LEAD FOR GOLD

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXVII, Issue 8349, 8 February 1913, Page 11

LEAD FOR GOLD

THE BOXES THOSE IN WHICH SOVEREIGNS WERE PACKED. PUZZLED POLICE. LONDON, December 29. In the presence of detectives, bank officials, and others, numbering in all some twenty-five persons, the two cases in which were found pieces of lead instead of the 10,000 sovereigns they should have contained, being part of a consignment of £200,000 in gold sent to Alexandria, have been opened and examined. The two boxes were returned to Alexandria, where the robbery was discovered, and arrived in London on Friday last week. Great importance was attached to the examination of the boxes as a means of determining whether they were the originals or only dummies. After prolonged and careful scrutiny not the slightest doubt was felt by those competent to pass judgment on the matter that they were the original boxes in which the sovereigns were packed. They were still weighted with the lead found in them at Alexandria, and it was plain that they had been prised open with extreme care. Though the marks caused by the jemmy were cleverly disguised, they were apparent to the skilled eyes of experts. They had. however, been obliterated in such a manner as to be observable only on the opening of the boxes. The ingenuity displayed by the thieves was, in fact, marvellous. Each box was bound with iron, and, as a further precaution,wassealed in eight places. The seals were embedded in holes bored three-quarters of an inch into the wood at the joint where the lid is nailed on to the sides, and also at the junction of the bottom and the sides. The diameter of the seals was about that of a two-shilling piece or half-a-crowu. It would be impossible to take off the lid or bottom of the boxes without breaking four seals in each case. The examination showed that the broken seals had been cleverly replaced by new ones, containing the forwarding bank’s mark, but one of the experts quickly discovered that the wax used in the seals on the two boxes was of a different colour from that employed for the originals. That extraordinary care was taken by the thieves in prising open the boxes was shown by the condition of the nails. The lids and bottoms of the boxes are made of deal, while the sides are of teak, all being lin thick. The deal being much softer than the teak, the heads of the nails are liable to be drawn right through the wood when the lids are prised off. The lead has yet to be analysed in order to discover whether it is foreign or English, and the nails will bo examined by experts to discover their country of origin. No official information is available as to the opinion ormed by the authorities as the result of their investigations, but it is understood not the slightest doubt is entertained that the robbery took place abroad.