2:17
Speaker 1: heist as either the inside man or the shady government liaison.
2:24
Speaker 2: I would have called you the brain.
2:25
Speaker 1: That's very kind. That's very kind, And I guess, by
2:29
Speaker 1: virtue of his position on the show, our super producer,
2:33
Speaker 1: Casey Pegram would probably be and I don't want a pigeonhole,
2:38
Speaker 1: you hear, Casey, our computer expert. You got to have
2:41
Speaker 1: a hacker.
2:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, it's actually funny. There was a character
2:43
Speaker 2: in one of the Grand Theft Auto games that reminded
2:45
Speaker 2: me a lot of Casey and Casey if you take
2:48
Speaker 2: this as an insult, and you know the character I'm
2:50
Speaker 2: talking about, please don't, because I'm more talking about his
2:52
Speaker 2: his very intelligent demeanor, not his look. He was a
2:55
Speaker 2: little bit of an odd looking fellow. But he's the
2:57
Speaker 2: guy that ran the warehouse or they planned all the
2:59
Speaker 2: heist and had the big chalkboard and they you know,
3:01
Speaker 2: drew the maps and they had the table. I remember
3:03
Speaker 2: that guy.
3:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, as long as you're not Trevor Phillips Casey.
3:07
Speaker 2: And Grove Street forever. Man, is he like the meth
3:11
Speaker 2: head guy? Uh yeah, Trevor.
3:13
Speaker 1: Trevor Phillips is the unhinged method guy.
3:16
Speaker 2: Yeah. He lived kind of out in the Salt and
3:18
Speaker 2: Sea type area of what's the name of the fake
3:21
Speaker 2: La san Andreas?
3:23
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, Well, I want to say there's definitely a
3:26
Speaker 1: San Andres. It's got to be San Andreas.
3:28
Speaker 2: I have a segue. It's actually gonna work here. Back
3:30
Speaker 2: all right, go for it. We're talking about video games.
3:32
Speaker 2: You ever heard of the Assassin's Creed video games?
3:34
Speaker 1: Yes, I've played them all.
3:35
Speaker 2: Actually, is there is this one out yet? I just
3:37
Speaker 2: saw this video. It's called like Assassin's Creed something Legacy
3:40
Speaker 2: or something. But it's Abogin or maybe it's about London gangs.
3:43
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I don't know if that one's out yet.
3:45
Speaker 2: Okay, I saw a preview of this game, and it's
3:48
Speaker 2: about London gangs. And in this game, the topic of
3:52
Speaker 2: today's episode was paid homage to Oh Wonderfully.
3:56
Speaker 1: They talked about the forty Thieves, the Farty Thieves, the
3:59
Speaker 1: fire to Elephants gang.
4:01
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, remember the Gangs of New York. Wasn't there
4:03
Speaker 2: a gang called the Farty Thieves.
4:06
Speaker 1: An Irish gang, Irish gang? Yeah yeah, And just to
4:08
Speaker 1: be clear, we're saying four zero with an Irish accent,
4:11
Speaker 1: not not the flatulent Elephants or the flatulent for the
4:14
Speaker 1: flatulent Thieves.
4:16
Speaker 2: Yeah.
4:16
Speaker 1: That's awesome. I want to check that game out. I mean,
4:19
Speaker 1: have you played as thousands agree before?
4:21
Speaker 2: I have not.
4:21
Speaker 1: Oh, it's it's funny, it can be repetitive at times.
4:24
Speaker 1: It's a mixture of some really cool fighting and then
4:27
Speaker 1: some at times incredibly frustrating jump around solve the puzzle sequences.
4:32
Speaker 2: Isn't there a lot of like stock kind of like
4:34
Speaker 2: from a distance, keep your distance and then move in
4:36
Speaker 2: for the kill kind of stuff.
4:37
Speaker 1: But I mean, who hasn't done that totally, just in
4:40
Speaker 1: regular life.
4:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, so.
4:44
Speaker 1: There was a real life gang of thieves, jewel thieves specifically,
4:51
Speaker 1: that were known for their successful, very well planned out heist.
4:55
Speaker 1: They were active for more than two hundred years.
4:59
Speaker 2: See, I thought that was typo when I first saw it.
5:01
Speaker 2: Well someone added an extra zero.
5:03
Speaker 1: Right, No, two hundred years. And this gang was made
5:08
Speaker 1: entirely of female criminals, operating out of the Elephant and
5:13
Speaker 1: Castle area of London.
5:15
Speaker 2: Which I find to be a magnificently whimsical name for
5:18
Speaker 2: an area.
5:19
Speaker 1: London, and you know, the UK in general, they have
5:23
Speaker 1: the very they have wonderful names for places in streets
5:28
Speaker 1: and neighborhoods. But I gotta say I'm not a fan
5:31
Speaker 1: of British names for food, probably just because I didn't
5:35
Speaker 1: grow up there. But like barley water, spotted dick, bubble
5:38
Speaker 1: and squeak bubble and squeak bubble and squeak it isn't
5:40
Speaker 1: even that egregious, sounds like fun whatever it is. But
5:44
Speaker 1: barley water, that just that sounds like a punishment.
5:48
Speaker 2: That's beer, right.
5:49
Speaker 1: I don't think it is noile, I think it's it
5:52
Speaker 1: sounds like it would be a good euphemism for beer.
5:55
Speaker 1: But barley water is a it's just boiled grain in
5:59
Speaker 1: water that hasn't you know, it still doesn't have alcohol.
6:02
Speaker 1: Well it seems like there's no alcohol. Why would you bother? Right,
6:05
Speaker 1: why would you bother consuming barley? So when did the
6:11
Speaker 1: forty Thieves really? What were their glory days?
6:15
Speaker 2: No, we talked about that. They were also called the
6:17
Speaker 2: forty Elephants. Yes, yeah, so that's what I'm going to
6:20
Speaker 2: refer to them as because they lived in this Elephant
6:22
Speaker 2: and Castle district. They were also they were self contained
6:26
Speaker 2: and they were an all female band of heisters. I
6:31
Speaker 2: don't know what you want to call it, criminals, but
6:33
Speaker 2: they were backed up by another gang of kind of
6:36
Speaker 2: really rough and tumble dudes who were the Elephant and
6:40
Speaker 2: Castle Gang and kind of like were almost like their muscle.
