Forgery is the fraudulent making or altering a written instrument, to the detriment of another person. To constitute a forgery it is not necessary that the whole instrument should be fictitious. Making an insertion, alteration, or erasure, on any material part of a genuine document, by which any of the lieges may be defrauded; the insertion of a false signature to a true instrument, or a real signature to a false one, or the altering of the date of a bill after acceptance, are all forgeries. There are different classes of these. For example, there are forgeries of bank notes, of cheques, of acceptances, wills, and other documents.
Bank Notes.—There are many forgeries of Bank of England notes, executed principally at Birmingham. In the engraving and general appearance the counterfeit so closely resembles the genuine note, that an inexperienced eye might be easily deceived. The best way to detect them is carefully to look to the water-mark embossed in the paper, which is not like a genuine note. When the back of the former is carefully inspected, the water-mark will be found to be indented, or pressed into the paper. The paper of a forged note is generally of a darker colour than a good one. To take persons off their guard, forgers frequently make the notes very dirty, so as to give them the appearance of a much-worn good note. They are frequently uttered by pretended horse-dealers, in fairs and markets, and at hotels and public-houses by persons who pretend to be travellers, and who order goods from tradespeople in the provincial towns, and pay them with forged notes. This is often done before banking-hours on the Monday, when they might be detected, but by this time the person who may have offered them has left the town. This is the common way of putting them off in London and the other towns in England. Sometimes they utter them by sending a woman, dressed as a servant, to a public-house or to a tradesman for some article, and in this manner get them exchanged—perhaps giving the address of her master as residing in the vicinity, which is sure to be false. Tradesmen are frequently taken off their guard by this means, and give an article, often of small value, with the change in return for a note. They sometimes do not discover it to be false till several days afterwards, when it is taken to the bank and detected there.
An experienced banking clerk or a keen-eyed detective, accustomed to inspect such notes, know them at once. It sometimes happens they are so well executed that they pass through provincial banks, and are not detected till they come to the Bank of England.
They generally consist of 5l. or 10l. notes, and are given to agents who sell them to the utterer, and the makers are not known to them. Knowingly to have in our possession a forged bank note, without a lawful excuse, the proof of which lies on the party charged, or to have forging instruments in our possession, is a criminal offence.
There are also forged notes of provincial banks, but these are not so numerous as those of the Bank of England. The provincial banks have generally colours and engine-turned engraving on their notes. Some have a portion of the note pink, green, or other colours, more difficult and expensive to forge than the Bank of England note, which is on plain paper with an elaborate water-mark.
Numerous cases occur before the criminal courts, where utterers of forged notes are convicted and punished.
A case of this kind was tried at Guildhall, in October, 1861. A marine-store dealer in Lower Whitecross-street was charged with feloniously uttering two forged Bank of England notes for 5l. and 10l., with the intent to defraud Mr. Crouch, the proprietor of the “Queen’s Head” tavern, in Whitecross Street.
The store-dealer had waited on him to get them exchanged. Mr. Crouch paid them to his distiller, who took them to the Bank of England, when they were sent back, detected as forgeries.
The prisoner was committed to Newgate.