Colonel Blood's Theft of the Crown Jewels

On May 9, 1671, Irish adventurer Colonel Thomas Blood made one of the most audacious theft attempts in English history — trying to steal the Crown Jewels from the Tower of London. Blood had spent weeks befriending Talbot Edwards, the elderly keeper of the Jewel House, posing as a clergyman and visiting multiple times. On the day of the theft, he and three associates overpowered Edwards and broke into the vault. The gang flattened the crown with a mallet to conceal it under a cloak, stuffed the orb down a bag, and began sawing the sceptre in two. They were caught at the Tower gates when Edwards's son arrived unexpectedly and raised the alarm. Blood and his accomplices were arrested after a brief pursuit through the grounds. What followed was stranger than the crime itself. Rather than face trial, Blood demanded a personal audience with King Charles II, a request inexplicably granted. After the meeting, Blood was not only pardoned but granted an annual pension of £500 and had his Irish lands restored. Historians have speculated ever since that Charles II was somehow complicit in the plot, perhaps needing to raise quick funds discreetly. The full truth of the royal pardon has never been established. Blood became something of a celebrity in London society and died a free man in 1680. The case remains one of history's most puzzling royal mysteries, raising questions about corruption at the highest levels of the English court that were never publicly answered.