6:43
Speaker 2: But yeah, so they were active possibly as early as
6:48
Speaker 2: the seventeen hundreds based on police records, and a lot
6:52
Speaker 2: of this comes from a book called the Gangs of
6:54
Speaker 2: London by a guy named Brian McDonald, and he says
6:58
Speaker 2: that the forty Elephant Gang was probably the most active
7:03
Speaker 2: between the eighteen seventies and the nineteen fifties. But again,
7:07
Speaker 2: go back as far as possibly the seventeen hundreds.
7:10
Speaker 1: Right, it may have been operating without being recognized. Brian also,
7:15
Speaker 1: Brian McDonald also has a book specifically about the forty
7:19
Speaker 1: Elephants and one of their most notable leaders, who we'll
7:22
Speaker 1: get to in a moment, but the book is called
7:24
Speaker 1: Alice Diamond and the Forty Elephants. I appreciate that you
7:27
Speaker 1: mentioned the Elephant and Castle Mob. They were, in a
7:31
Speaker 1: way the muscle. They were headed by these guys called
7:36
Speaker 1: the McDonald brothers, and while they were allied together, they
7:43
Speaker 1: differed widely in their methods. So the Elephant Castle Mob
7:47
Speaker 1: they were more kind of bruisers, but the forty Thieves
7:52
Speaker 1: or the forty Elephants were much more calculated in their crime.
7:57
Speaker 1: They would play the long game. At times, they would
8:01
Speaker 1: masquerade as housemaids for wealthy families. They would use false
8:07
Speaker 1: references and back up the references as well. And during
8:11
Speaker 1: the early twentieth century they were led by someone called
8:16
Speaker 1: Alice Diamond, known variously as the Queen of the Forty
8:20
Speaker 1: Thieves or as Diamond Danny.
8:23
Speaker 2: That's the thing. Then they were a very very militaristically
8:26
Speaker 2: run organization. From their inception, they operated in a series
8:31
Speaker 2: of like cells, almost like a terrorist group, and they
8:33
Speaker 2: always were led by a queen. This Anni Diamond was
8:37
Speaker 2: just kind of the most notorious and influential one.
8:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's correct. There were many, because again, this gang
8:43
Speaker 1: was active for around two hundred years, far surpassing the
8:48
Speaker 1: lifespan of the average person at the time and in
8:52
Speaker 1: their heyday. It's strange because they were romanticized a bit
8:57
Speaker 1: by papers of the time. In one paper they were
9:01
Speaker 1: referred to as Amazons, who were handsome women about six
9:04
Speaker 1: feet tall. We can walk through maybe some of their methods,
9:08
Speaker 1: because I know we made them sound like they only
9:11
Speaker 1: did disguise work, but that was just one of their
9:15
Speaker 1: many strategies for bilking people out of jewelry and valuables.
9:21
Speaker 1: They did a shoplifting method that is actually still common
9:24
Speaker 1: and in practice in parts of the world today, which
9:27
Speaker 1: is overpowering a store through the sheer volume of people participating.
9:31
Speaker 1: All of the gang members would rush into a store
9:34
Speaker 1: from various entrances, and then since there were too many
9:37
Speaker 1: people to apprehend, they would just grab everything they can
9:41
Speaker 1: and then they would flee out of the store, heading
9:43
Speaker 1: in multiple directions, knowing that not all of them could
9:46
Speaker 1: be caught.
9:47
Speaker 2: Not only that, they had like reserve funds for when
9:50
Speaker 2: they had to bail out the one or two stragglers
9:53
Speaker 2: that did get caught. And they basically were considered like
9:56
Speaker 2: untouchable because they had deals running with the p Lease.
10:00
Speaker 2: And this is a very corrupt period in English history.
10:03
Speaker 2: You have to remember. This is like on the tail
10:05
Speaker 2: end of the Industrial Revolution. Things were changing really really quickly,
10:10
Speaker 2: and it was kind of like just a free for
10:12
Speaker 2: all as far as these street gangs, of which there
10:15
Speaker 2: were many, and I just wanted to rattle off a
10:17
Speaker 2: few other ones in there. You know, in this part
10:19
Speaker 2: of the country is huge. You've got gangs like the Scuttlers,
10:24
Speaker 2: the High Rip Gang, the Peaky Blinders. In Birmingham, you've
10:27
Speaker 2: got the cock Road Gang and other such amazingly absurd
10:32
Speaker 2: and beautiful names. But the forty Elephants had an incredible
10:37
Speaker 2: reputation for being ruthless and being cunning and being like
10:42
Speaker 2: I said before, practically untouchable because of the way they
10:46
Speaker 2: ran their operation in these cells and like you're saying,
10:49
Speaker 2: been the way they were able to kind of scatter, you.
10:52
Speaker 1: Know, yeah, kind of a hydra organization cut off one
10:58
Speaker 1: head and two will rise in its place. I don't
11:01
Speaker 1: think we mentioned that Diamond Annie was ruling during the
11:05
Speaker 1: interwar period, so she's around nineteen ten or the late
11:11
Speaker 1: nineteen tens, so World War One has already started. She
11:16
Speaker 1: and her lieutenant Babyfaced Maggie, which I love these nicknames.
11:21
Speaker 1: Everybody's got a great nickname. They're the ones who reputedly
11:26
Speaker 1: had the idea of partnering with the Elephant and Castle
11:32
Speaker 1: Mob to make sure that they had enforcers. There's an
11:36
Speaker 1: excellent article about this gang written by Amelia Hill for
11:41
Speaker 1: The Guardian called Girl Gangscript on London Underworld Revealed, and
11:46
Speaker 1: it dives into some of the work of Brian McDonald.
11:50
Speaker 1: But it also gives us a good context for the
11:54
Speaker 1: time in which this gang existed, or this Glory Day era,
11:59
Speaker 1: because they were taking advantage of the misogynistic chauvinistic attitudes
12:04
Speaker 1: of the time. You know, people thought, oh, a woman
12:09
Speaker 1: couldn't possibly be a criminal if she's dressed.
