Curious Find of forged Notes.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 4, Issue 22, 19 March 1915, Page 3 (Supplement)

Curious Find of forged Notes.

The story of a curious " find" in London came to light in January, 1884. Early in the month a woman, accompanied by a respectable tradesman of Leadenhall Market, presented a £SOO note at the Bank of England, for which she required change in other notes and coin. The note appeared perfectly genuine, but it really was a forgery, which was proved by the fact that no genuine note for Cooo of the number of the one presented had been issued. Detectives were called in, and the woman questioned, hut she at first declined to give any information. The tradesman, however, said that the woman owed him money, and had asked him to take the amount of her debt out of the CoOO note, and he, not having sufficient cash to change it, came over with her to the Bank.

On the police pursuing their investigations, the following facts came out. The woman's husband, a shopkeeper in Mansell-street, Whitoehapol, said he had received the notes from a friend in the country, and lie handed to the officer three or four similar notes, and several others for I'loo each. Following the matter up, the notes were finrlly traced to a man employed by the .Metropolitan Board of Works to keep dean the paths on Clapham Common. The scavenger admitted having the notes, and stated that he and two of his companions had, towards the end of the previous year, found a box hidden under a furze-bush. On opening it they found it to contain Bank of England notes to the amount of £6,000 or £7.0110, in denominations of £IOO and £SOO. The men agreed to divide the find between them, but did not do so at once lest the owner of the box should appear. The police eventually obtained the whole of the spurious notes; but who was the clever forger of them and how they came to lie hidden on the common was never discovered.