Yesterday evening saw a packed public meeting at Bruce Castle Museum in Tottenham, to mark 100 years since 1909's 'Tottenham Outrage'.
If your knowledge of politically motivated English crime is weak, the Tottenham Outrage occurred when two east European radicals botched a wages heist on Tottenham High Road, and ended up being pursued across much of north London, merrily opening fire on their pursuers. A police officer, a 10 year old boy and both gunmen died.
Barbara Hedgecock, museum curator, spoke about a week of events, that included a ceremony on Friday 23rd January at Abney Park cemetery in Stoke Newington, where PC Tyler and Ralph Joscelyne are buried, and the unveiling of a plaque at Tottenham Police station.
One of the difficulties with assessing historical events like this is how often terms, sometimes competing, merge. In discussing the gunmen, Ms Hedgecock made use of the following: Latvian, Lithuanian, Russian, Jewish, Lettish, east European, Social Revolutionaries, SR's and of course Anarchists. Contemporary press reports certainly concentrated on "Russian Anarchists" and Tottenham was home to not one but two 'Little Russia's'. I believe that Phil Ruff, in his forthcoming study of the Siege of Sydney Street, has cut through many of these terms, at least with regards to the Hounsditch murders and the Siege of Sydney Street.
London in 1909 was certainly a very different world to now. One feature that emerged was the comparatively high gun ownership - police officers were being handed guns by members of the public with which to pursue the robbers, and it is worth noting that this was an era of no passports - if you made it to the UK, you were in all likelihood here to stay.
As with any great story, the Tottenham Outrage has a good mystery - just what happened to the money? A full bag of loot was taken, but never recovered, and Paul Hefeld and Jakob Lepidus hardly had time to stop, dig a hole and bury it.
So where is it? Two possibilities emerged - that Lepidus hid it in the house where he was finally trapped, where some of it was seemingly discovered, years latter, after the house collapsed. A further suggestion was that the loot was dropped on Tottenham Marshes, where some small boys skimmed the coins across the River Lea (!) before a bag, containing one remaining gold sovereign, was handed in to Tottenham Police station. No doubt other theories could be considered - that pursuing police officers recovered and kept it (not unknown, but hardly without risk) that one of those chasing Hefeld and Lepidus was in fact chasing the money rather than the baddies, and on seeing an opportunity to grab the money did so, or finally, and least likely, that the money was somehow passed to an accomplice en route.
The beauty of local history, when it is done well, is that it involves people. It is easy to think of Tottenham as a rather rootless, cosmopolitan place, yet in the room last night were descendants of Ralph Joscelyne, and others whose families had been shot at or chased the gunmen. The room was packed to the rafters.
Could such an 'outrage' occur today? Well, Anarchists can usually find easier ways of getting money. And 'have a go heroes' are also a little less common.......
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