The Wicked Boy (50 page)

The Thames Iron Works, the West Ham shipbuilding company at which Robert worked as a ‘plater's boy' in June 1895, and (
below
) the Japanese battleship
Fuji Yama
under construction at the yard that month.

Newspaper sketches of Robert and Nattie Coombes, aged 13 and 12 respectively, in July 1895.

Robert and Nattie's mother, Emily; their father, Robert; and their friend John Fox.

Mary Jane Burrage, a friend of Robert and Nattie's mother; the boys' aunt Emily; John Hewson, chief cashier of the shipping line for which their father worked; and Detective Inspector Mellish.

A match at Lord's cricket ground in the summer of 1895 (
above left
), and a newspaper sketch of W. G. Grace at Lord's on 8 July, when Robert and Nattie watched him bat for the Gentlemen.

The young adventurer Jack Wright, the hero of one of the ‘penny dreadfuls' found in the back parlour of 35 Cave Road, and (
right
) another of the sensational stories in Robert's collection.

Holloway gaol, north London, in which Robert and Nattie Coombes and John Fox were held in the summer of 1895, and (
below
) a cell and galleries at Newgate gaol, in the City of London, to which they were transferred for their trial in September.

Street view of Newgate gaol, with the dome of St Paul's in the background, and (
below
) Birdcage Walk, the passageway along which prisoners were led from the prison to the Old Bailey courthouse.

Robert Coombes and John Fox and Nattie Coombes in the Old Bailey on 16 September 1895, and the dagger and truncheon produced in evidence.

The Old Court in the Old Bailey in the 1890s, with the dock on the left, the judges' bench on the right, and the jury box by the windows at the back.