Highland hotel robbers among Inveraray Jail records online

They were apprehended after it became apparent that Lyon and Thorpe always seemed to be in the vicinity when the robberies took place.

The pair, who travelled as husband and wife, were arrested at a hotel in Edinburgh. Their associate Joseph Dowling was caught red handed with some of the stolen items.

At their trial the men were convicted but the case against Thorpe, who was 20 years old, was found not proven. Lyon was sentenced to seven years in Inveraray Jail.

Photographs of Lyon, Thorpe and Dowling were kept in an album of interesting cases by the local procurator fiscal.

Their entries in the registers for Inveraray prison are among 4,600 for that jail now on Scotland’s People, the official site for Scottish government records. 

Men, women and children were incarcerated at the jail in the 19th century. The youngest was seven-year-old James McCulloch who was caught stealing, the oldest 82-year-old Ann Kerr found guilty of ‘vagrancy’.

The newly published records will simplify research for people tracing their ancestry, as archivist Veronica Schreuder explained.

“Prison registers are a rich source of information for social researchers and family historians alike,” she said.

 “While it can be a shock to find an ancestor in prison, it can sometimes lead to details that are unlikely to have been preserved for most people.

 “Finding out the colour of their hair, details of their health or whether they could read or write can turn a name and some dates into a much more rounded person.

"And of course, if they have committed a serious crime, it can explain a lot about the decisions of other relatives such as moving area, changing a name or simply never talking about them.”