12:12
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, and I heard this somewhere, Ben, and let
12:15
Speaker 2: me know if you did, or if you think this
12:17
Speaker 2: is completely bogus, But I heard that they sort of
12:19
Speaker 2: had an advantage because women weren't allowed to do very
12:24
Speaker 2: much on their own in this time. But one thing
12:27
Speaker 2: they were allowed to do was shop right on their own.
12:30
Speaker 2: And it may have even been that they were not
12:34
Speaker 2: paid as close attention to because of the fact that
12:36
Speaker 2: you're saying that they're wearing nice clothes and that they're
12:39
Speaker 2: on their own, unaccompanied without a chaperone.
12:42
Speaker 1: You want to respect their privacy. You don't want to
12:44
Speaker 1: be forward in this very repressed age. So there were
12:49
Speaker 1: some upsides here, which we can explore later. But there
12:54
Speaker 1: are some other organizational things that they were very talented at.
12:59
Speaker 1: They had their own territory like most gangs do, but
13:03
Speaker 1: they demanded a percentage of all crimes committed in their territory.
13:09
Speaker 1: So if there's another gang, we'll make up a gang.
13:12
Speaker 1: Let's say the Devin rye on Sandwich gang steals something.
13:17
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter what they steal, they still get wind
13:19
Speaker 1: of it. They still hats yeah, and then the forty
13:22
Speaker 1: thieves or the forty elephants find out about it. They
13:25
Speaker 1: will demand a percentage from that haberdasher's robbery because it
13:30
Speaker 1: happened on their turf. And then if someone refused to
13:33
Speaker 1: pay up got a bit too big for their breeches
13:36
Speaker 1: or perhaps their trousers. Then the gang would send their
13:41
Speaker 1: elephant and castle mob to beat the snot out of
13:45
Speaker 1: them or kidnap their notable members or their family members
13:49
Speaker 1: until their percentage was paid.
13:51
Speaker 2: And that's not to say that the female members of
13:53
Speaker 2: this gang weren't bruisers in and of themselves. Diamond Annie,
13:57
Speaker 2: for example, got her name because she had a fistful
14:00
Speaker 2: of diamond rings that if she clocked you in the
14:03
Speaker 2: face with, you'd probably lose an eye or you know,
14:06
Speaker 2: you would not be doing very well. And they were
14:09
Speaker 2: known for wriggling out of tight situations with the law
14:14
Speaker 2: with violent methods. They'd carry blackjacks and straight razors and
14:17
Speaker 2: all kinds of concealed weapons. But for the big stuff,
14:20
Speaker 2: like you said, the door to door, you know, give
14:23
Speaker 2: us our what do you call, like our vig or
14:25
Speaker 2: whatever you know, or like the what do they call
14:27
Speaker 2: in the Sopranos when they get in collections, right going
14:30
Speaker 2: door to door? They sent left that to the big
14:33
Speaker 2: burly dudes.
14:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, there might also be the matter of protection fees
14:37
Speaker 1: or something like that. Common mind, Yeah, exactly exactly. They
14:41
Speaker 1: also did something that may surprise people. They they diversified
14:46
Speaker 1: their crime, which makes it more mafioso and less just
14:51
Speaker 1: street gang. They were. They were very into blackmailing men,
14:57
Speaker 1: seducing married men or men of and then forcing them
15:02
Speaker 1: to pay either a huge lump sum or a continuing
15:06
Speaker 1: almost the service fee not to reveal their carnal predilections.
15:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, and we're kind of leaning on some of the
15:13
Speaker 2: most well known members of this gang, like Diamond Anny
15:16
Speaker 2: in particular. Like you said, I mean that book that
15:19
Speaker 2: McDonald wrote focuses a lot on her. But there's a
15:23
Speaker 2: lot of periods in this gang history that we don't
15:25
Speaker 2: know a whole lot about other than that they did exist.
15:29
Speaker 1: Right right, because they were also successful at functioning away
15:34
Speaker 1: from the spotlight. It's weird because for almost two hundred years,
15:39
Speaker 1: you know, they were playing a very dangerous game. If
15:42
Speaker 1: any of them were caught, they could be sentenced to
15:45
Speaker 1: somewhere between three and twelve months hard labor or three
15:49
Speaker 1: years in prison and hard labor at the time. We've
15:52
Speaker 1: talked about this in previous episodes was absolutely no joke.
15:56
Speaker 1: You know, you're like, un what is it you're unraveling rope?
15:59
Speaker 1: I think that's that's one of the things you had
16:00
Speaker 1: to do you dig in ditches. And despite these high
16:05
Speaker 1: risk and these serious consequences, a lot of the gang members,
16:09
Speaker 1: maybe even the majority, were longtimers. Maggie Hughes or Babyface.
16:13
Speaker 1: Maggie had shoplifting convictions that went back to the age
16:17
Speaker 1: of fourteen. And when these as I think we said earlier,
16:22
Speaker 1: when these women or members of the gang were caught,
16:26
Speaker 1: they did have their own independent support systems. So your
16:31
Speaker 1: family members or you know, your dependents would be taken
16:35
Speaker 1: care of, or they would help you fight the system
16:39
Speaker 1: get out of jail. But another I like that you
16:42
Speaker 1: mentioned the fact that there were many other people who
16:46
Speaker 1: were lost to history that were members of this gang.
16:48
Speaker 1: We know a few. There's for example, Ada Wellman, who
16:52
Speaker 1: was convicted of shoplifting from Army and Navy stores in
16:56
Speaker 1: Victoria in nineteen twenty one, and she we know she
17:01
Speaker 1: was still an active member of the gang almost twenty
17:03
Speaker 1: years later because she shows up in police reports eighteen
17:07
Speaker 1: years after her nineteen twenty one arrest when she got
17:11
Speaker 1: jailed for four months due to another crime. So these
17:14
Speaker 1: are career criminals. It's not like a side job. It
17:18
Speaker 1: doesn't sound like they were doing that thing. So common
17:20
Speaker 1: in heist movies where we'd say, you know, Casey nol,
17:25
Speaker 1: let's get the gang back together for one last score.
