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THE CHINA MAIL SATURDAY, DECEMBER 16, 1961,
Early Christmas visit to the Abbey produced MOST INCREDIBLE CRIME OF
THE CENTURY
BIG BEN boomed out 2 a.m., and the din died shudderingly between the tall buildings that stared down blankly on to empty streets.
London slept, on this Christmas morning of 1950. No single footfall rang out on the freezing air.
the
Three young Scottish students, hugging shadows outside Westminster Abbey, tensed as they heard it. Their two cars were park- ed nearby. They had their file, saw, screwdriver, wrench and hooded Porch ready.
By Paul Cannon
slid
up. Was the brave Christmas adventure to end before had begun?
I really looked like it, when a police officer asked the young Scots the number of their car and they did not know it.
The trouble was
For ex-RAF law student Ian Hamilton, and his accomplices Alan Stuart and Gavin "Ver- non, the ordeal of wafting was had hired the over at last.
Now it was time for the great adventure to begin: a wild adventure, fired by nationalistic zeal, that was to erupt sensa- tionally into headlines as the most daring "crime" for years. Tip-toeing down a narrow lane to a side door of the Abbey precincts, they forced it
open easily with their big jemmy. Slipping across a mason's yard alid up a stone staircase, they found themselves tip against another door: studded, of solid onk. This time the jemmy was useless.
Bul, exploring the yard in the lorch's glow, they found a third door that appeared to open on to the part of the Abbey known Bs Poet's Corner.
that they
and Caf
Dol
noticed, they said. They realised
as they spoke that it sounded pretty thin.
But at last they found a hire- car receipt that sutisfied the policemen. 'They even applo- gised before they moved off.
Fantastic
s'one, lying under the historic Coronation Chair and labelled "CORONATION STONE".
This was the prize: the stone of destiny which had always been associated with
right of government, taken from Bootsmen 630 years before as the symbol of their loss liberty.
While remained in England. old legends said, Scotiand could never prosper or break her spell of bod luck.
The Prize of the most in-.. credible crime
of the century --the Stone of Scone un- der the Coro- nation Chair.
helmet on the car. shared Д friendly
roof, he The watchman, although Ian cigarette did not know it until much with them.
later, was just then reporting After all, it was Christmas. The theft by telephone to the There was a soft noise from police.
inside
But now, after the Second World War, a new generation of reluctantly: and pushing and Scats had returned to find their tugging, they staggered clear country astir with cultural with if at last. renaissance and political revival, Soon they had to put it down
There was mounting clampur and rest. How were they ever for home rule. to replace going to get it to be, door?
the Abbey. "Probably They had the Stone. An in- It was the Arst of a fantastic governm
government from Whitehall They hit on the idea of the
watchman falling down cocent, spectacular blow for chain of tucky breaks that hundreds
away spreading a coat on the floor, stalra,” the policeman laughed. Scottish freedom had been WAR to see through to uh- Towards
at least a then lifting the Stone on to it It was a good night for crime, likely success à crazy ven- measure of it, the Scottish and so dragging it silently they quipped back at him as he ture that by alf the rules
Covenant movement
had along. should have failed half 3 collected almost two million dozen times over.
signatures in a year.
even
was
The students' plot amateurishly
and conceived bungled They could hardly have dared to hope that it would keep Scotland Yard's best brains guessing for weeks.
Four am, The roar of their seemed alarmingly loud engine as they manoeuvred the car in- to collect Kay, the fourth 10 @ narrow lane conspirator, who was weak with Au but would not miss the fun. Returning to their
By now it was 3 am: time
The
near
the had
Abbey.
door they found gave a loud crack under
of miles securing
Ideal
But the British Government So there yielded pot an inch. was only one thing for 1, a Jew young men of spirit decided, They must take the Stone, and hear it back symbolically to
got oncient Scotland to right an
But then the worst happened, As one of the chains fastened to the stone was tugged, there was a cracking sound. A 90-lb. chunk of it had broken' away along the line of an old fracture Ian Hamilton, clutching Rugger-style, ran to the Abbey door with it, then dumped it on seat of the car in the back which the girl waited.
Heaving and sweating, they back to work manhandling
The
They reached the but, as lan door with it at last: peeped out, he saw the girl sturing hard at him,
There was a policeman cross- ing the road.
left.
Their second
Gavin
struck. Singing a psalm in wild elution, he steered at random through the unfamiliar maze of London streets.
But where were the others? At 6.15 on this Christmas morning they could be
any- where in the whole vast city.
This time you could almost call the fuck a miracle. In an area of London none of them knew he happened across them both, walking disconsolately, believing · all was lost.
Kay drove off with her part of the stone in the car boot, 'to. head west out of London. And for Ian there was another crisis right away. He could not find the keys to car, parked nearby.
Worse, Alan and were missing.
They drove clear of the city, Steading back into the Abbey, and out along a country road. and a half miles from the blackness. The keys: sa Rochester they hid the stone other stroke of fantastic luck,
wet grass in a among
wood Then, backing up the car (and then headed north. passing two more policemen by They hadn't seen the Corona- the House of Lords) he tackled tion Stone, bad they? A police the huge weight of the Stone patroi asked them
heat alone. Somehow God must caster.
cars, they the strain of shoulders and the wong. Christmas was the ideal the big sandstone lump across he felt something underfoot in. Two
Un-
drove
ghostly, across а peopled London and banged on the door of her hotel.
Her father was ill, they told the sleepy manager. She had to return to Scotland at one.
But the manager was wide enough awake to be suspicious. Disappearing indoors, he rang the police. And
suddenly a delective appeared beside one of the parked cars.
Jemmy.
And they were inside West- minster Abbey.
Guided by one dim light at the far end, they stole silently through a grilled gate and up a few steps. A marble tomb shone in the torchlight. They were in the Chapel of St Edward Confessor.
the
They Bfted a rail and shone the torch ahead-and there it
the: no Englishuman was long away from his own home then if he could help
11. Plans had been laid, Abbey guide-books studied, details of locks and doors memorised, financial help enlisted trom sympathetic Scottish business men.
It was past 4.30 now, as they levered away a strip of wood from acTOSS the front of the Chair and tried to slide out the
He blew a short blast on his whistle, and a police car was a bulky lump of ancient big heavy Stone, It budged
nave.
He raced into the car by her side and wound an arm around her, pretending to make love,
The policeman was stern at first: but his frown melted as
Don-
they
have given him strength, he. They had heard, of it, said afterwards he got it into said. It
I was a jolly good show. the car.
Worn out and unshaven, they
He drove away just in time, fell into their beds in Edin- they told him they were down realising as he went that his burgh at last. They had not from Scotland on a touring wristwatch must have dropped slept for 112 hours. holiday. At last, placing his off somewhere inside, the Abbey. Continued on Page 28
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