Members gathered to hear residents relate anecdotes and reminiscence of their associations with their previous neighbour, the Great Train Robber Charlie Wilson, alias Ronald Alloway, who lived with his wife and three children in Hudson and Rigaud for several years, until his recapture by Scotland Yard on February 1, 1968.
Charlie Wilson (Ron Alloway) had been one of 20-member gang who robbed the Royal Mail Glasgow-to-London post office train of around $100 million (if calculated today) on August 8, 1963. It was billed as « The Great Train Robbery » in England. Most of the thieves were captured and imprisoned, while Charlie Wilson escaped, disguised himself, and, eventually took up residence in Hudson, as Ron Alloway, with his family.
“Alloway arrest stuns area,” reported the local press. “It was the day the world’s media flocked to Hudson,” read Kevin O’Donnell, HHS president from a news article. “We were approached by the press, too, to sell them our stories about the Alloway family, but we declined. However, after we heard that Charlie Wilson’s wife, Pat had sold her story to the press for about $250,000, perhaps we might have been tempted,” said Betty Whiting, who had invited a group of residents to share their memories of the time when the Alloway family lived in their neighbourhood. Memories and photos from this train robber were shared at the September 10 monthly HHS meeting.
Letters were read, signed by Charlie Wilson (Ronald Alloway) to Hudson residents following his re-capture, when he expressed his thanks for their help, and above all, expressing his love to his children. He had signed a letter to his daughters from prison with “lots of love and love, and more love, from your father”. Ronald Alloway and his wife, Pat, and three children had lived for a brief period in a house on Main Road, near St. James Church in Hudson, before moving to Rigaud. Their daughter, Tracy, went to a local elementary schol where she made friends. One of the Hudson families housed the Alloway family, in the hours after their father was re-captured as they were barred from their home by the RCMP. There was a consensus that Charlie Wilson was, above all, a devoted father and family man, who had a dual personality as a criminal thief. Perhaps the most vivid anecdote was presented by Perry Bedbrook, who was a real estate agent at that time. He remembere driving Ron Alloway around to more isolated places outside of Hudson, and selling him the vacant lot in Rigaud, where Ron Alloway built the house, where he lived with his family until his re-capture. “Ron Alloway was desperately trying to be as respectable, as we all were trying to be. When we looked at the vacant lots in Mountain Ranches, a big red deer was sitting on the ground. He asked me: “Is it always there?” “It’s a friend of mine,” I replied. We wondered where he got his money. He was a nice guy,” said Perry Bedbrook.
Some facts incorrectJoanne Wilson, the daughter of the couple who lived in the only other house on Mountain Ranches at the time, recalled that her mother was a great fan of mystery stories and that had she had a copy of a book about the “Great Train Robbery” on the coffee table. When they referred to the book, Ron Alloway always said “some of the facts in the book were incorrect, about the sums of money that were stolen,” said Ms. Wilson.
