From Anlaby Road to Monte Carlo and nearly bust: The rise and fall of a Hull shipping tycoon
SPLENDOUR: The Hotel Metropole in London was a favourite of Sir Walter Cockerline
Now & Then, a column by Angus Young
The rise and fall of Sir Walter Cockerline
When the police finally caught up with him in Paris, Australian conman William Warren tried one last bluff. “I am an American. I have just come from Switzerland. What do you want?”
Warren – whose nickname was Bludger Bill – had recently arrived in the French capital with his wife in a Rolls Royce equipped with a false number plate. When the vehicle was searched, police found French, English and Spanish banknotes and diamond-encrusted jewellery stuffed inside cushions and its upholstery. Even the toolbox was packed with securities and shares certificates.
Some of the cash – an estimated £25,000 – had previously been emptied from the deep pockets of Sir Walter Cockerline in an audacious swindle over a horse race at Longchamps. The scam was a typical Warren trick and his victim – a millionaire from Hull – had been well and truly played.
It was 1923 and Sir Walter was one of Hull’s best known figures. A year earlier the former Sheriff of Hull and a magistrate had been knighted for services to the community while the shipping company he owned was one of the most successful in the country.
Born in Hull in 1856, he married at the age of 22 and having initially worked at Earle’s shipyard he set up own shipping and brokerage business with an office in Wellington Street before later moving his company to Trinity House Lane. The age of the steam ship was in its pomp and the Cockerline fleet of cargo-carrying steamers was in big demand.
The first family home was 5 Clyde Terrace, which still stands today in the shadow of the Anlaby Road flyover next to the former St. Matthew’s Church. However as his wealth grew, Cockerline decided to buy a relatively new villa further along Anlaby Road to cement his standing in society.
FORMER HOME: The Albert Hotel in Anlaby Road, once home to millionaire Hull shipping tycoon Sir Walter Cockerline
Fairholme was originally built in 1894 as a large detached house for James Cook, one of the founding partners of the ship-building firm Cook Welton & Gemmell. It stood next to Broxholme, another large mansion owned by Charles Hellyer, founder of the trawler owners Hellyer Brothers, and diagonally opposite his business partner William Gemmell’s house.
While the latter still carries its previous owner’s name as a pub, Cockerline’s former residence has undergone many name changes and guises over the years, operating as a hotel, nightclub and, more recently, a sports bar known as the Albert Hotel, which closed earlier this year.
Despite many unsympathetic architectural changes over the decades, you can still get a sense of its grandeur from Cockerline’s day if you look closely enough. At the rear, a large garden would have almost certainly covered the space occupied by the current car park while the outline of the footings of a detached building – probably stables – can still be seen.
Unlike the neighbouring Broxholme which was demolished and replaced with a block of flats in the early 1980s, Fairholme is a reminder of the days when that particular section of Anlaby Road was the place to live if you happened to be a wealthy shipowner.
The Cockerline fleet would eventually number 44 vessels but his eye for a deal would often see many sold to shipping companies around the world for big money. As such, Sir Walter was as much at home on his travels as he was in west Hull, and it seems he wasn’t afraid to make the most of his wealth and splash the cash when necessary.
The 1901 Census records him as living temporarily at the Hotel Metropole in Northumberland Avenue in London, at the time regarded as one of the most fashionable new hotels in the capital.
ASSET: Built in 1918, the steam ship War Hamlet was one of 44 vessels owned and operated by Sir Walter Cockerline’s company. This picture was taken in 1933 when she was named Kurrika. She was sunk by a German U-boat in 1941
It’s also clear that away from shipping, his great love was horse racing and betting, eventually owning his own stable of racehorses in North Yorkshire. It was also nearly his downfall.
His fateful meeting with William ‘Bludger Bill’ Warren took place during a holiday in France where the latter, posing as the rich owner of a South African diamond mine, led a gang of swindlers who regularly preyed on unsuspecting English millionaires and naïve aristocrats visiting the famous casinos on the Riviera.
In his own 1930 memoir looking back on a career tracking down criminals, ex-Scotland Yard detective Charles Leach describes Warren as a “rough uneducated colonial who could barely write his own name”. He was certainly part of an established gang, moving initially from fleecing wealthy passengers crossing the Atlantic on liners to conning the rich and famous in the playgrounds of Europe.
