Monday 22 March 2004

The Case of the Disappearing Jewels, Part I

The setting is the country house of an English Lord. The characters include a famous and fashionable couple overshadowed by a social stigma lurking in their past. The subject of the mystery is the puzzling theft of valuable jewels, some rumored to have a questionable history. And, of course, there’s the unconventional detective attempting to solve the crime. The only element of the classic mystery novel missing is a murder. But the mystery itself is only the beginning of this perplexing case. 

On October 11, 1946, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, along with three army trucks filled with luggage, arrived in London for a private visit. While the duke had made numerous visits to England since he abdicated the throne in December 1936, it was only the second visit in 10 years for the duchess. As far as the couple was concerned, the real purpose of the visit was twofold: to gain for the duke some type of official function, and to attempt to secure royal recognition for the duchess. 

Unable to stay at the duke’s former country home, Fort Belvedere, the couple instead stayed not far away at Ednam Lodge in Berkshire, the country estate of the Earl and Countess of Dudley.  In order to allow the duke and duchess relative privacy, the Dudley’s were staying temporarily at Claridges Hotel in London. But on October 16, the duke and duchess made a visit to London – also staying at Claridges – leaving only the servants at Ednam Lodge.  

Among the duchess’s belongings at the Lodge was a jewel box, about the size of an overnight bag or small trunk, normally kept for safekeeping under her maid’s bed. For the brief trip to London, the duchess opted to leave the box at the Lodge, but instead of placing it in the strong room as she had been urged, the duchess had her maid move a locked trunk containing the jewel box into the duchess’s bedroom, where it was left in front of the fireplace. The reasoning was that her maid would be leaving for holiday and the jewel box would be placed the following day under the bed of Lady Dudley’s maid. 

Around 6:00 that evening, the bell rang calling all of the staff and servants, including the detective guarding the house, to tea. When the duchess’s maid returned to the room, perhaps no more than two hours later, she discovered that the trunk had been pried open and the jewel box was missing. Nothing else had been taken and there was no sign of searches either elsewhere in the duchess’s room or in any of the nearby rooms, although the thief (or thieves) had walked down a corridor to get to the duchess’s bedroom. On his way, the thief would even have passed Lady Dudley’s bedroom, where some of her jewels were visibly placed on the dressing table. 

The Faberg� boxes belonging to the duke, which were kept on a tray at the bottom of the case, had been abandoned – still on the tray – on one of the windowsills, and a number of unmatched earrings were found littered on the nearby Sunningdale golf course. Apart from that, police found few clues and most of the immediate leads were soon dismissed. A number of suspects were questioned, but no one ever admitted to the crime or served jail time for the robbery. The case was closed in 1961, leaving an unsolved mystery, and to this day the jewels have never been officially recovered. In the minds and writings of historians, however, the mystery has remained very much alive, and with the recent release of the case file at the National Archives at Kew, it has come back into the public consciousness. But even today, the facts of the mystery are still a bit of a puzzle.  

Over the years, the story has been told by many different sources with everything from very minor discrepancies to significant differences in important facts and details. Even the recent news reports vary slightly on the main facts, despite the availability of the official case file. Of course, this could be due in part to the fact that police case files themselves often contain conflicting or inaccurate information. Rumors have also played a major role in the mystery, often further obscuring the few available facts and leading to elaborate conjectures and conspiracy theories. Most of the rumors have old roots, going back to before King Edward VIII even abdicated his throne for Wallis Simpson. Others are more recent or are the product of speculations by authors and historians. 

In this two-part column, I will attempt to address many of these factual discrepancies and rumors – based on my own and others’ research – by melding the historical accounts with the newly available information. This week, in part one, I’ll cover the details of the robbery and the prime suspects. Next week, in part two, I’ll evaluate the rumors surrounding the case, particularly as they relate to the so-called “Alexandra’s emeralds.”  Unfortunately, as I have not yet seen the recently released case file at the National Archives, I will be relying on current news reports for that information. At some point in the near future (probably April or May), when I have analyzed those documents for myself, I will certainly share my personal findings. 

The Robbery

Both the historical and recent accounts agree that, sometime after the bell rang calling the servants to tea, the thief or thieves entered Ednam Lodge via an open upstairs window in the bedroom of Lady Dudley’s daughter. It would seem that the duchess’s secretary was using this room at the time. Once inside, the culprit walked through the corridor and straight into the duchess’s bedroom before making his escape via another, unidentified, window – likely the same window where the duke’s Faberg� boxes were later discovered. None of the dogs belonging to either the duke and duchess or the earl and countess ever barked. 

Where the historical and recent accounts diverge is over the means of entry. While all of the recent accounts indicate that investigators determined the thief climbed up a drainpipe, crossed a flat roof, then entered via the open window, most of the historic accounts suggest that the thief climbed up a white rope attached to the window. Apparently, investigators found the rope hanging from a hook on the window frame. Since the current accounts are based on the case file, the drainpipe theory is probably the most likely form of entry; however, that still leaves the white rope and the method of escape.  

