three men then cleared away the mess they had made—mostly splinters and drops of wax—and prepared themselves by strapping on the courier bags beneath their cloaks. When the train arrived in Folkestone at about 10:30 pm, Pierce and Agar hid in the van while the safes were removed by staff. They then left the van and entered the main part of the train, passing through until they reached first class, where they sat until it arrived in Dover. When the train reached Dover, Pierce and Agar alighted, collected their carpet bags full of gold from the guard's van, then went to a nearby hotel for supper. Agar threw the keys and tools into the sea before the two men returned to London on the 2:00 am train, which arrived at around 5:00 am. In total they had stolen of gold, valued at the time at £12,000. Immediate aftermath When the steamer carrying the gold arrived in Boulogne, one of the crew saw that the bullion boxes were damaged, but, as staff at Folkestone had not mentioned it, saw no cause for concern. The boxes were weighed on arrival at Boulogne where the box from Abell was found to be lighter than it had been in London, whereas the other boxes both weighed more. They were transported to Paris, where they were weighed again, with the same results as at Boulogne. When they were opened the lead shot was found and the news relayed back to London. When the working day began on 16 May, Pierce and Agar went to a money-changer's shop with some of the American eagles and obtained £213 for them; at a second such shop, they exchanged 200 of them to get a cheque for just over £203. The three bullion merchants demanded recompense for the lost gold—most of Abell's gold was insured through the SER, but the company denied any culpability, claiming that the robbery must have taken in place in France. The French authorities pointed out that as the weights of the boxes in France both matched, and differed from that in England, it must have occurred in the UK; both the French and British companies stated "that the crime was an impossibility", according to Thomas. Newspapers reported that "It is supposed that so well planned a scheme could not have been executed in the rapid passage by railway from London to Folkestone". Burgess was