17:28
Speaker 2: Now this is a perma score. This is a life.
17:31
Speaker 2: I mean, this is a generational thing. If we're talking
17:33
Speaker 2: about two hundred years of this, I'm going to call
17:35
Speaker 2: it an organization because that's clearly what it was, and
17:38
Speaker 2: it was maintained that way for quite a long time.
17:40
Speaker 2: You know, this stuff, these tricks of the trade would
17:44
Speaker 2: be passed down, you know, like I mean, it's really fascinating.
17:52
Speaker 1: So they had one, I guess, great problem that any
17:57
Speaker 1: shoplifting network will run in who if they are successful,
18:01
Speaker 1: And the problem was they had abundance of stolen riches.
18:06
Speaker 1: How do they get rid of this? How do they
18:08
Speaker 1: take something that they have stolen, for instance, a unique
18:12
Speaker 1: piece of jewelry right, or very high quality clothing and
18:16
Speaker 1: translate that into cold, hard cash. This meant they had
18:21
Speaker 1: to create a distribution network so that they wouldn't you know,
18:26
Speaker 1: because if they stole something and then just waited a
18:29
Speaker 1: week and start of wearing those clothes or selling diamonds
18:32
Speaker 1: on the street, boom, They're back to hard labor again.
18:36
Speaker 1: So they instead relied on a network of fences and
18:39
Speaker 1: then unaffiliated street market traders and of course pawn shops.
18:45
Speaker 1: So part of the clothing they stole would be just
18:48
Speaker 1: sold to a clothing store. In the clothing store just
18:52
Speaker 1: to make some scratch, all they would do is replace
18:54
Speaker 1: the labels, so you would say, oh, that's not a Hardford,
18:58
Speaker 1: sure Blackfoot Boustier. I'm just making so.
19:02
Speaker 2: You were close though. I think one of the big
19:04
Speaker 2: stories they robbed had a very similar name to that,
19:06
Speaker 2: And just.
19:07
Speaker 1: Like the gang itself, this network, while being fluid, also
19:12
Speaker 1: prospered for a long time. The forty Thieves seemed to
19:16
Speaker 1: have been at their glory days in the nineteen twenties
19:19
Speaker 1: and nineteen thirties. So that's why we know so much
19:24
Speaker 1: about Alice Diamond or Diamond Annie, the woman with a
19:28
Speaker 1: punch to beware of. Oh, I guess we could talk
19:31
Speaker 1: a little bit about her background if you want, just briefly.
19:34
Speaker 2: Oh, we absolutely should have been. But I dude, just
19:36
Speaker 2: want to point out the names of some of the
19:37
Speaker 2: biggest retail stores in London on the high Street that
19:40
Speaker 2: they hit. It was because you made up a beautiful
19:43
Speaker 2: one and it made me think of it. It wasn't
19:44
Speaker 2: that far off, ben We've got Debenham and Freebody.
19:47
Speaker 1: Oh what do they sell.
19:49
Speaker 2: You know, ladies Lingerie? It is more of a department
19:52
Speaker 2: store they sold, you say, still at all? You know,
19:55
Speaker 2: It's just sort of like a Sears type situation. I
19:58
Speaker 2: mentionin like departments, the department Herod's exactly. Okay.
20:02
Speaker 1: So since we are lucky enough to know a little
20:06
Speaker 1: bit about the notorious Alice Diamond, let's let's look into
20:11
Speaker 1: her background. She was born in eighteen ninety six in
20:14
Speaker 1: June of eighteen ninety six in Lambeth Workhouse Hospital, and
20:20
Speaker 1: Diamond was her real name. It wasn't just a cool moniker.
20:23
Speaker 1: Her father was named Thomas Diamond. Her parents had applied
20:27
Speaker 1: for a maternity birth under the name of Black before
20:31
Speaker 1: they married, because at the time Alice would have been
20:34
Speaker 1: an illegitimate child because she had been born out of wedlock. However,
20:39
Speaker 1: since they decided instead to marry shortly before Alice was
20:43
Speaker 1: born to avoid the problem. Her father had at least
20:47
Speaker 1: three criminal convictions, including one where he assaulted the son
20:51
Speaker 1: of the Lord Mayor of London by punching his head
20:54
Speaker 1: through a pane of glass and a door, and Alice
20:58
Speaker 1: turned out to be the eldest of seven children. One
21:01
Speaker 1: of her younger sisters also joined the Forty Thieves gang,
21:06
Speaker 1: and one of her brothers, Tommy, became a member of
21:09
Speaker 1: the Elephant and Castle Gang.
21:11
Speaker 2: Bid. Can I just point out really quick that I
21:14
Speaker 2: have seen it as Alice and also Annie. Yes, yeah,
21:18
Speaker 2: just real quick, because I was confused for a second.
21:20
Speaker 2: I was about to cop to uh do saying the
21:22
Speaker 2: wrong names. Now I'm looking back over our sources. It's
21:25
Speaker 2: definitely both are said.
21:27
Speaker 1: Like many criminals, she added Anne and Alice to her
21:31
Speaker 1: name or referred to herself as that multiple.
21:33
Speaker 2: That makes perfect sense. It's like an alias, so she
21:35
Speaker 2: can't get pinned down.
21:36
Speaker 1: There you go, just like sometimes I'll be Max Powers
21:39
Speaker 1: astronaut with a secret or Chris from Boston, who again
21:42
Speaker 1: is retired. We mentioned him on a previous episode.
21:44
Speaker 2: People love Chris from Boston.
21:46
Speaker 1: He just you know, the brightest lights shine briefest. So
21:51
Speaker 1: here's to you, Chris. That's sad, it's good, it's it's okay.
21:55
Speaker 1: We've got to move on, you know, circle of life
21:57
Speaker 1: and all that. As far as alias is, nike aasg
22:01
Speaker 1: Alice's or Anne's criminal career began in nineteen twelve because
22:07
Speaker 1: she was caught stealing chocolate. In nineteen fifteen, she was
22:13
Speaker 1: officially named the Queen of the Forty Thieves. The previous
22:17
Speaker 1: queen was someone named Mary Carr, also known as Polly car.
