In 1971, police officers in London received a tip about a potentially ongoing bank robbery. But when they approached one of the local banks and quickly rushed over to its vault, they were surprised to see that nothing at all seemed to be out of the ordinary. All the locks were still intact and none of the alarms had been triggered.

In fact, there was no sign that even a single hair was out of place as such. Since this particular bank was also widely considered as one of the most death proof banks in all of England, the officers figured it had to be safe. But little did these officers know that as they were on the outside of the speaker's vault, a team of criminals were on the inside, quietly preparing to make off with millions.

Welcome back, guys. My name is Andy Jiang and this is Hidden Stores.

In 1970, a 38 year old photographer and career criminal from London named Anthony Gavin began planning one of the most ambitious and daring heists in British history. Having recently read the Sherlock Holmes novel The Redheaded League, where a group of thieves try to rob a bank by digging a tunnel into the bottom of the vault from a nearby building.

He was inspired to try something similar in real life, and he already had a location in his mind. The local branch of a bank called Lloyds Bank. Now, this particular branch of Lloyds Bank was one of the most renowned and secure banks in all of England. The place where all of London's richest and most powerful people's stored their wealth.

So it was, of course, designed to be completely impossible to break into. Not only did its vault have a five ton bombproof door and three foot thick steel reinforced concrete walls, it also had numerous tremor alarms to detect even the slightest movements in and around it. As far as I'm aware, no one had even tried to break into Lloyds Bank before Anthony.

It was just one of those places that you would be crazy to even consider. But despite just how secure this place was, Anthony knew that since the owners of Le Cirque, a leather goods store just two doors down from the bank, had recently closed down and were trying to sell their property, a property with a basement that was almost on the exact same level as the bank's fault.

There would never be a better opportunity to tunnel in to a bank then from there. And since Lloyds Bank was also located at one end, seven Baker Street, almost identical to Sherlock Holmes address of 221 Baker Street, Anthony felt that a successful heist from there would just be poetic as such with the location of his house in his mind.

Anthony began to get to work to put his plan into place. As a former Army physical training instructor, he was a very disciplined and intelligent man who knew the value of teamwork as such, since he also had connections to several local gangs. He began to quickly put together a strong team of highly specialized individuals, each with their own unique skill sets and rules, including a used car salesman, a burglar alarm expert, an explosives expert, a lookout man, as well as a handful of other men and women.

And in December of 1970, the first part of Anthony's plan finally went into action. Since the used car salesman, a man named Red Tucker, didn't have a criminal record. And he also had an air of natural charisma and charm from his years working as a salesman. He was the perfect person to infiltrate the bank and to gather precise details on the bank's faults, dressed in very fancy, expensive clothing and giving himself the fake name Je Edwards.

He was able to pose as a high end customer and open an account at Lloyds Bank. He then rented out a safety deposit box which gave him access to the bank's vault. And since the bank's practices at the time was for Steph to leave all of the customers alone while they were visiting the vault to help them feel more comfortable retrieving whatever secret items there were.

Therefore, whenever Reg visited, he would carefully measure the parameters of the room using an umbrella that he had brought with them, as well as his own wingspan. In the following months after Anthony brought him on board, he visited the vault 13 different times, which allowed him to gradually draw out a highly precise diagram of the room for the heist, him marking where each cabinet was and the positions of all the furniture.

And with this detailed map of the vault now in his hands, in May of 1971, Anthony kicked off the second part of his plan with the Lisak building two doors down from Lloyds Bank still available for purchase. Anthony enlisted an older 64 year old man named Benjamin Wolff, who made a living selling ornaments to buy the property for £10,000.

After that, the only thing left stopping them from actually beginning to dig their tunnel was the issue of the bank's tremor alarms. However, after Anthony's alarms expert, a man named Mickey Travis, has spent a while trying to figure out how to bypass this issue. The team caught an incredibly lucky break. Right around that time, some construction work had begun on the roads near Lloyds Bank.

