101 Interesting Facts on Ronnie Biggs and the Great Train Robbery

By Mike Gray

The Great Train Robbery, and the part Ronnie Biggs played in it, is one of the most famous true crime stories of all time. Ronnie’s imprisonment, subsequent escape and life on the run has been the subject of much discussion and this new book sets out the facts for anyone wishing to find out what really happened on the day of the robbery and in the years beyond. Do you know how many members of rail staff were on board the train on the day of the robbery? Are you aware which celebrities became involved in the Free Ronnie Biggs Campaign? Can you name the many films, documentaries and books that have been produced about the Great Train Robbery? All this information and more is in 101 Interesting Facts on Ronnie Biggs and The Great Train Robbery. Despite Ronnie Biggs’ advancing age and the fact that 2013 marks the 50th anniversary of the Great Train Robbery, the daring 1963 heist still attracts a great deal of interest. If you would like to know the facts, this book is for you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Apex Publishing Limited
• Release date: Oct 31, 2013
• ISBN: 9781909949973

Book preview

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About the author

Mike Gray is the organiser of the ‘Free Ronnie Biggs’ campaign. He was born in 1957 in Lambeth, London. Mike first contacted Ronnie Biggs in Rio, Brazil, in 1989, and set up the Ronnie Biggs website with Michael Biggs in 1999. He was also involved in setting up ‘The Biggs Experience Limited’ with Ronnie, Michael, and Bruce and Nick Reynolds. Mike was a regular prison visitor to Biggs. Mike’s first book ‘Ronnie Biggs: The Inside Story’ was published in 2009, co-written with Tel Currie. Mike also wrote ‘The Ronnie Biggs Quiz Book’ which was published in 2013.

The Facts

Ronnie Biggs’ wedding in the prison chapel, at HMP Belmarsh, in July 2002, was attended by ten specially invited and Home Office vetted guests, which did not include any of Ronnie’s underworld friends or associates, only close family and friends along with his legal representatives. The ten also included the bride (Raimunda De Castro) and best man (son, Michael Biggs).

Gordon (Douglas) Goody, one of the Great Train Robbers, who is now 84-years-old and is suffering with emphysema, still lives in Mojacar, southern Spain, where he used to run a popular beach bar for local ex-pats. To this day, he still has one of the original stolen mail bags from the train robbery of 8 August 1963.

Ronnie Biggs once appeared in the adult men’s magazine, Men Only, but only as a colour six page editorial feature. Paul Raymond, the publisher and owner, who was once known as The King of Soho, flew to Rio De Janeiro with his daughter Debbie, to spend a week in the company of Ronnie. Both Debbie and Paul Raymond have now passed away.

Elton John’s ex-manager, Gus Dudgeon, was one of the first visitors to see Ronnie in HMP Belmarsh upon his return to the UK in May, 2001. Gus visited Ronnie with Train Robbery mastermind Bruce Reynolds, and Gus was also involved in the setting up of the 1999 Ronnie Biggs Amnesty campaign, along with Nick and Bruce Reynolds and Mike Gray. Gus and his wife Sheila were sadly killed in a car crash on the M4 motorway a year after visiting Biggs, in July, 2002.

The Train Robbers book by Piers Paul Read in 1978, told