Mail robbery is the robbery of

mail The mail or post is a system for physically transporting postcards, letters, and parcels. A postal service can be private or public, though many governments place restrictions on private systems. Since the mid-19th century, national postal sys ...

usually when it is in the possession, custody, or control, of the delivering authority, which in most countries is the postal operator and can involve the theft of money or luxury goods.

History

In the UK stage coach (from 1784

Mail coach A mail coach is a stagecoach that is used to deliver mail. In Great Britain, Ireland, and Australia, they were built to a General Post Office-approved design operated by an independent contractor to carry long-distance mail for the Post Office. M ...

) robberies by

highwaymen A highwayman was a robber who stole from travellers. This type of thief usually travelled and robbed by horse as compared to a footpad who travelled and robbed on foot; mounted highwaymen were widely considered to be socially superior to fo ...

were common, despite the death penalty. For example, in 1722 two were executed for robbing the Bristol mail. Robberies from trains also began early. An early example was on the Bristol and Exeter Railway in 1849. In the USA, the period immediately following the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

witnessed a large number of mail robberies. Eventually, the frequency of these thefts caused the

Department of the Navy Navy Department or Department of the Navy may refer to: * United States Department of the Navy, * Navy Department (Ministry of Defence), in the United Kingdom, 1964-1997 * Confederate States Department of the Navy, 1861-1865 * Department of the ...

to place armed

Marines Marines, or naval infantry, are typically a military force trained to operate in littoral zones in support of naval operations. Historically, tasks undertaken by marines have included helping maintain discipline and order aboard the ship (refle ...

on all mail trains. A number of high-value mail robberies occurred in the UK after the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

, as a result of a lack of improvements in security in the transport of money. One major example was the

Eastcastle Street robbery The Eastcastle Street robbery was the holdup of a Post Office van in London in May 1952 which, at the time, was Britain's largest postwar robbery.''The Guardian''; 26 January 1995; "Final curtain for robber who got away" The robbers escaped with ...

in 1952, involving the theft of £287,000 from a post office van in London. Overall that year, 629 mailbags went missing, and in the following year the figure was 738. The two most significant mail robberies both occurred in the early 1960s. In the UK, £2.6 million was taken in the ' Great Train Robbery' of 1963. A year earlier, $1.5 million was stolen from the hold-up of a U.S. Mail truck in

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...

. By the end of the 1960s, however, mail robbery had become less common.

References

Robbery Postal systems Organized crime activity {{crime-stub

History

See also

References