Other gang members included Gordon Goody, Buster Edwards, Charlie Wilson, Roy James, John Daly, Jimmy White, Ronnie Biggs, Tommy Wisbey, Jim Hussey, Bob Welch and Roger Cordrey, as well as three men known only as numbers "1", "2" and "3"; two were later identified as Harry Smith and Danny Pembroke.
The gang departed in their Austin Loadstar truck some 30 minutes after the robbery had begun and, in an effort to mislead any potential witnesses, they used two Land Rover vehicles, both of which bore the registration plates BMG 757A.
The gang then headed along minor roads, listening for police broadcasts on a VHF radio, the journey taking somewhere between 45 minutes and an hour, and arrived back at Leatherslade Farm at around 04:30, at around the same time as the first reports of the crime were being made.
The gang that carried out the robbery consisted of 15 criminals predominantly from south London: Gordon Goody, Charlie Wilson, Buster Edwards, Bruce Reynolds, Roy James, John Daly, Roger Cordrey, Jimmy White, Bob Welch, Tommy Wisbey, Jim Hussey, and Ronnie Biggs, as well as Harry Smith and Danny Pembroke, who were never charged due to the lack of evidence against them, and one still unknown, plus the train driver they nicknamed "Pop".
When that money ran out, Reynolds moved his family to Canada and then France under false identities, in search of work, before returning to the United Kingdom to pursue opportunities promised by his old criminal contacts.
[32] He produced occasional journalism pieces, was a consultant on movie and book projects about the train heist, and published a well-regarded crime memoir, Crossing the Line: The Autobiography of a Thief (1995).
[36] In August 1963, he was arrested in connection with the Great Train Robbery and taken to the Leicester City Police Headquarters for questioning by Detective Chief Inspector Peter Vibart of the Flying Squad.
At 05:00, Chief Superintendent Malcolm Fewtrell, head of the Buckinghamshire Police Criminal Investigation Department (CID), located at Aylesbury, arrived at the crime scene, where he supervised evidence-gathering.
By lunchtime of the following day, it became obvious to Fewtrell that extra resources were needed to cope with the scale of the investigation and the Buckinghamshire Chief Constable referred the case to Scotland Yard.
George Hatherill, Commander of the C Department and Detective Chief Superintendent Earnest (Ernie) Millen, Head of the Flying Squad were initially in charge of the London side of the investigation.
They also found a large quantity of food, bedding, sleeping bags, post-office sacks, registered mail packages, banknote wrappers and a Monopoly board game.
It was determined that although the farm had been cleaned for fingerprints, some finger and palm prints (presumably of the robbers) had been overlooked, including those on a ketchup bottle and on the Monopoly set (which had been used after the robbery for a game, but with real money).
[52][page needed] The breakthrough came when Detective Chief Superintendent Millen met a distinguished barrister in a smoking room of an exclusive West End club who told him that someone was willing to inform on the gang.
The Bournemouth police were tipped off by Ethel Clark when Boal and Cordrey paid her for three months rent in advance on a garage in Tweedale Road, off Castle Lane West.
Surrey police delivered the money and the receipt to Fewtrell and McArthur in Aylesbury, who knew by then that Brian Field was a clerk at James and Wheater who had acted in the purchase of Leatherslade Farm.
He calmly (for someone whose relatives had dumped a large part of the loot) provided a cover story that implicated Lennie Field as the purchaser of the farm and his boss John Wheater as the conveyancer.
His counsel, Walter Raeburn QC, claimed that the evidence against his client was limited to his fingerprints being on the Monopoly set found at Leatherslade Farm and the fact that he went underground after the robbery.
[58][page needed] Detective Inspector Frank Williams was shocked when this occurred because, owing to Tommy Butler's refusal to share information, he had no knowledge of the fact that Daly's prints were only on the Monopoly set.
[59] On 15 April 1964 the proceedings ended with the judge describing the robbery as "a crime of sordid violence inspired by vast greed" and passing sentences of 30 years' imprisonment on seven of the robbers.
Wilson's funeral on 10 May 1990 was attended by Bruce Reynolds, who reported seeing Edwards, Roy James (who got into a verbal argument with the press), Welch (hobbling on crutches) and White (who went unnoticed due to his ability to blend into the background).
She confirmed that she took Roy James to Thame railway station so he could go to London and that she led a convoy of two vans back to her house, where the gang were joined by wives and girlfriends for a big party to celebrate the crime.
That raid consisted of Roy James and Mickey Ball as the getaway drivers, with six robbers—Bruce Reynolds, Buster Edwards, Gordon Goody, Charlie Wilson, Flossy (and a sixth man who did not participate in the train robbery).
Henry Thomas 'Harry' Smith (born 20 October 1930) is believed to be Flossy, and unlike most other robbers, actually got to spend his share of the loot, buying 28 houses, a hotel and drinking club in Portsmouth.
With the meagre details provided, Read used a detective agency to track down the driver at a town 20 miles south of London, and found that he was still alive, although somewhat senile and being cared for by his wife.
[98] Unlike the other three members of the gang who got away, Peta Fordham does make mention of the replacement driver, but notes that he is said now to be dead, perhaps the robbers who provided material for the book did not want the police looking for him, as at the time of publishing (1965) Reynolds, White and Edwards were still on the run.
[105] Frank Williams (at the time a detective inspector) claimed that at least three men who were directly involved are still at liberty and enjoying their full share of the money stolen and the profits from the way they invested it, one of them being the man responsible for the attack on the train driver.
[108] His family are now trying to have his name cleared, as they believe, based on evidence not used in the original trial, that Boal was at best an accomplice after the fact with no knowledge of the robbery, and that it was likely that Cordrey told him nothing about the provenance of the cash.
After his success in securing White and Edwards, Tommy Butler got the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Joseph Simpson, to suspend his retirement on his 55th birthday so he could continue to hunt the robbers.
It has been said that he bore a striking resemblance to John Thaw, who was the star of Inspector Morse, which, perhaps coincidentally, was a television series about a detective in the Thames Valley Police Force (the modern-day successor to Buckinghamshire Constabulary).
[114] The retrieved Monopoly board used by the robbers at their Leatherslade Farm hideout and a genuine £5 note from the robbery are on display at the Thames Valley Police museum in Sulhamstead, Berkshire.