As a result, since all the digging and drilling, though was taking place, was repeatedly triggering these tremor alarms. Bank employees decided to temporarily turn them off every time the roadwork was happening. As such, Anthony, in his hosting, realized that every time this roadwork was going to happen, they'd be able to freely dig without having to worry about the alarms.

And since the extremely loud construction noises would also help drown out any potential noises that their tunnel digging would make, which was another possible concern. This turn of events was an absolute miracle for them to be as safe as possible, though the bank employees still decided to only take on weekends when the bank was closed and when the bank employees were just literally right above them.

But although they had now successfully dealt with all their biggest roadblocks at the moment, digging the tunnel itself was still a lot easier said than done. Starting on a Friday evening in August 1971, Anthony and the rest of his group started their work on the tunnel for the very first time. Even from the start, Anthony knew that this would be an increase doubly challenging feat since the classic building was around 40 feet away from Lloyds Bank.

This tunnel would have to be dug through 40 feet of extremely unstable layers of dirt and debris that had been built up over centuries. Even though Anthony had intensely recruited several mining experts and people with engineering backgrounds onto his team, there was still always the risk that each bit of rubble they removed could instantly cause the entire tunnel to collapse and kill them all.

As such, digging this tunnel was an extremely slow, stressful and uncomfortable process since the tunnel itself was only made just barely wide enough, even for an adult human to just crawl through both to save time and energy, and also to just reduce the chances of the entire thing collapsing. The team had to hammer and dig away. Will be packed together in these insanely claustrophobic areas for hours at a time.

It was extremely dark and extremely hot, and since they were underground in this relatively sealed off area with dust everywhere, there was also very little oxygen. Still, however, the team, including Anthony, at the very forefront of the tunnel digging, pushed on through these conditions and just kept going. But on August 15, their first problem struck. Turns out, although Anthony and his team had been making a ton of progress with their tunnel, this progress had taken them right under the building that was directly in between Lloyds Bank and the SEC, a restaurant called Chicken Inn.

Even though they were only digging on weekends when most people were around. All the inevitable noise and vibrations that were being made by the team chiseling apart rocks and pushing aside dirt had still caught the attention of the chicken and workers who had no idea where the sound was coming from but were highly suspicious of it. As such, one worker decided to come over to the neighboring Woodside property and knock on the door to ask what's going on.

Unfortunately though, since at this time all of the heist team members were either in the basement or literally inside the tunnel for a while, no one heard the knocks at all. Now, this was really, really bad for them. Since when? No one responded, this chicken worker seriously considered calling the police and reporting the strange noise. But in another stroke of just incredible luck, one of the team members with apparently insane hearing just so happened to pick up on the knocking and reported it to Anthony at the very last minute.

And after Anthony sprinted upstairs to answer the door and explain to the worker that, Oh, we're just doing some minor renovations, there's nothing to worry about at all. The worker left and the team was able to go right back to digging over time. As the tunnel progressed further and further, the group began to use a sort of trolley that they had on pulley ropes to move all that dirt that they had dug up outside the tunnel.

Anthony was very careful to continuously monitor the direction and length of their digging, using a compass and a tape measure to ensure that they wouldn't accidentally pop up in the middle of some route. And after nine entire weeks had gone by and over 8.1 tonnes of waste had been removed. With Anthony losing over £28 in the grueling process, the team finally felt that they were now under the bank's fault.

Now, one vet, Tucker, had been posing as a customer at Lloyds Bank. He had gone the chance to talk to the bank's manager a couple of times and to learn some details about the bank's vault. The manager would often probably tell him, You know, one of the greatest things about this bank is that we have a time lock on the vault which enables every single weekend and cannot be opened even by me until the weekend is over at 10 a.m. on Monday morning.

So everything will 100% be safe over the weekend. But little did this bank manager know that was exactly what the heist team was counting on. They had planned to break into the fold on a Friday evening right after the time lock had been activated, which gave them the entire weekend to steal as much stuff as they could with pretty much a guarantee that no one would visit the vault as such.