22:23
Speaker 1: But we don't know a ton of stuff about Mary.
22:27
Speaker 1: We mostly know when it goes to who was the
22:30
Speaker 1: Queen of the forty Thieves, we mostly know about Alice
22:33
Speaker 1: or Anne. And when you think about it, it sounds
22:36
Speaker 1: like a swashbuckling life, or it sounds like a maybe
22:41
Speaker 1: a romanticized thing. But it was a brutal life and
22:44
Speaker 1: they believed that the only alternative to this would be
22:49
Speaker 1: a crushing existence in poverty, you know what I mean.
22:54
Speaker 2: Or possibly crushed under the thumb of some man.
22:57
Speaker 1: And they did live it up. They were well known
23:00
Speaker 1: for their parties, that's right. They would really throw down
23:04
Speaker 1: at pubs and social clubs. And I think the fact
23:07
Speaker 1: that they also because of their reputation, I would imagine
23:10
Speaker 1: they were allowed and permitted to do things that you know,
23:13
Speaker 1: other women would not be because people were scared of
23:16
Speaker 1: them and they didn't want to like raise up right, yeah,
23:19
Speaker 1: because that wouldn't have been proper for a group of
23:21
Speaker 1: women to have a big old, you know, drunken to
23:25
Speaker 1: do right, and that also gives them some support. That
23:29
Speaker 1: kind of lifestyle gives them some support in parts of
23:33
Speaker 1: the population, right because you know, if the forty thieves
23:37
Speaker 1: or the forty elephants are coming to the restaurant or
23:40
Speaker 1: the club or something, that it's going to be a
23:42
Speaker 1: wild night, right. I mean you can part. You might
23:45
Speaker 1: get blackmailed later, but you could party.
23:47
Speaker 2: That's right. I mean they were getting the equivalent, the
23:50
Speaker 2: late eighteen hundreds equivalent of like bottle service. You know,
23:53
Speaker 2: they were like really really dropping some cash.
23:56
Speaker 1: And we do have to thank McDonald's. We can't think
23:59
Speaker 1: of it enough because Brian McDonald uncovered a lot of
24:04
Speaker 1: this previously unknown information by hitting the bricks, scouring official
24:09
Speaker 1: birth and death records, perusing marriage indixes. A local newspaper
24:15
Speaker 1: reports hunting down out of print books at the British
24:19
Speaker 1: Library to read contemporary accounts, and everything he found was verified.
24:26
Speaker 1: There's a thing where, like imagine you grow up in
24:30
Speaker 1: a very impoverished situation and you say, well, I can
24:34
Speaker 1: slave away at a minimum wage job until I get ill,
24:38
Speaker 1: at which point I have to be consigned to the
24:41
Speaker 1: poorhouse or workhouse or something and probably die early of
24:45
Speaker 1: a disease that may well have been preventable. Or I
24:49
Speaker 1: can break social norms. I can not only become a criminal,
24:53
Speaker 1: but I can do it well. According to McDonald, they
24:57
Speaker 1: idolized glamorous movie star and the decadent living of the
25:01
Speaker 1: nineteen twenties flapper society. So they read about the scandalous,
25:06
Speaker 1: saalacious behavior of people born into privilege or celebrity, and
25:10
Speaker 1: they wanted to emulate them in a way. It's in
25:13
Speaker 1: a way it is very similar to the stories we
25:18
Speaker 1: hear now about modern drug dealers, right, you know, I
25:22
Speaker 1: mean Atlanta is full of strip club.
25:24
Speaker 2: They want the chains, they want the grills, they want
25:26
Speaker 2: all this stuff, the status symbols or whatever. But ultimately
25:29
Speaker 2: they're living a very risky and potentially short existence in
25:33
Speaker 2: order to have those things.
25:35
Speaker 1: Did I ever tell you about that excellent freakonomics report
25:39
Speaker 1: that broke down how much per hour drug dealers actually
25:43
Speaker 1: make on average?
25:45
Speaker 2: You were saying it wasn't great. No, it's the option
25:48
Speaker 2: unless you're like the distributor or whatever. Yeah, the high
25:51
Speaker 2: level individual that's really pulling the strings that's where you
25:54
Speaker 2: make the big money.
25:55
Speaker 1: Right, It's a very unfairly distributed hierarchy typically, So if
26:01
Speaker 1: you want to learn more about that, and it is
26:04
Speaker 1: tangentially related to this episode, but it's fascinating information. Nonetheless,
26:09
Speaker 1: I'd like to recommend a TED talk by the author
26:13
Speaker 1: Stephen Levitt, who presents the data he found on the
26:17
Speaker 1: finances of drug dealing. These folks are not living the
26:21
Speaker 1: high life. It is much more what's the best way
26:25
Speaker 1: to say it, No, it's just terrible. There's not a
26:27
Speaker 1: good way to say it. It's a terrible, terrible life.
26:30
Speaker 1: Don't sell drugs. I mean, if you're looking to make
26:32
Speaker 1: a lot of money off of it, don't expect to.
26:35
Speaker 2: Well, how about forming a very organized cell based gang
26:40
Speaker 2: and doing smash and grabs for a living.
26:42
Speaker 1: That would be there's an interesting topic there too, nol,
26:45
Speaker 1: because that would be much more difficult, at least here
26:48
Speaker 1: in the US in the modern day, and definitely in
26:51
Speaker 1: the United Kingdom. The United Kingdom for a few years
26:54
Speaker 1: running now has had the largest amount of closed circuit
26:58
Speaker 1: television cameras CCTV cameras per capita, I believe in the world.
27:05
Speaker 1: So you're much more likely to get caught on film. Right,
27:09
Speaker 1: You're also much more easy to track if you have
27:12
Speaker 1: a cell phone, since we all have those GPS locators
27:15
Speaker 1: on our phones. It was easier to get away with
27:18
Speaker 1: crime back then.
27:20
Speaker 2: Oh absolutely, I mean like it was just rampant. I
27:22
Speaker 2: can't imagine who would want to go into business. Have
27:26
Speaker 2: you seen the ballad of buster scrugs?
