In the early 2000s, infamous London gangster Eddie Richardson was attending a black-tie event at a snooker hall when he saw, seated across the room, the man he despised more than anyone else.
Fury quickly got the better of him. Eddie marched over and, in full view of the guests, launched into what he later described as “a right slagging,” only just stopping himself from knocking the man out.
Given the mythology that surrounds Britain’s gangland past, it would be easy to imagine that Eddie — who died two weeks ago aged 90 — had confronted a rival crime boss, perhaps even one of the Kray twins or someone from their circle.
But the object of his rage was not an enemy from another firm. It was Charlie Richardson, his elder brother.
Together, the Richardson brothers ran an operation widely regarded as more profitable, more brutal and more sophisticated than the empire built by Ronnie and Reggie Kray — yet their real story has faded behind decades of myth, fear and folklore.
Like the Krays, the Richardsons are often spoken about as if they were a single unit, but the pair parted ways in terms of criminal activity in the early 1960s and had a difficult relationship in the years that followed, ultimately reaching the point where they had no contact at all.
When Charlie died in 2012, Eddie turned up to his funeral but then refused to attend the burial service.
Charlie and Eddie Richardson (right) were kingpins of a more successful, more vicious and more sophisticated criminal operation than that led by Ronnie and Reggie Kray
Ron and Reg Kray (pictured) ruled east London with an iron first during the 1960s, while the Richardsons were based in south London
Eddie Richardson at the funeral of British gangster Frankie Fraser at Honor Oak Crematorium in south London in 2014
Now The Crime Desk looks at the very different paths that their lives took and how the actions of one brother helped bring about the downfall of them both.
Edward George Richardson was born in Camberwell in 1936, the second of four children.
Growing up during the blitz, the family abandoned by their father, he and his older brother Charlie soon drifted into petty crime. Eddie got his first conviction in 1949 at the age of 13 after stealing a torch.
Both brothers had dabbled in boxing but Eddie, a self-confessed ‘dangerous man’ who ‘loved having a row’ was the more talented and vicious of the two. The harder he was hit, the angrier he became, meaning he rarely lost fights in the ring or in the street.
Charlie was also handy with his fists, but his true gift was a sharp business brain. By the mid-1950s he owned six scrapyards with a staff of 30 and a legitimate turnover of £250,000.
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Eddie left school without any qualifications and drifted between work as a draftsman and railway porter before eventually deciding to work alongside his brother. However, while the Peckford Scrap Metal Company was legitimate, it was also being used as a cover for a rapidly growing criminal empire based around smuggling, extortion, robbery, assault and prostitution.
Leaning on their reputation for violence, the brothers made thousands from protection rackets by intimidating shop owners, pubs, clubs and other businesses into paying for protection. Failure to do so would lead to windows being smashed and staff being attacked, often by the brothers themselves until they finally agreed to pay up.
Charlie and Eddie ruled the gang that formed around them with an iron fist. They converted the basement of their offices into a drinking club which also doubled as a courtroom and torture chamber where those who crossed them were made to pay the price of betrayal.
In one instance, a club owner was hauled before the gang accused of swindling them out of £600 over a consignment of cigarettes. Inside the basement, a gun was placed on the table and he was ordered to strip. A Richardson associate, ‘Mad’ Frankie Fraser, then appeared with a pair of pliers.
‘He put them into my mouth and started to try to pull out my teeth,’ the man later recounted. ‘He slipped and pulled a lump of my gum out. Then he tried again and pulled part of a top tooth out.’
Cigarettes were then stubbed out on his arms and chest before he was wrapped in tarpaulin and ‘taken for a ride’ before being dumped.
Other victims were said to have suffered even more extreme treatment. One man who had been stripped, trussed to a chair and beaten for hours was made to clean up the blood-soaked room with his own underpants. Then there were claims of fingers and toes being amputated with bolt-cutters, whippings and genitals wired up to a black box with a handle which, when cranked, delivered an electric shock.
Often, Eddie or Charlie would don robes and take it in turns to play the judge or the prosecutor in a mock case. If proceedings went on too long, the beatings would be paused so the brothers could send out for beer or fish and chips.
Years later, the pair vehemently denied having taken part in some of the more extreme mutilations attributed to them, but Eddie finally admitted to the use of the black box, claiming the shock it provided was no stronger than that of a farmer’s electric fence. ‘That’s not to say it wasn’t unpleasant, especially as Charlie liked to wire it to blokes’ bollocks,’ he said.
As profits from the criminal empire grew, Charlie moved into ‘long firm fraud’. This involved setting up a company using the name of a patsy and then building up a good credit rating before placing a huge order. The goods would be sold, the brothers would pocket the money, and the fake company would vanish without a trace.
