The film’s plot is loosely based on the Great Gold Robbery of 1855, in which a cracksman named William Pierce engineered the theft of a trainload of gold being shipped to the British Army during the Crimean War.[1] The gold shipment of £12,000 (equal to £1,101,507 today) in gold coin and ingots from the London-to-Folkestonepassenger train was stolen by Pierce and his accomplices, a clerk in the railway offices named Tester, and a skilled screwsman named Agar.