27:28
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, I've seen it several times.
27:30
Speaker 2: It makes me think of the bank teller kind of
27:32
Speaker 2: situation where you're just constantly on the ready with like
27:35
Speaker 2: guns loaded and pointed at every potential person that's going
27:39
Speaker 2: to walk on that door and rob you. I would
27:40
Speaker 2: just think that some of these shopkeepers must have been
27:43
Speaker 2: quite foolish for at least a minute, you know, with
27:47
Speaker 2: to allow this kind of stuff to keep happening. I
27:48
Speaker 2: don't know, I wonder.
27:50
Speaker 1: Well, And also, what can you do if you have
27:52
Speaker 1: if you have a small shop, are you supposed to
27:56
Speaker 1: continually employ five people just for security on the off
28:00
Speaker 1: chance that something happens one day? I mean you're throwing
28:04
Speaker 1: money in a hole until the robbery happens, it's right,
28:12
Speaker 1: And maybe wondering well, Ben, well, no, well, casey, this
28:18
Speaker 1: sounds like quite an adventure and it would make for
28:20
Speaker 1: a great film, Like you guys are doing a history show.
28:25
Speaker 1: Are the forty Elephants still around today?
28:28
Speaker 2: No? No, they're not. And again you don't even really
28:31
Speaker 2: hear much about them at all until this book came out.
28:34
Speaker 2: But in the mid twenties, there was a member of
28:36
Speaker 2: the gang named Marie Britton who kind of on her
28:41
Speaker 2: own through her actions, and this kind of chain of
28:43
Speaker 2: events led to the dissolution of this crime dynasty. I'm
28:48
Speaker 2: going to combon to go so far as to call
28:49
Speaker 2: it that two hundred years Is that a dynasty. I
28:51
Speaker 2: think that's a dynasty. So yeah, she had fallen for
28:55
Speaker 2: a dude who was not a part of this CD
28:59
Speaker 2: under world, and you know, it's a network, and it's
29:02
Speaker 2: sort of like West Side Story, you know, where it's
29:04
Speaker 2: like the Jets and the Sharks or whatever. You fall
29:06
Speaker 2: in love with a shark. It's not okay with the Jets, right,
29:10
Speaker 2: It's a little different. This person was neither a Shark
29:12
Speaker 2: nor a Jet. This person was outside of the world entirely.
29:15
Speaker 1: They were a square of civilians exactly because Marie had
29:19
Speaker 1: fallen in love with someone outside of London's underworld. She
29:24
Speaker 1: had also broken one of the gang's many internal rules
29:28
Speaker 1: thou shalt not date a square. So she was called
29:34
Speaker 1: up to see Alice and babyface Maggie, and Marie was scared.
29:39
Speaker 1: She brought along her father to protect her as her
29:42
Speaker 1: own muscle, essentially, and they, you know, we can speculate
29:46
Speaker 1: on the the essence of their conversation. Alice and Maggie say, Hey,
29:50
Speaker 1: you've got to drop this guy. He's lame. He's not
29:54
Speaker 1: in the.
29:55
Speaker 2: He's not one of us.
29:56
Speaker 1: He's not one of us. He's not in our crime
29:58
Speaker 1: sororities or ffiliated crime fraternities. And Marie says, no, I'm
30:05
Speaker 1: not going to do it, at which point Maggie whips
30:07
Speaker 1: out her aforementioned straight razor and attacks Marie's father, Slice
30:12
Speaker 1: and they escape. Marie and her father managed to escape,
30:16
Speaker 1: but Alice is not gonna let this go.
30:18
Speaker 2: Alice sounds like a real tough cookie. Oh yeah, she's
30:22
Speaker 2: not not for the for the better necessarily. I mean,
30:25
Speaker 2: I guess if she's she's the kind of person you
30:26
Speaker 2: probably want in your corner. But if you make an
30:29
Speaker 2: enemy of her, of her, she's gonna come at you
30:31
Speaker 2: with a straight razor, right, And she's gonna come to
30:34
Speaker 2: your house and start hurling rocks through the windows and
30:38
Speaker 2: then force entry into the home and search manically for you.
30:45
Speaker 2: I'm speaking of myself as though I were Marie and
30:49
Speaker 2: my father and they're you know, going to ransack the place,
30:53
Speaker 2: and in doing this attract the attention of the police
30:58
Speaker 2: because they became a riot.
30:59
Speaker 1: Basically not sting in the police. They weren't on the
31:03
Speaker 1: scene yet. No, so what happens. What happens?
31:07
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, they slashed their way through this house
31:09
Speaker 2: looking for Marie and her father and ended up injuring
31:13
Speaker 2: some of the other folks that were around, and the
31:16
Speaker 2: cops came. The fuzz showed out because this is a
31:18
Speaker 2: whole mele, you know, and the ring leader of the
31:23
Speaker 2: forty Elephants, Alice Diamonds Diamond, Alice Annie Diamonds Diamond, Annie,
31:30
Speaker 2: was arrested.
31:31
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it didn't go well for her, No, it didn't.
31:33
Speaker 1: They went to trial. They were easily convicted Alice and Maggie.
31:40
Speaker 1: That is because you know, this.
31:42
Speaker 2: Is baby face Maggie.
31:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, baby face Maggie, because they clearly did this. But
31:47
Speaker 1: the prosecution, despite the fact that there were multiple members
31:50
Speaker 1: of the gang attacking Marie's house. The prosecution only convicted
31:55
Speaker 1: or only even charged Alice and Maggie because you see,
31:59
Speaker 1: according to the rumors in the speculation, certain gentlemen in
32:03
Speaker 1: high places of society did not want the details of
32:06
Speaker 1: the blackmail activities to come to light. So maybe we
32:12
Speaker 1: can conjecture with a fair amount of certitude, maybe there
32:16
Speaker 1: were a couple of people in the government or high
32:19
Speaker 1: end business who said, look, you can convict the two
32:23
Speaker 1: ring leaders, but gray Tooth Desdemona can't go to court.
32:29
Speaker 1: That's right, my wife can't find out. Yeah, that's right.