In 1963, eager to break away from his brother’s influence, Eddie and Fraser set up a company called Atlantic Machines to cash in on the market for newly legalised one-armed bandits. Club owners would be encouraged to install the machines in their premises with a promise of a higher-than-average share of the profits.
The club owners who refused would soon find their premises vandalised and their staff attacked. It was a more subtle form of protection than Eddie had indulged in before and one that appealed as the club owners didn’t have to pay anything out.
Together, the pair quickly built a lucrative empire with thousands of pounds flowing into their coffers each week and Eddie was soon driving around the capital in a Bentley.
Pictured: (right to left) Eddie Richardson, actor Stanley Baker and Frankie Fraser
Eddie Richardson (left) and Frank Fraser, who was known for torturing anyone who crossed the Richardsons gang
While the Krays were most concerned about raising their public profiles and being filmed with as many celebrities as possible, the Richardson brothers focused on expanding their operations. Though the two groups were aware of one another and often ended up at the same venues, this never led to any direct confrontation between the brothers and the twins.
It’s widely agreed that, out of the two organisations, the Richardsons were the ones earning the most money, though their income streams were now almost entirely separate.
Around this time, Charlie moved to South Africa to pursue his dream of owning his own diamond mine and becoming a millionaire.
Meanwhile, Eddie and Fraser continued to expand. In early 1966, they were approached by the owners of a club in Catford called Mr Smith’s and the Witchdoctor, in the hope that they could help them out. After finding the venue attracting a rough clientele, the owners had turned to two local toughs, Billy and Harry Hayward, to keep order in exchange for free drinks.
At first the arrangement went well but then the owners began to suspect the Haywards were planning to oust them and take over the club for themselves. In desperation, they turned to Eddie and a new deal was struck. In return for clearing out the Hayward brothers, Eddie would be allowed to install his own gaming machines in the premises.
To celebrate the new business, Eddie, Fraser and a few of their friends visited Mr Smith’s for a drink, sitting at a table on the opposite side of where the Haywards and their friends were. Fearing the worst, the Haywards called in backup and weapons including a sawn-off shotgun. Another man present, Dickie Hart, a thief who the Richardsons referred to dismissively as the ‘Catford fart’, told Harry Hayward he didn’t need a gun as he had his .45 pistol on him.
Around 3am, Eddie approached the Haywards’ table and told them it was time to leave. It didn’t go down well. One of the opposition, Peter Hennessy, called Eddie a ponce and challenged him to a fight.
Charlie Richardson (pictured) was jailed for 25 years for his role in the infamous ‘torture trial’
The pair moved to the dance floor and began exchanging blows. Hennessy briefly had the upper hand, catching Richardson with several hefty punches, but this just made him angry, and he soon knocked Hennessy down who screamed that he’d had enough. Eddie later recalled wanting to ‘smash his head through the floorboards’ but that was when the shooting started.
Hart was yelling: ‘someone is going to die’ and firing blindly. People were diving for cover or attacking one another with anything to hand. By the time it was over, Eddie had taken a shotgun blast to the back of the leg and buttocks, Fraser had been hit in the thigh, breaking his leg, and several others had been badly wounded. Somehow someone had taken the pistol away from Dickie Hart and shot him dead.
Eddie was bundled into a car and taken to hospital where he was booked in under the name of George Ward. The ruse worked until a police officer toured the ward and spotted him: ‘I know you. You’re Eddie Richardson.’
Charged with affray once he had recovered from his wounds, Eddie faced trial at the Old Bailey at the end of July 1966. With the jury unable to reach a unanimous verdict, he was remanded in custody to await a retrial, confident he was about to be acquitted.
In the past the Richardson gang had specialised in nobbling juries and paying off police officers to have charges dropped. Whenever a member of their team was arrested, the witnesses would inevitably lose their memories and the case would go no further.
But this time was different, and events outside of Eddie’s control meant he would soon be serving a lengthy sentence.
The previous year, older brother Charlie had fallen out with the Afrikaner with whom he had jointly purchased a large mine. A few months later, the business partner was shot dead on his doorstep.
A long-time member of the Richardson gang, Johnny Bradbury, was arrested and charged with the killing. During his trial in Johannesburg, Bradbury told the court that he had only carried out the murder because he was in fear of his life from the man who had ordered the hit: Charlie Richardson.
Found guilty and sentenced to hang, Bradbury struck an extraordinary deal with Scotland Yard detectives, who flew to South Africa to speak to him directly.
In return for a pardon and total immunity, he would tell everything he knew about the Richardsons. It was the beginning of the end.
Unbeknown to the brothers, several victims of their torture chamber had also been speaking to the police in the preceding months. On the morning of the 1966 World Cup Final in which England would beat Germany, a huge police operation took place rounding up dozens of Richardson gang members and taking them to Bow Street magistrates’ court for a hearing.
