At New Scotland Yard a large apartment is devoted to the exhibit of ten thousand and one records of crime, in the shape of the actual weapons, and what not, associated with particularly notorious, and, in some instances, almost historic, deeds. A visit to this place is the finest and most complete nerve-tester in the world! The authorities at New Scotland Yard have kindly placed this room and its contents at our disposal; and each of the separate cases, which severally contain exhibits of some distinctive branch of punishable offences, requires a chapter to itself. The most recently arrived exhibit is one which, at the present time, possesses a peculiar interest. In the centre of the room is a glass case, which provides a resting-place for mementos of the more important outrages and attempts and suspicious cases of discoveries of explosives which have called for the attention of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Explosives for the last fifteen or twenty years—Colonel V. D. Majendie, C.B., H.M. Chief Inspector of Explosives, and Colonel A. Ford; whilst Dr. Dupré has throughout been associated with these gentlemen as chemical expert. As an expert in explosives, no name is better known than that of Colonel Majendie, a man in the prime of life, of indomitable energy and immovable disposition; who may be singled out as being engaged in the two extremes of business and pleasure. His business: dynamite, gunpowder, and all the kindred blasting operatives; his pleasure: the "Children of Paules," as the choir boys of St. Paul's Cathedral used to be designated. In his room at the Home Office slabs of American dynamite, infernal machines, and detonators; in his rooms at home walls covered with portraits of these tuneful youngsters, many of them in the whitest of white surplices; while the drawers of his desk are brimming over with youthful letters from the past and present choristers of the great Cathedral. Colonel Majendie never destroys a dynamite relic—or a child's letter. Both are too precious.
COLONEL MAJENDIE
From a photo by Webber, Canterbury.
Such is Colonel Majendie, the sworn enemy of dynamiters; and it was in company with him that the writer visited New Scotland Yard and examined, one by one, the contents of the case already referred to, and associated them with the various incidents in which they were designed to play—and, in some instances, succeeded in playing—so prominent a part.
FIG. 1.—EXPLOSION AT DUBLIN CASTLE.
FIG. 2.—"BABY'S BOTTLE?" FIG. 3.—EXPLOSIVE COAL.
It may be said that the more serious attempts to devote dynamite to the very reverse purpose from what it was intended for commenced in 1881, when, on the 14th January of that year, an attempt was made to blow up the barracks at Salford. Very little damage was done to the barracks, but a lad was killed and another injured. In all the subsequent attempts to destroy life and property, only one other death has occurred. On the Christmas Eve of 1892, an infernal machine exploded outside the Detective Office in Exchange Court, Dublin Castle, when a detective officer was killed (Fig. 1). Without including minor explosions, the numbers of important dynamitic efforts from the year 1881 to 1892 are as follows:—In 1881, 9 attempts; 1882, 5; 1883, 10; 1884, 12; 1885, 8; 1886, 4; 1887, 15; 1888, 2; 1889, 3; 1890, 5; 1891, 6; and in 1892, 7 outrages. It is not necessary to say that the initial explosion at Salford, in 1881, greatly alarmed the public. Anything found of a suspicious character was at once associated with dynamite, and the earliest relic treasured at New Scotland Yard is a strange-looking object which was found in a tram-car, and owing to the excited state of the mind of the British public at that time, was immediately put down as an infernal machine. There is, however, some reason to believe that it was nothing more than a model for a new idea in babies' feeding-bottles (Fig. 2). Its inventor never put in a claim for it, but it still remains at "The Yard" for anybody who can justify his or her claim to its possession. By its side is an imitation piece of coal—(Fig. 3)—a most deadly weapon when used, for it is intended to be filled with explosive and thrown in the stoke-hole of vessels, in the hope that the stoker may shovel it into the furnace with some of the other fuel. Another relic of this year is one of four machines which were found on the 2nd July at Liverpool in the Bavaria (Fig. 4), six other infernal machines having been found in the Malta two days previously. They were discovered in barrels of cement. They contained lignin-dynamite, with a very cheap clock arrangement for firing it. The machines proper were in leaden boxes about nine inches long by four inches square. A second machine of the 1881 period is of the clockwork pattern (Fig. 5), and is controlled by a small knife, which falls at the set time, cutting a string, releasing a spring which falls on a percussion cap, and so brings about an explosion.