On the Friday evening, right after the team had finally reached right underneath the bank's vault. Anthony launched the third part of his plan into action as Anthony and his team made their way inside the tunnel one last time. Their lookout, a man named Bobby Mills, was carefully watching over the outside of the bank from one of the nearby rooftops, communicating with the group via walkie talkie and making sure that no surprise guests were showing up unexpectedly when the lookout reassured them that the coast was clear.

The group quickly got to work on the last piece of the puzzle, which was breaking into the vault floor. But unfortunately for them, this was no easy feat. Although the votes for was slightly less protected than the walls and ceiling were, with only two foot thick steel reinforced concrete rather than three, it was still incredibly hard to break through.

The group's first attempt at using a hydraulic jack to chisel through the material barely made a dent, even after more than an hour. As such, Anthony decided to resort to his Plan B, which was to use a thermal fence. The 8000 degree Fahrenheit temperatures that these thermal lances produced would definitely be enough to cut through the vaults for.

But the reason that using the thermal lance wasn't planned was simply because it was just extremely dangerous. The fumes that using the lance produced were highly poisonous, which could easily be fatal in such a closed, unventilated space. As such, as the group desperately tried to burn through the steel, for they were all just choking and coughing on these poisonous fumes, unable to really concentrate.

And after another hour or two had gone by and still very little progress had been made. The group became really desperate. They knew that they were running out of time, so they had to resort to drastic measures. The one that's potential solution that Anthony had was to just blow the four up. It was not only the most dangerous solution due to just how close they would be to the explosion and just how unstable their tunnel was.

It was also by far the riskiest since it was the loudest and least subtle. But still, at this point, time was ticking fast and with no other way. The group really didn't have a choice. As such, with the help of Anthony's explosives expert, the group managed to stick several sticks of gelignite, a cousin of dynamite into the vaults for desperately praying and hoping that it would work and that they wouldn't die.

Everyone then quickly moved to the far end of the tunnel and with a green light from their lookout, they triggered the explosion to Anthony and his group's incredible relief and joy. Their plan actually worked. Their tunnel was fine. They were fine. And now they were staring at this large, gaping hole that went straight inside the vault as they each climbed inside, instead of the thousands of safety deposit boxes holding millions upon millions of unimaginable treasures.

They almost couldn't believe it did manage to pull something off those thought to be impossible. All the relentless hard work and dedication over the past few months had finally paid off. It was an incredible moment for them. But although the group had figured the moment they arrived inside the vault, everything would be smooth sailing from there. They were wrong.

Since the explosion that they had just created had lifted up this massive cloud of dust and fumes inside this, of course, completely airtight vault. Soon they could all barely see. They could barely breathe with everyone once again choking and tumbling over, coughing their lungs out. Anthony and his team knew that there was simply no way they'd be able to hit all the safety deposit boxes they had intended on looting in these conditions.

For a while, they tried to loot what they could, but none of them could stand the fumes anymore. The transmitted to the look out that they might have to leave and then come back later. Once everything had cleared out, however, when the look, I was told that he would have to stay up on the roof all night. He became frustrated and started arguing with the group inside the vault, telling them to just keep on working.

This argument went on for a pretty long while and things started getting heated fast, but little did any of them know someone was listening in on their conversation. That very night, it just so happened that a local amateur radio enthusiast named Robert Rollins was warming up a specialized radio to listen to a news broadcast when he suddenly heard some muffled voices coming through.

Turns out, by some insane stroke of chance, he had just accidentally been on the exact same frequency that the heist team's walkie talkies were on. As such, as Robert started listening in on the conversation just out of curiosity, trying to figure out where it was coming from. He was sort to realize that he had stumbled across a bank robbery happening at that very moment.

Of course, he immediately called the cops to tell them what he had found. But to Robert's surprise, the officers didn't seem interested at all. And what he was telling them, what he was saying was just so crazy that the officers thought he was breaking them and they simply told him to record the actual conversation before calling them again.

Robert realized that this was actually a really good idea, so he started recording the heist team, talking to one another, talking with him at the security company building. And we're all going to try to stop this way. We're only coming in on security and control movements. However, they were also arguing with one another, but eventually, with some pressure from Anthony and another one of the group's leaders, the lookout finally agreed to stay and keep watch for the night, while the rest of the group waited for the fumes to clear up.

