Context Note: Warner’s wife [Hannah (Lowe) (Warner) Hodges] was presumably at home at the time, with their baby daughter.
Provincial Intelligence.
BIRMINGHAM. – BANK ROBBERY. – A robbery to a considerable amount was on Thursday afternoon effected by a clerk of the Town and District Banking Company of Birmingham. It appears that about one o’clock in the day, William Stanley Warner, a young man about 27 years of age, left, as usual, to take dinner, previously to which he was observed to go to a drawer at the counter. This drawer contained cash and notes to a very considerable amount; but at the time no suspicion whatever was entertained as to Warner’s dishonesty. At the closing of the bank, at 4 o’clock, notes numbered from 46,531 to 46,542 both inclusive, for £100 each, dated Birmingham, April 18, 1843, were stolen, together with about ten sovereigns. As a matter of course, Warner not having permission of absence from Mr. Smith, the managing director, suspicion fell upon him. Mr. Smith immediately communicated with Mr. Stephens, the head of the police, and every exertion was made to discover Warner’s retreat. Communications were sent to the different police-offices in the kingdom, and a reward of £100 for his apprehension was offered.
BIRMINGHAM, MONDAY EVENING. – William Stanley Warner, the clerk in the Birmingham District Banking Company, charged with having stolen from that establishment notes and sovereigns to the amount of £1,210, and subsequently absconded, was apprehended at Chester on Saturday evening, under very peculiar circumstances. Soon after he left Birmingham, on Thursday afternoon, he was traced towards West Bromwich, and the next day he was found to have been in Shrewsbury, where he slept at the Crown Inn on Thursday night. Tandy, an active officer of the Birmingham Police, was close upon him in Shrewsbury, but Warner for a time eluded apprehension, and during Friday, he left Shrewsbury it was supposed, for the Whitmore Station on the Grand Junction Railway. So close was Tandy upon his heels, that at Shrewsbury, he succeeded in taking Warner’s beaver hat, which he had exchanged only a few hours before for a straw one. From information afterwards received, Tandy and Mr. Floyd, a clerk in the bank, who accompanied him, proceeded by the Wrexham-road, to Chester. By this route they traced Warner all the way to that city. He had, it appears, called at almost all the road-side public-houses, and at one or more was so boisterously intoxicated, that he was refused lodgings for the night. Having, it was supposed, walked the greater portion of the way from Shrewsbury to Chester; on Saturday evening, he was observed driving up Watergate-street in a gig in so drunken a state, that Mitchell, one of the City Police, deemed it right to take him and his vehicle to the York public-house, for safety. Previous to putting him to bed, the officer examined the contents of his pockets, and, to his no little surprise, he found in one of them 9 sovereigns, 14s. 10d. in silver, and 8d. in copper, and in another 12 Wolverhampton £5 notes, and 11 Bank of England £100 notes. Upon making this discovery, Mitchell immediately communicated with Mr. Hill, the chief superintendent of the city police, who at once suspected that it was the very person “wanted” for the robbery of the bank at Birmingham. He at once proceeded to examine him, and found, not only that the person of Warner corresponded with the description given of him in the printed handbills, but also that the numbers of the £100 notes found in his trousers pocket, were the identical numbers of the stolen notes. Mr. Hill immediately caused Warner to be removed to the prison; but he was so dreadfully inebriated that he did not appear conscious of his removal, nor at all aware of his situation until he awoke the following morning. During the night, Tandy, the Birmingham officer, and Mr. Floyd, arrived in Chester, and traced Warner to the York Tavern, when, to their great surprise, they found that the Chester police had anticipated the object of their errand, and thus entitled themselves to the £100 reward offered for the culprit’s apprehension. This morning, Warner was brought before Mr. Bolton and Mr. Beilby, two Birmingham borough magistrates, at the public-office, in the town. The only evidence given related to the loss of the notes, and the circumstances under which the prisoner was apprehended with the notes in his possession. He was remanded till Thursday next for further examination.
(Coventry Standard, 2nd August 1844)
Our Family 2 