Burglary at Orpines (1850)

Kentish Gazette - Tuesday 19 February 1850 reported

'WATERINGBURY. Another Gang of Burglars.—Early on Friday morning se'nnight the residence of Mrs. Bigge, of Wateringbury, was broken open, the thieves effecting an entrance through the cellar window. Unfortunately they obtained a valuable booty, comprising a pair of gold scissors, two gold thimbles, a purse containing five pounds in gold and ten shillings in silver, a pair of silver candlesticks, a silver inkstand, seven silver wine labels, and a number of articles of less value. Field and another of the London Detective Police have, it is said, been employed to trace the thieves.'

Mrs Charlotte Hanway Bigge lived at the Orpines (not identified as such in the article) from 1846 to 1856. For a short history of the house from its building in 1844 until its demolition in 1970 together with a photo see page 66 of 'Wateringbury Revisted' by George Newman, enlarged and illustrated by Dail Whiting. Detailed plans of an extension to the house in 1897 by Leney which added a substantial billiard room and new corridor are available in Maidstone museum.

Mrs Bigge was probably (http://thepeerage.com/p47037.htm#i470361) born as Charlotte Scott (daughter of Reverend James Scott) and married Thomas Hanway Bigge, a banker from Newcastle, (died 1824) in 1815. In 1856 in the London Daily News a Francis Edward Bigge, a director of The London and West of Ireland Fishing and Fish Manure company was described as living in Wateringbury and at the Union Club, Trafalgar Square.

In 1856 someone left a baby, towards the end of the hopping season, in the shrubbery of The Orpines. It was reported in the Kentish Gazette of 7th October 1856 as follows:

Child Found.—On Monday, a male child, about six or seven months old, was found in the shrubbery of Mrs. Bigge's house, within six feet of the turnpike-road at Wateringbury. The clothes of the poor child, which were very ragged and dirty, were soaked through by the heavy rain that had fallen, and he appeared to have suffered from want of food. His parents have not sought him, nor have they been heard of.

For other burglaries in Wateringbury see Daring robbery, Women burglars of Wateringbury