Strangely, none of the current sources comment on the rope or elaborate on the method of escape, probably preferring to infer that the thief escaped the same way he entered, but it would seem logical that the rope (if it existed, which we have little reason to doubt) was in fact the thief’s means of escape. To begin with, it is quite difficult to secure a rope to an upstairs window from the ground, unless a grappling hook is used, as one source suggests. But since no other source mentions such a concept – only a simple hook – it seems more likely that the thief secured the rope while inside the house and used it as a means of quick escape, rather than going back the long way in which he entered.   

Another discrepancy between the current and historical accounts involves the items that were discovered on the Sunningdale golf course.  The recent news articles claimed that the jewel box itself was discovered on the golf course the next morning, while most of the historical accounts claim that the box was never found. Both indicate that a number of other pieces – mainly mismatched earrings – were scattered on the golf course, although the exact location varies by individual accounts. Perhaps more significantly, recent reports state that one of the items recovered on the golf course was a string of pearls worth �5,000 that had belonged to Queen Alexandra, but none of the historical accounts list or mention this item. I find this unusual given the rumor running rampant for many years that jewels rightfully belonging to the royal family, but in the duchess’s possession, were among the items stolen.  

In fact, there has always been much controversy over the jewels – what exactly was stolen, origins and ownership of certain pieces, real and insured values, etc. – but Suzy Menkes states in her book “The Windsor Style” that “ten good pieces” were stolen and never recovered, including diamonds, sapphires, emeralds and precious metals. At the time, the jewels were most commonly estimated to be worth around �500,000 (about �13 million in today’s terms), although the duke claimed it was more like �20,000.  I’ll discuss more about the jewels and the controversy and rumors surrounding them in part two. Now to the suspects… 

The Prime Suspects

Immediately following the theft, standard practices were followed in terms of questioning everyone on or near the estate. A number of “eyewitnesses” claimed to see various vehicles and strange looking individuals, but none of these clues were ever substantiated.  With no immediate strong leads and few clues on the home front, Detective Inspector John Capstick of Scotland Yard initially believed a London gang was responsible for the robbery. A list and pictures of the stolen gems were circulated to police in North America and Europe and an international memo was sent out naming two Britons known to have operated in Cannes, where the duke and duchess had spent considerable time. Friends of the Windsor’s who lived in Cannes confirmed that they had seen one of the men there during the war and that he had looked suspicious. This particular lead seems to have died out. 

According to Suzy Menkes, again in “The Windsor Style,” the mystery was solved in 1960 when a man named Richard “Tiptoe” Dunphie confessed to participating in the theft along with three accomplices. He claimed they sold the jewels to a “fence” (an old-fashioned term for a person who buys and sells stolen goods) in London. Police investigations suggested that the jewels were kept on a boat while they were hot, then dismantled and sold. As recent reports suggest, the case had its share of oddballs who confessed to the crime without any foundation to their stories. Whether Mr. Dunphie was one of these individuals or an actual confirmed suspect is unclear, but two critical points seem to indicate that he was part of the former group. First, Mr. Dunphie made his confession while on trial for other robberies and was subsequently jailed for only those robberies, not the Windsor case. Second, neither the theory nor Ms. Menkes’ source, Michael Nash, are mentioned in connection with the robbery in any of the historical sources, except as a direct reference to Menkes’ theory. Even more telling is that none of the recent reports so much as mention Mr. Dunphie’s name.   

What they do mention, however, is that the case file reveals that a former bricklayer was the primary suspect for many years. At the time, Leslie Arthur Charles Holmes was a 28-year-old housebreaker living in Sunningdale with his wife and three children. At the time of the robbery, he was working as a handyman on the Dudley estate, making repairs to a statue in the garden. He was among the individuals questioned by the police at the time of the robbery, but since he didn’t yet have a criminal record he was not immediately considered a suspect. It wasn’t until he was arrested for selling stolen property that investigators took another look at him. In 1947, he was sentenced to five years in prison for a number of cases of housebreaking and larceny, but there was never enough evidence to even try him for the Windsor robbery.  

Mr. Holmes, now 85 and living in a �200,000 cottage in Bognor Regis with his second wife, has never confessed to the crime, although he admits to being a petty criminal at the time. He claims he was “no cat burglar” but focused more on “sheds and garages.”  Despite the denials, D.I. Capstick was so sure Holmes was the thief that he visited him in jail and sent him a Christmas card every year in an attempt to gain both his trust and information about the location of the jewels. Police even dug in Holmes’ garden and searched his well in an attempt to find evidence. In 1951, Capstick told the FBI: “There is little doubt that he has buried the jewelry and I am convinced that he is afraid to dispose of it.” 

Whether Capstick was right or not, we’re unlikely to know for certain. Even if we were all absolutely certain who the thief was, many of the questions and controversy surrounding the case would likely still exist… Did the royal family orchestrate the robbery in order to take back jewels that belonged to them? And did the Duke and Duchess of Windsor even have jewels that belonged to the royal family? Or was it all just a carefully planned insurance scam? These questions and more will be addressed next week in Part II: Rumors vs. Reality.

Until next week,

- Tori Van Orden