“They belong to an international fraternity of a very exclusive kind”, noted The Times just before the outbreak of the First World War. “There are said to be not more than 30 or 40 in London, Australians for the most part. All are known to one another. All are ready to work with a temporary associate until the job is finished.”
Warren’s favourite con was taking money off victims to bet on horse races by convincing them he had inside knowledge and then disappearing with the cash. In just one case, he duped £12,000 after falsely claiming to be the owner of an Ascot Gold Cup winner. In another, he swindled £15,000 from a wealthy English businessman in two betting scams.
Under gambling law, debts like this were irrecoverable at the time so his victim sued for fraud and a jury took just five minutes to find in his favour. Warren duly fled the country and resumed his way of life, setting up home in the south of France where he would eventually meet Sir Walter.
ROYAL CONNECTIONS: Sir Walter Cockerline, bottom right, pictured in his role as Hull’s High Sheriff
With Warren posing as a diamond mine owner staying at the same hotel, the Hull shipping tycoon was introduced to an acquaintance – an American oil baron who was actually another member of the same gang. After striking up a friendship over a few days, the trio then headed for the casinos of Monte Carlo where, as luck would have it, a passer-by was recognised by the oil baron as they were all taking coffee on the balcony.
“That’s the biggest bookmaker in the United States. His limit is the blue sky,” said the oil man. Duly invited to join the party, the bookie confirmed his betting limit credentials and a series of heavy bets were laid. At the end of the day, they had chalked up £170,000 worth of winnings.
However, when it came to settle up, the diamond mine owner informed Sir Walter and the oil king that the bookmaker’s club would not pay up until they could provide a sufficient deposit to prove they were men of sufficient financial standing. Sir Walter drew a cheque worth £25,000 and handed it over but was then unexpectedly called home on business before he could collect his winnings. He never saw his money again.
Soon after the con, some of Warren’s associates were arrested in Paris in connection with a series of swindles. As a result, he drove from Monte Carlo with the aim of helping them but was arrested himself with the cash and jewellery stashed in his Rolls Royce.
Warren’s fate was then sealed by accident. One of the gang already in prison wrote to him at an address in London unaware that he was actually in the same jail. The letter, which asked for money, was intercepted and provided enough evidence for the police to link the pair.
Sir Walter was then invited to Paris to identify the man who had swindled him out of his £25,000 deposit. Warren was eventually jailed for five years.
CASE CLOSED: Fraud charges against Sir Walter Cockerline were withdrawn after the prosecution had closed its case at Hull Magistrates’ Court
If Sir Walter had thought this was the last of his money troubles he couldn’t have been more wrong.
In 1925 the Inland Revenue started an investigation into his company’s tax returns. Three years later after what was described as an “exhaustive enquiry”, agreement was reached by both sides that Sir Walter was liable and should pay just over £107,000 in owed taxes – the equivalent of £8.6m in today's money – relating to a 12-year period. He paid the sum with a single cheque.
In July 1928 separate criminal proceedings were started against him by the Inland Revenue and he was charged with fraud in relation to his tax returns.
The case was heard before a stipendiary magistrate in Hull with the prosecution putting its full case over several weeks before the hearing was adjourned until late September.
During this break, the defence informed the Inland Revenue that Sir Walter’s health had declined to such an extent that his life was likely to be endangered if proceedings were to continue. Two medical advisors –one from the Revenue and the other being Sir Walter’s own doctor – carried out examinations and reached the same conclusion. As a result and after consultation with the Attorney-General, the criminal case was withdrawn based on an agreement by Sir Walter to pay a £300,000 fine for false and fraudulent returns instead.
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The decision to abandon the case stunned many and even led to a question being asked about it in the House of Commons by Labour MP Hugh Dalton.
The answer was provided by the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, Winston Churchill. He said: “In view of the defendant’s state of health, it is proposed not to proceed with the criminal prosecution unless there should have been a material improvement in his health when the case comes up at the York Assizes later this month.”
Evidently not happy with this, Dalton replied: “Would the Right Honourable Gentlemen say whether this is to be a precedent, and whether in future people will be permitted to get off if they can produce medical certificates?”
Churchill replied: “No Sir. It is not a question of precedent, but what is the right action in a particular case under notice.”
Sir Walter had avoided the possibility of ending up in the jail and went on to live for another 13 years, spending his later years in Scarborough before his death in 1941 at the age of 85. After his death the running of his company was taken over by his son, who was also called Walter. In 1954 the firm sold its last ship and went into voluntary liquidation three years later.