Saturday night May 24th 1930, Sunderland town centre was a
busy place. At what was known as gas office corner workmen were laying new
tramlines, and the noise of the drilling and hammering over a period of days
had the residents and shopkeepers pulling out their hair. This was not the case
for everyone, as a group of burglars used the noise to cover up their own noise
as they chiselled their way into a jewellery shop in Fawcett Street.
The burglars had been watching Gowland and Grants (now Northern Goldsmiths) and
knew how to get in through the offices next door. Once inside the offices then
owned by W and T R Milburn they went up the stairs armed with a bag of tools,
they lifted some floorboards, and made a hole in the ceiling of the jewellers
below. The hole was 13 by 11 inches, small enough it can be assumed for a
child, to be lowered by the others in a dustsheet.
The thief put all he could find bracelets, gold watches, rings and necklaces
into the dustsheet for the rest of the burglars to lift up, then the sheet
lowered again to lift up the small thief. With the workmen still drilling away
outside no one heard as the gang made their way back onto the street to
disappear into the night. Though they had not gotten into the safe they had
still gotten away with £2,000 worth of jewellery. Even after a long
investigation by police the thieves were never caught.