The conversation then went silent. But by then, Robert already had more than enough footage to share with the police. This time, instead of just calling his local police station, Robert decided to directly call Scotland Yard, the headquarters of the Metropolitan Police. When he informed them about the conversations that he had captured. Scotland Yard immediately sent a couple of officers over to his home to take a listen for themselves.

When they arrived, the very quickly saw Robert's point. These guys were very clearly committing some sort of bank robbery somewhere. However, since they had no way of specifically pinpointing where this radio signal was coming from, they had no idea which bank was being robbed. As such, these officers immediately started putting together a team to try to go out and visit all these local banks to figure out which one had been broken into.

But although Robert, who is very familiar with radios and how they worked, told these officers that were just how clear the voices were. This bank had to be very close nearby and that they should just search in a one mile radius around his home. These officers kind of just dismiss them and told them, Hey, man, look, we know what we're doing.

The officers then set up an eight mile radius around his home instead and then started to look through all the banks in that area. But since this made it so that there were more than 750 banks to visit, this was going to take them ages. Luckily, however, around 6 hours after the voices on Robert's radio had gone silent, at 7 a.m. on Saturday morning, they suddenly started up again.

Turns out the heist team had returned. And when I went back inside the boat, since all the fumes had finally cleared. But no, since several police officers were also listening to their conversations alongside Robert. These officers hope that they'd be able to pick up some details that will lead them straight to the right bank. With every new word that came through the radio, the chances became higher and higher that the robbers would screw up and that they would accidentally reveal some sort of detail that would expose their location.

But then the heist team came across another incredible stroke of luck. Shortly after they had arrived back inside the vault, their lookout man suddenly reported. Another waiter from the next door took an inn restaurant suddenly outside the bank, trying to look in through the front windows. He had apparently heard some noises coming from inside the big, so he was trying to see what was happening.

But although the heist him froze and when terrified that this man would call the cops and report that something was up to their immense relief, he eventually figured there was nothing and left. And little did Anthony and his team know this close call actually went on to potentially save them from being caught because they were so spooked by that, they decided to change the frequency on their walkie talkies, inadvertently cutting off the only clue the police officers had to their location.

But although the police team that was still running all around London trying to find these robbers was now left completely in the dark. They eventually did end up finally checking Lloyds Bank, which, by the way, was actually within a mile of Robert's house like he had expected. As the bank's manager, let the police officers in and begin leading them towards the bank's fault.

The House seems look out quickly, warned the group inside the vault to stop moving now as Anthony and his crew each instantly told it to stop holding their breath and hearts pounding on their chests, their minds begin to run through all these worst case scenarios. What if that waiter had called the police? What if some of the fumes had made it outside of the vault?

What if the officers could hear them breathing inside the vault? But as the police officers and the bank's managers stood outside the vault store, they saw no sign of any break in and nothing at all out of the ordinary. Of course, they had no idea that someone had tunneled the way in from underneath. But to them, from the outside, it just seemed like another perfectly secure vault.

And since just like the heist team had originally planned the vaults, time lock couldn't be opened by the bank's manager to check everything inside. The police officers eventually left and moved on to took the next pick. But by this point, Anthony Ms. team had had enough. He had already experienced way too many close calls for comfort. And even though there were still a little bit of time left before the weekend was over, they wanted to be as safe as possible.

As such, they opened up just a few more safety deposit boxes, and then on Saturday afternoon they left the bank's vault for good. Anthony made sure to leave just one clue behind. The words. Let's see how Sherlock Holmes solves this one scrawled on one of the vaults. What's despite the robbers having already left the bank? The police officers obviously had no idea and just kept searching bank after bank after bank, hoping to stumble across the robbers red handed.

But of course, by Sunday evening, they still hadn't found anything. And so they had no choice but to wait until Monday morning when all the banks were opened up to see which one had been robbed. When Monday morning finally came, the same bank manager, which so confidently reassured the police officers that Lloyds Bank was perfectly secure. Just two days earlier, walking Swiss banks fault in his heart stopped.

