Read Online Inside the Firm - The Untold Story of The Krays' Reign of Terror by Tony Lambrianou - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Tony Lambrianou
Ads: Link
opinions, especially if he didn’t like someone in our scene, and we’d argue with him, but at the end of the day we respected and listened to him.
But by and large he wasn’t a man to interfere. His sons were six feet tall, looking for trouble all the time, fearing no one. Because of his lack of English he didn’t understand a lot of it. But he understood it when we got into trouble, and if trouble came, he was there regardless of what. We were his sons and that was it. He was very, very proud of us. Same with my mother. She believed that her boys were being singled out by the police, that there was a vendetta going on about getting Chris put away, and she lost a lot of respect for authority.
My mother and father were people who would help anybody. Sometimes it would involve criminals. If Chris had been in a fight with a couple of his pals, my mother was the first to dress their wounds. I have never known my parents refuse anybody a cup of tea and a meal. They were as good an influence as they could possibly be under the circumstances, and we brought them a lot of heartbreak. Yes, we did that. And there was more of it to come.
CHAPTER FOUR
CASHING IN ON CHAOS
I was nineteen when my brother Jimmy went to work at a refrigeration depot which had opened about a hundred yards from where we lived in Queensbridge Road. It was owned by a man called Carlo Gatti, who was known as the Ice King of the East End. He had originally made his money selling ice to fish stalls and shops. The depot was purpose-built and it contained four massive stores, each set at a different temperature. If you had turkey for Christmas from his deep freeze, you could bet your life it was seven years old. Meat traders from all over London used to store their goods at the depot, and various frozen-food firms had contracts to put their fish and pies and other foods in there.
Jimmy and a couple of his mates were taken on as porters, and he said to me one day, ‘Why don’t you go over there and get a job?’ So I did. And before long we had about nine of our pals working with us. We used to have to come to work with donkey jackets, thick trousers and socks, steel-capped boots, hats and gloves because it was so cold in there. But we were on to a good thing. We were stealing meat, topsides, silversides, steaks … half the stock was disappearing, and we were earning bundles.
Jimmy and I had the power in the workforce. If there were any problems in the firm, Jim the manager and Pete the assistant manager would come to us and we’d sort it out. Inevitably we’d cause trouble every now and again; so they had further reason to ask for help, and we would end up getting more out of them. One day one of the lorry drivers from Smithfield Meat Market pulled in and asked, ‘Are you organised in here?’.
I said, ‘What do you mean, organised?’
‘Union,’ he said.
Once you’re in with the Meat Market, you’ve got a job for life. So of course we were very interested.
He said, ‘If I talk to one of our boys, perhaps we can enlighten you on how to get a union here: Any problems, we can back you.’
Jim and Pete got to hear that the union was becoming very interested in this cold store, and they didn’t like it. As things stood, the management could pay lower wages and sack the staff, and they could continue hiring out storage space to frozen-food companies, which would be in contravention of the union rules: the Meat Market handled meat, and meat alone.
We appointed a bloke called Ted to be our union official, the puppet who did what we told him, and a few days later the same driver came to see us. He said, ‘You know the Meat Market have been trying to get this place in the union since it opened, but we won’t go in there while it’s handling frozen food and all that. Go away and think about it….’
The prize was a Meat Market ticket. Ten of us were strong for the union, and six, led by a half-gypsy called Spike, were against it. We called a
But by and large he wasn’t a man to interfere. His sons were six feet tall, looking for trouble all the time, fearing no one. Because of his lack of English he didn’t understand a lot of it. But he understood it when we got into trouble, and if trouble came, he was there regardless of what. We were his sons and that was it. He was very, very proud of us. Same with my mother. She believed that her boys were being singled out by the police, that there was a vendetta going on about getting Chris put away, and she lost a lot of respect for authority.
My mother and father were people who would help anybody. Sometimes it would involve criminals. If Chris had been in a fight with a couple of his pals, my mother was the first to dress their wounds. I have never known my parents refuse anybody a cup of tea and a meal. They were as good an influence as they could possibly be under the circumstances, and we brought them a lot of heartbreak. Yes, we did that. And there was more of it to come.
CHAPTER FOUR
CASHING IN ON CHAOS
I was nineteen when my brother Jimmy went to work at a refrigeration depot which had opened about a hundred yards from where we lived in Queensbridge Road. It was owned by a man called Carlo Gatti, who was known as the Ice King of the East End. He had originally made his money selling ice to fish stalls and shops. The depot was purpose-built and it contained four massive stores, each set at a different temperature. If you had turkey for Christmas from his deep freeze, you could bet your life it was seven years old. Meat traders from all over London used to store their goods at the depot, and various frozen-food firms had contracts to put their fish and pies and other foods in there.
Jimmy and a couple of his mates were taken on as porters, and he said to me one day, ‘Why don’t you go over there and get a job?’ So I did. And before long we had about nine of our pals working with us. We used to have to come to work with donkey jackets, thick trousers and socks, steel-capped boots, hats and gloves because it was so cold in there. But we were on to a good thing. We were stealing meat, topsides, silversides, steaks … half the stock was disappearing, and we were earning bundles.
Jimmy and I had the power in the workforce. If there were any problems in the firm, Jim the manager and Pete the assistant manager would come to us and we’d sort it out. Inevitably we’d cause trouble every now and again; so they had further reason to ask for help, and we would end up getting more out of them. One day one of the lorry drivers from Smithfield Meat Market pulled in and asked, ‘Are you organised in here?’.
I said, ‘What do you mean, organised?’
‘Union,’ he said.
Once you’re in with the Meat Market, you’ve got a job for life. So of course we were very interested.
He said, ‘If I talk to one of our boys, perhaps we can enlighten you on how to get a union here: Any problems, we can back you.’
Jim and Pete got to hear that the union was becoming very interested in this cold store, and they didn’t like it. As things stood, the management could pay lower wages and sack the staff, and they could continue hiring out storage space to frozen-food companies, which would be in contravention of the union rules: the Meat Market handled meat, and meat alone.
We appointed a bloke called Ted to be our union official, the puppet who did what we told him, and a few days later the same driver came to see us. He said, ‘You know the Meat Market have been trying to get this place in the union since it opened, but we won’t go in there while it’s handling frozen food and all that. Go away and think about it….’
The prize was a Meat Market ticket. Ten of us were strong for the union, and six, led by a half-gypsy called Spike, were against it. We called a
Similar Books
