THE GOURLAY JEWELLERY ROBBERY.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume IX, Issue 2815, 4 February 1888, Page 2

THE GOURLAY JEWELLERY ROBBERY.

Audacious Affair,

Meleoubne, January U, ' •'ss■; On the Bth of Beptomber last, a robbery, almost unexampled for audacity, was committed in Collins Strttt, when the shop of Mr K. GourlajvS), Collins Street East, was broken into, and ransacked at 9 p.m., andjewellery to the value of £IOOO carried off. Entrance was affected by forcing open the Collins Street door, which was done uuder the blaze of a lamp, and whilst many people were passing and re-passing. The robbers got away their booty, and left not a trace by which they could be identified, though the detective police were apprised of the robbery within an hour of its occurrenca. There was every pigg} pect that the affair would passim ' the limbo of undiscovered crime, and be forgotten, but thepolico havere> • . ceived information of the recovery of ' part of the plunder in Birmingham; England, and the arrest of ft wa;

supposed to have been connected with the deed, The following are the particulars of the discovery mado in England ;-0n December Bth, two men and a woman passed the night at tho Market Hotel, , ' Birmingham, each occupying a separJjrtato room. They left in the morning, the chambermaid discovered between tho mattrasses of the bed ' occupied by the woman abustlo stuffed with jewelky carefully packed in feathers and rouge. The property which was valued at from £IOO to £2OO, was handed over to the police. The'same day a telegram was received from Sheffield from one of tho men who had passed the night at the hotel' ■ asking that the" parcel" left by the wonwn should bo kept until called for. Th®iian appeared noxt day and received the parcel, but was immediately arrested for being in possession of goods supposed to Lavo been Htolen. He merely stated that the goods belonged to the woman, and that he knew nothing about them. On being , • r searched a bag was found in his posM- session, bearing tho label" Jas. Tay- "'■ passenger from Melbourne, s.s. Liguna," but he donied that he was the person. It appears that a passenger of that name came by the Liguria to Plymouth on the 7th, The prisoner is about 47 years of age. The jewellery is all new, as every article has •Attached to it a small slip of vellum, | ■™earing a tradesman's private trade | mark and a number. It comprises, gold and silver bracelet's pencil-cases, I •._ .match-boxes, lockets, rings, brooches, j k, It is reported that the other man; who slept at tho hotel on the Bth inst, has been arrested. _ Mr Go rlay, in Melbourne, recognised many of the articles iu the list. supplied from England, a3 identical ' with those stolen from his shop. The man who has been arrested under the name of Jas Taylor is believed to be identical with a man who, under the name of James Bearder, worked for several months at the establishment of Mr Thomas White, cutter, of Bourke-street west. He has been recognised by the English Police as a man who, in the year 1863, was sentenced to 13 years' transportation at "- Derby for a great jewellery robbery, and # prior to that had served a sentence. He no doubt made his way to the colony km West Australia at tho f 'ration of the sentence. The ctives hero are convinced that lie associated in the robbery with several other criminals some of whom are now in Pentridge on other charges. It is not known who the woman was who was with him in Birmingham, but a singular ciroumstauco connected with the matter is that the wife of Taylor's employer, Mrs White, went home in_ the same ship with him, though his going was not known at the time. She is an elderly woman, and left on a tour for her health with the full knowledge of her husband. The law requires tho prosecutor in such a case as this to supply funds to bring back the supposed criminals, but Mr Gourlay has been so heavy a loser that he cannot afford the sum needed, which would bo about £IOO. He has applied to. the Government to relax the rule in his case, but without avail, and it is quite possible that r "'' the prisoner may get off.scotfree,TelMgaph.