Case · Theft
The Russborough House Robbery (1974)
An IRA heiress and a political ransom
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Image: Wikimedia Commons (public domain)
In 1974 Rose Dugdale, an English heiress turned IRA militant, led a gang that stole nineteen paintings from the Beit collection to ransom for the release of republican prisoners. All were recovered within days.
Dugdale and her accomplices tied up Sir Alfred Beit and his wife and stripped the walls of works by Vermeer, Goya, Gainsborough, and Rubens, demanding the transfer of IRA prisoners to Northern Ireland.
The demand failed, and Irish police found the paintings in a rented cottage in County Cork within a week. Dugdale was convicted, and Russborough's vulnerability was tragically confirmed twelve years later.