Eddie Richardson with one of his paintings at an exhibition of his work in London, October 2003
Instead of having his retrial and being acquitted as he expected, Eddie found himself in court alongside the others, facing brand new charges.
Standing among 14 other defendants, the long-running trial saw all the torture allegations made public in grisly detail. Charlie was jailed for 25 years and Fraser for ten. Eddie also received ten years and later a further five for the affray relating to the incident in The Catford club Mr Smith’s.
Released in 1977, Eddie attempted to go straight and while he had some success, he struggled to keep up with the lifestyle to which he had become accustomed before being sent away.
It was around this time that Colombian drug cartels were trying to expand their cocaine operations to the UK – seen then as an ideal gateway into Europe. Unsure who could be trusted, they turned to the most notorious gangland figures of the time, knowing that they lived by a code of ‘honour’ which meant they would never go to the police.
For Richardson, the offer was simply too good to turn down. His role would be to arrange the collection and distribution of the cocaine once it arrived in the UK. He would not have to invest any money himself – it would all be supplied on credit on account of his reputation.
Better still, he would not have to personally handle anything – not even a single line. Through his contacts he arranged for baggage handlers at Heathrow to be bribed and take cases with the drugs off the plane before they ever got to customs. The first shipment of 24 kilos came through without a hitch and Eddie received a payment of £100,000.
A second, far more lucrative deal was set up that was set to earn him at least £2million. But Eddie was unaware that customs were already on the case and had diverted the ship carrying the goods to another port. He was arrested and ultimately sentenced to 25 years for his role in the conspiracy.
It was around this time that the brothers fell out for good. Though they presented a united front during the height of their gangland days, their relationship was always a troubled one and the pair rarely socialised together.
When Eddie was sent away after his drug conviction, he claimed Charlie repeatedly robbed his scrapyard, making away with tens of thousands of pounds worth of metal and ultimately forcing the business to shut down. ‘He was diabolical. He destroyed my family,’ he wrote later.
In prison, Eddie signed up for art classes and soon discovered a hidden talent. After his release in 2001 he began taking commissions, selling signed prints on his website and even had his works exhibited in a high-profile gallery in 2003.
In 2005, he published his biography, The Last Word: My Life as a Gangland Boss, written with the assistance of his good friend, best-selling crime writer Martina Cole. A second book, No Handcuffs, followed in 2019.
He also became a popular after-dinner speaker, regaling pub crowds with stories about his time as a leading gangster during London’s underworld heyday. In September 2012, Charlie Richardson died of peritonitis.
In 2015 he was nominated for (but ultimately not awarded) the freedom of the borough of Southwark for raising funds for charity and championing disadvantaged children.
It was, perhaps, the final proof that he had put his old life behind him, though he wasn’t afraid to acknowledge the fear he had once inspired. Yet as he wrote in The Last Word: ‘Today, I would not like to meet the likes of me as I was then.’
Sibling rivalry: The Richardsons vs The Krays
Much has been made of the rivalry between the Richardson brothers and the Kray twins, but in most accounts, these claims were greatly exaggerated.
Joey Pyle, a notorious underworld figure of the era, was friendly with both camps, visiting the twins at home one day, socialising with the Richardsons the next, and neither side seemed to mind.
‘Sometimes the Twins and the Richardsons would be in the same club at the same time, but nothing ever sparked off while I was around,’ he said. ‘Sure, there was tension some of the time, but that was just a typical north and south London thing, nothing more. There would be a bit of looking, sizing up and that would be it. All this stuff you read about them being at each other’s throats – it wasn’t like that at all.’
Eddie was disdainful of the comparison, describing them as ‘small-time’ fantasists who only played at being gangsters.
The two firms might well have clashed in the future had they both continued to expand their operations, but the incident at Mr Smith’s followed by the arrests in connection with torture allegations meant it never came to pass.
Dickie Hart, who was shot dead in the 1966 Catford bust up, was an associate of the Kray twins and after death, Ronnie Kray took advantage of the fact that most of the Richardson mob, especially Eddie and Fraser, were behind bars or out of action, and shot dead their associate George Cornell while he was sitting in the Blind Beggar pub in Whitechapel.
It was as much personal as anything else. Cornell had worked with the Krays for years before switching allegiance. He had also come to blows with Ronnie a few months earlier after calling him a ‘fat poof’ (though Ronnie later denied this was the case’.
It was this killing, not the supposed years-long feud, that gave rise to the enduring legend of a Kray-Richardson war. In truth, when violence did flare between individuals on each side, it usually had more to do with personal grievances between hard men than any organised gang rivalry.
And for all the talk of a feud running for years, there was never a single direct confrontation between the Krays and the Richardson brothers themselves.
Had there been, Eddie left no doubt about what the result would have been: ‘If you put the four of us in a room, only two people would have come out. And that would have been me and my brother.’
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