Page 358 - The Secret Museum

IN 1671, COLONEL THOMAS BLOOD (1618–80) used this dagger, now stored in the
archives of the Tower of London, to steal the Crown Jewels. The aptly named Blood
made friends with the elderly Keeper of the Jewels, Talbot Edwards, by posing as a

wealthy man who was offering his (non-existent) nephew as a husband for Edwards’s
daughter.
Edwards kindly invited Blood to come over and take a look at the Crown Jewels.

Blood accepted the invitation and took along his son, and a Mr Perod. He carried a
cane, inside of which he had hidden this dagger. When Edwards let the threesome in,
they tied him up, knocked him out and stabbed him. Then they leapt into the vault
containing England’s Crown Jewels.

Blood squashed the Imperial State Crown – by bashing it with a mallet – to make