32:32
Speaker 2: And you know, subsequently, there was a vacuum left behind
32:35
Speaker 2: because Annie, Diamond, Annie, Diamond, Alice whatever you want to
32:39
Speaker 2: call her, the Diamonds call that was put away and
32:43
Speaker 2: sentenced to hard labor for how many years?
32:46
Speaker 1: Well, let's see, she was imprisoned in nineteen twenty five,
32:51
Speaker 1: and the power vacuum has a pretty swift effect on
32:56
Speaker 1: the gang. By nineteen thirty, they're falling out of power,
33:01
Speaker 1: but people are still claiming membership of the gang, and
33:03
Speaker 1: they're still shoplifting up into the nineteen fifties.
33:08
Speaker 2: But it sure seems like Diamond Annie is the one
33:11
Speaker 2: who kind of had that iron fisted control over the
33:15
Speaker 2: organization to the point where they existed almost as a
33:18
Speaker 2: central power in the London crime world. So when she
33:22
Speaker 2: went away, it kind of reverted back to this more
33:24
Speaker 2: petty thievery and they sort of lost their grip on
33:28
Speaker 2: the underworld in general, right.
33:31
Speaker 1: Right, And by the nineteen fifties the gang had just
33:36
Speaker 1: lost too much power. Maggie Hill ended up dying in
33:43
Speaker 1: nineteen forty nine. Don't know where she was buried, but
33:49
Speaker 1: her best friend was Alice Diamond, obviously, And who's the
33:53
Speaker 1: in Casino? Is it Joe Peshy? Who's the wild card? Oh?
33:57
Speaker 2: Yeah? His character?
33:58
Speaker 1: Okay, So Maggie Hill, by way of comparison, is kind
34:03
Speaker 1: of the Joe Peshi of this group. And there's not
34:06
Speaker 1: really a Robert de Niro. If there is, it's Alice.
34:09
Speaker 1: But she in court attempted to attack members of the
34:14
Speaker 1: court during the.
34:15
Speaker 2: Trial it with a pen.
34:18
Speaker 1: Who knows. She was like a like a real life
34:21
Speaker 1: cartoon Tasmanian devil.
34:23
Speaker 2: But I also read that she did not keep her
34:25
Speaker 2: composure when sentenced, that she's freaked out, and yeah, but
34:30
Speaker 2: like got really upset, was not stoic at all, was
34:33
Speaker 2: very like emotional.
34:35
Speaker 1: And railed against the court. Yes, probably because she saw
34:39
Speaker 1: more than a few people associated with their crime ring
34:44
Speaker 1: in court on the other side.
34:46
Speaker 2: With their pious wigs on.
34:48
Speaker 1: We know that Alice Diamond passed away in a place
34:54
Speaker 1: called Southwark, close to the East Lane market in nineteen
34:57
Speaker 1: fifty two. So this gang pretty much pretty much expire.
35:04
Speaker 1: It's death Knell is the last imprisonment, and then later
35:07
Speaker 1: the death of Diamond Dallas or Diamond Ann. And that's
35:12
Speaker 1: not to say gangs don't continue in London today.
35:15
Speaker 2: Oh no, for sure, but it's you know what the
35:17
Speaker 2: thing about London too is you always hear about how
35:20
Speaker 2: gangs there don't use there's not as much gun violence
35:23
Speaker 2: because they're a lot harder to get. So you gotta
35:26
Speaker 2: wonder if like the gang culture has kind of like
35:29
Speaker 2: been influenced by this more kind of crafty gang culture
35:33
Speaker 2: where it's more about like figuring stuff out and being
35:36
Speaker 2: sharp on your feet, you know what I mean, as
35:38
Speaker 2: opposed to just like running in and blasting up the place.
35:40
Speaker 2: Because you just don't hear about a lot of gun
35:42
Speaker 2: violence in London.
35:43
Speaker 1: Not near as much as there is in the US
35:46
Speaker 1: or some other countries, but knives. We have to keep
35:49
Speaker 1: in mind. One of my old instructors used to always
35:51
Speaker 1: try to hammer this into our heads that knives up
35:54
Speaker 1: close are more dangerous than guns, oh for sure. So
35:57
Speaker 1: they they're probably walking around with some blaze a blade
36:00
Speaker 1: or two.
36:01
Speaker 2: That's what I'm saying, though, two wheeled a knife. You
36:03
Speaker 2: gotta be a little more brave and a little more
36:07
Speaker 2: clever and have a little more training kind of you know,
36:09
Speaker 2: you got to know what to do with it.
36:10
Speaker 1: Well said, Well said, And for the record, I agree.
36:14
Speaker 2: So I guess I'm saying, way to go London crime
36:16
Speaker 2: world for being a little less lazy.
36:20
Speaker 1: I don't know if I if I agree with that,
36:23
Speaker 1: of man, It's it's true, though, while gangs still exist
36:28
Speaker 1: and even thrive in some parts of London, there's not
36:32
Speaker 1: really at this moment in time, something like the forty Elephants,
36:38
Speaker 1: unless you want to say the banking cartels are gangs,
36:41
Speaker 1: but they rob people in a different way very much.
36:43
Speaker 1: So do you like how I had to walk around
36:45
Speaker 1: the block to throw that little piece of shade in?
36:47
Speaker 2: I loved it.
36:48
Speaker 1: I'm telling you, man, the city of London, it's it's sketchy.
36:51
Speaker 1: The whole thing's sketchy, but that is the story of
36:55
Speaker 1: the Forty Thieves, the forty Elephants.
36:57
Speaker 2: Alice Diamond Diamond, Alice Annie Diamonds, Diamond Anny, the all.
37:04
Speaker 1: Female crime syndicate or dynasty, which we think is appropriate here,
37:09
Speaker 1: who ran shoplifting and somehow got away with it for
37:14
Speaker 1: almost two centuries.
37:15
Speaker 2: I want to see their like internal records, you know,
37:21
Speaker 2: for that two hundred years, Like I want to see
37:23
Speaker 2: the turnover of like who who is in charge? If
37:25
Speaker 2: any of that was on paper, it probably wasn't. It
37:27
Speaker 2: was probably all just like oral.