The entire place had been trussed. There was dirt everywhere. Safety deposit boxes have been smashed, open and thrown about. And so he immediately called the police. In the following days, the heist, which became known as the Baker Street robbery and also the walkie talkie heist, became this huge news story. There was this general feeling of disbelief among the public, especially among the higher end British citizens who had actually had stuff inside of this bank's vault.

People were just socked in in all that someone had actually managed to do it. Someone had managed to steal from Lloyds Bank when an investigation was launched into the heist. It was estimated that up to £3 million worth of cash and other items could have been stolen, which amounts to around £54 million today. Although at first the police were just completely out laws as to who had committed the crime since whoever it was had covered up their tracks extremely well, leaving behind no fingerprints or other identifying evidence.

When the officers trace the tunnel in the vaults for back over to the Issac building and realized that the property had been purchased by a man named Benjamin Wolff, they finally had their first lead. Turns out when Anthony had initially approached Benjamin about buying the classic building, Benjamin had chose to do so using his real name, since he had figured that he could just tell the police that he had temporarily left the place empty after buying it and had no idea that someone had been digging a tunnel in its basement.

When the police eventually tracked down Benjamin and questioned him, that's exactly what he told them. But although the police officers did let him go after he repeatedly stuck to the story, he had failed to take just one small thing into account. As Benjamin went about his life as usual after his encounter with the police, he failed to realize that the police had placed him on surveillance, and since he was making regular contact with the same few people, including a man named Anthony Gavin, who seemed to have an almost identical voice to one of the voices on the walkie talkie conversation, the police officers soon realized that they had found their host in within weeks.

Benjamin. Anthony Gavin, the used car salesman, Rogue Tucker, and a man named Thomas Stephens would help to acquire all the tools needed for the heist. Were all arrested despite the tunnel that they dug, being described in court as, quote, a magnificent piece of engineering. Anthony Rigg and Thomas would go on to each be sentenced to 12 years in prison while Benjamin received just eight years due to his age.

All the other members of the heist team, including the alarms expert Mickey surveys and the Lookout Bobby Mills, were never captured. It's rumored that some of them actually paid off the police in exchange for their freedom, which makes sense because most of the money and valuables that were stolen from the bank were never recovered either. As for Robert Rawlins, the radio enthusiast would alerted the police to the heist in the first place for a while.

Scotland Yard actually really wanted to take him to court for listening to unlicensed radio transmissions. In the end, however, they decided not to, so it would be very poor publicity for them to try and prosecute the man who tried to help them. And Lloyds Bank would also later gift Robert 20 £500 or around £45,000 today to thank him for his actions.

But the story doesn't end there. In fact, it takes a very eerie turn. Several sources at the time, including Robert Rawlins himself, reported that the British government had issued a notice in the days after the heist, which banned any reporting on the heist due to reasons of national security. As such, it was reported that for a while at least, the bank robbery story disappeared from the newspapers entirely, which is confusing as to why the government would do that until you realize what might have been inside that bank's fault.

You see, people don't just leave money and jewelry inside vaults. They sometimes leave secrets that they don't want ever uncovered. Following the robbery, one of the members of the heist team came out and said that while they were looting the vault safety deposit boxes, he came across some photos of one of Britain's cabinet ministers at the time abusing children.

It was also said that sexually compromising photos of Princess Margaret with the actor and criminal John Benton were found inside the vault as well. However, although the heist team claimed to have left these photos out for the police to see and deal with, according to them, nothing ever happened and everything was quickly covered up, which was the reason for the details.

Now, the British government, of course, denies all of this and denies even ever issuing a notice. And there's no real evidence that any of this actually happened. But although we'll never know for sure whether any of this is true. What we do know is that most of the information surrounding the Baker Street robbery, more than 800 pages of documents are under embargo at the National Archives and won't be available for viewing until 2071.

Maybe there's a legitimate reason for doing this, but you've got to ask yourself what's through to cover up? Take care, guys, and I'll see you all next week.