The Twins - Men of Violence. Kate Kray
as time went on he became more and more friendly with Ronnie and Reggie, and became an integral member of the firm. If Ron had sorted someone, they’d be banned from East London, and they knew that it was more than their life was worth come back until the twins said so. It was Charlie they’d have to call up to get that permission — Charlie would then speak to Ron and Reg and come back with a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’. He was constantly by their side, one of their most trusted companions.
I asked Charlie what he thought made the twins so terrifying. He smiled, and said that one of the things he’d always remember them for was the absolute loyalty they felt towards each other. They would row all the time, of course, and often it resulted in a tear-up. But never in public. There was a strange link that existed between them because they were twins, and it meant that they were incredibly protective of each other. Ron never really liked Reg’s wife Frances because she laid a claim to being almost as close to Reg as he was. In turn, Reg was unbelievably protective of Frances. Charlie recalls the time that Reg drove around all the clubs in London with Frances, saying to all of the doormen, ‘If you ever let my wife into this club, I’ll kill you.’ He didn’t want her anywhere near the scenes where Ron and he carried out their ‘business’. When Frances committed suicide, Reg was absolutely devastated.
Charlie told me he’d never heard Ron ever raise his voice. I remembered Ron saying a similar thing to me: ‘Kate, if you ask politely, you’ll always get whatever you want.’ Ron was a man who always appeared to be in complete control. His favourite tipple was dark brown ale, but nobody ever saw him drunk.
But everyone knew that the twins were more than capable of following through any threats of violence that they made. Charlie recalled an evening in the Double R, Ron and Reg’s club. After a certain hour in the evening, they’d lock the doors from the inside — after that time if you were in, you were in, and if you were out, you were out. On this particular occasion, a group of half a dozen or so dockers were making a nuisance of themselves — big guys. They were boozed up, fuelled up and ready to go. Ron and Reg took them all on single-handed; Ron hit one so hard he flew into the air, slid along the floor and bashed straight into a juke box, jamming a record over and over again. The others ended up a mess on the floor.
Another time, they were in a restaurant with Oliver Reed the actor. Now Oliver Reed could be foul-mouthed. Reg and Ron were having a meal with some friends, and Oliver Reed was swearing and cussing in front of all the women who were there. Now if there was one thing Ron couldn’t stand, it was a man acting disrespectfully in front of women. He didn’t care if it was a famous actor or a dustman — he wouldn’t have it. Ron put down his knife and fork. Reg knew what was going to happen. Ron apologised to the ladies. Oliver Reed was laughing and drinking as Ron approached him. He was a big man. He stood up, and Ron upped him. Oliver hit the floor with a thud.
Reg and Ron had morals. A code of honour that never changed. If they got the needle with anyone — even a famous actor — then they sorted it. Charlie told me how after Ron shot George Cornell, he went round all the pubs telling everybody, ‘It was me. I shot Cornell.’ Charlie, along with many others, had no time for Cornell. I asked him what he was like, and he gave me all the details. Cornell was in a gang called the Watley Street Gang. They were out of Stepney, and were a right rough bunch. Cornell made his first mistake when he went on to Ron and Reg’s patch and done a geezer with an axe. After that he defected to South of the river and joined the Richardsons. Ron knew at that point it was either him or Cornell — the rest is history.
One of Charlie’s jobs towards the end of the Sixties was to look after John Pearson. He was the writer that wrote the bestselling book The Profession of Violence. It was the first book ever written about the twins; it was in their heyday, at the height of their professional career.
The very fact that somebody wanted to write a book about them really pleased Ron and Reg. It would turn them into instant celebrities, and they loved it. They let Pearson shadow them around everywhere, and it was Charlie’s job to drive them round all the clubs. But Ron didn’t really like Pearson. He needed a place to stay, so Ron put him up in ‘The Dungeon’, a dingy little basement opposite the house in Vallance Road. After a while, Ron got so sick of Pearson that he upped him, and when the book was finally published, the twins hated what he had written. That aside, though, the twins did get a twice yearly pension from that book right up until their death.
Charlie was with the twins right up to the very end. In fact, he was with them on their very last night of freedom. He told me the whole story after Reg’s death.
The twins were entertaining in the Astor club, one of their haunts off Berkley Square in Mayfair. Their guests were two very important people — the Kaufman brothers from New York who were the twins’ immediate links with the Mafia in America. Ron and Reg wanted to put on a show for them.
In a nearby bar, a great band were playing. The twins decided that it would be good to have the band at the Astor club so that they could put on some entertainment for the Kaufmans. They used their ‘influence’ to hijack the band and move them over to their club.
Part of the entourage that night were two black dancers — the Clarke brothers. Ron went up to them and said, ‘When the band play, you fucking dance, alright?’ Which is just what they did. The band kicked in, the Clarke brothers started dancing. Half and hour passed; an hour. The dancers were getting tired, but Ron’s steely gaze encouraged them to continue…
Two hours passed. The Clarke brothers were exhausted. One of them went up to Ronnie and panted, ‘Ron, we can’t dance no more.’
‘What do you mean, you can’t dance no more? You’re fucking dancers, aren’t you? Dance! And make sure you’re smiling while you do it!’
‘But Ron …’ Something in the look Ron gave him told him that it wasn’t a good time to argue. The brothers took to the dance floor once again, and started dancing with as much energy as they could, hips shaking, legs moving, arms in the air. It didn’t take long for them to collapse completely.
The next morning Charlie was back home in bed. The phone rang. He peered at his alarm clock and saw that it was seven o’clock in the morning. He rubbed his eyes.
‘The twins have been nicked.’
At first he didn’t understand what the caller was saying, but he was startled by the urgency in the guy’s voice.
‘Who the fuck’s talking?’
‘Charlie, it’s me. Checa Berry. The twins have been nicked. It’s serious. Get dressed. I’ll be around in ten minutes.’
Checa explained that there had been a dawn raid and that Reg and Ron had been nicked. Charlie was amazed — it had only been a couple of hours ago that they’d been mob-handed in the Astor club having a good old knees up and watching the Clarke brothers bop till they dropped. Charlie had given Ron a lift home at about six in the morning and dropped him at Braithwaite House where he had a flat. Even at the time he’d noticed a heavy police presence all round the East End.
‘Something’s going down,’ he’d said to Ron. ‘Maybe I should drive around the back roads.’
But Ron was on a real high. ‘Fuck ‘em,’ he laughed. ‘They’re all mugs.’
Everyone roared with laughter. I wonder if they would have laughed so much if they’d realised that that night was to be the twins’ last night of freedom …
I asked Charlie how he felt now that the twins had died. His words were so moving that they speak for themselves:
I’m glad Ron didn’t die in Broadmoor. And as for Reg, he should have been let out years ago. But at least they let him out to die. At least they were both spared the indignity of dying in prison.
Broadmoor’s gone mad since Ron’s been gone. Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper, has been blinded in one eye. Ian Kay, another inmate, stabbed him in both eyes with a felt-tipped pen. Sutcliffe was on the same ward as Ron, in the very next cell. The stabbing would never have happened if Ron