37:30
Speaker 1: I wonder, yeah, because it's it's a huge liability to
37:33
Speaker 1: have that laund but it's prestigious and it would be
37:37
Speaker 1: It would also really help out Marnie Dickens, who as
37:41
Speaker 1: of twenty seventeen was developing a series on the Forty
37:45
Speaker 1: Elephants for Forty Thieves for the BBC, and it has
37:49
Speaker 1: the potential to be a Peaky Blinders kind of thing.
37:52
Speaker 1: Did you ever see that show?
37:53
Speaker 2: I started watching. I watched the first season and I
37:56
Speaker 2: like it.
37:56
Speaker 1: Yeah, I saw I think I saw the first episode.
38:00
Speaker 1: I started wondering whether I should also carry a razor
38:04
Speaker 1: around in my hat.
38:04
Speaker 2: Yeah, our boss Connall really likes it a lot.
38:07
Speaker 1: I could see that. That's classic Connell. Have you ever
38:10
Speaker 1: seen Peaky Blind jers Casey.
38:11
Speaker 2: No, I don't think I've even heard of it. Yeah, It'scott,
38:14
Speaker 2: Silly and Murphy in it. It's about a gang in Ireland.
38:17
Speaker 2: I want to say, though, right, wasn't an Irish gang
38:20
Speaker 2: like around the same time in the early twenties. I
38:23
Speaker 2: don't know they were around for two hundred years though. No.
38:27
Speaker 1: Would you guys watch a show based on this crime Syndica? Yes,
38:32
Speaker 1: I would too. Am wondering who they would cast. Let
38:35
Speaker 1: us know who you think would play an excellent Alice
38:39
Speaker 1: or Annie Diamond? And who is unhinged enough to be
38:42
Speaker 1: a babyface Maggie in your book?
38:44
Speaker 2: You know who I could pictures being baby face Maggie.
38:46
Speaker 2: Who's that Melissa McCarthy. I like she's got some acting chops, man,
38:52
Speaker 2: she knows all these kind of goofy comedy movies. Yeah.
38:55
Speaker 2: I think she's got the got the range. I think
38:57
Speaker 2: she's got it man.
38:58
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, I'm gonna think about this and come back.
39:03
Speaker 1: It is the end of the episode, which means that
39:05
Speaker 1: if we are still carrying on this tradition. My friend,
39:08
Speaker 1: it is time for us to give a comic book
39:10
Speaker 1: recommendation or two.
39:12
Speaker 2: Wow, we're gonna keep keep going with this?
39:13
Speaker 1: Huh, well, we said we would give it a shot.
39:16
Speaker 2: I like it. Have you read Saga? Yes, by Brian Cavon.
39:20
Speaker 2: I've only read a little bit of it, And again,
39:21
Speaker 2: I'm not as much of a comic head as you are,
39:23
Speaker 2: but I have enough of an idea of what's out
39:26
Speaker 2: there to give a recommendation for a couple episodes. But yeah,
39:30
Speaker 2: check out Saga by Brian Cavon. It's sort of a
39:33
Speaker 2: sci fi star crossed space adventure. Was that a good
39:38
Speaker 2: way of a Franks?
39:38
Speaker 1: Yeah? That's great. Yeah, it breaks a lot of genre rules.
39:42
Speaker 1: I think you'll really enjoy it.
39:44
Speaker 2: He also wrote Why the Last Man, which I did
39:46
Speaker 2: read every moment of about the last man on Earth
39:49
Speaker 2: after a disease kind of wipes out the male population
39:52
Speaker 2: and this one dude still around. Everyone else's female. That's
39:55
Speaker 2: a good recommendation for this episode. Actually, yeah, that was
39:58
Speaker 2: actually mine. No way, Oh no, my bad. I only
40:01
Speaker 2: said it because this is Brian, great writer, and I
40:04
Speaker 2: believe that's being adapted into a big old series.
40:06
Speaker 1: Right right, right, and for people who have yet to
40:09
Speaker 1: read it, this won't spoil anything. There is a character
40:13
Speaker 1: in Why the Last Man named Agent three point fifty five,
40:18
Speaker 1: and that comes from a real and mysterious part of
40:21
Speaker 1: early US history. So if you want to learn more
40:25
Speaker 1: about the real life Agent three fifty five, check out
40:28
Speaker 1: our other show stuff. They don't want you to.
40:30
Speaker 2: Know that was just recent, wasn't it.
40:32
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, yeah, And I don't want to ruin it,
40:36
Speaker 1: but check it.
40:36
Speaker 2: Out, dude, please, And in the meantime, always always want
40:40
Speaker 2: to thank Casey Pegrim, our super producer. I don't know
40:43
Speaker 2: where we'd be without you. We would we would sound
40:45
Speaker 2: like fools, that's for sure. So thank you to Casey.
40:48
Speaker 2: Thank you to Alex Williams, who composed our theme.
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Speaker 1: Yes, and thank you to Christopher hasiotis our research associate
40:55
Speaker 1: for this episode. Thanks also to our other research associates
40:59
Speaker 1: eves And and Gabe. Thank you, Nol, and thank you
41:03
Speaker 1: for listening. Folks. Hope this I don't know, I don't
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Speaker 1: want to say. I hope this inspires people because they
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Speaker 1: don't want us to get characterized as the inspiration behind
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Speaker 1: a new gang of jewel thieves.
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Speaker 2: You know what, you do you people out there, whatever
41:18
Speaker 2: you think be the change you want to see in
41:19
Speaker 2: the world.
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Speaker 1: So also let us know if you have found a
41:24
Speaker 1: story of another crime ring this successful, because regardless of
41:31
Speaker 1: your opinions about the internal workings or the consequences or
41:35
Speaker 1: their own strategies, there's no arguing with it. They were very,
41:39
Speaker 1: very successful. You can tell us about this on Instagram.
41:43
Speaker 1: You can find us on Twitter. You can visit us
41:45
Speaker 1: on Facebook, where we'd love to introduce you to your
41:48
Speaker 1: fellow Ridiculous Historians on our community page Ridiculous Historians.
42:00
Speaker 2: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
42:04
Speaker 2: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.