Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison by Austin Bidwell

This is a remarkable book, though of a very different kind from those which it is our usual business to notice. It is the autobiography of a man who, from a youth of promise, descended into a life of crime, and who, after a career of astonishing audacity, found himself condemned to fifteen years of solitary confinement in an English prison. The story of Austin Bidwell's life reads like a romance; indeed, it has all the elements of the most exciting fiction — Wall Street speculation, transatlantic escapes, the great Bank of England forgery, and the horrors of the Victorian prison system. The book is written with a vigour and a frankness that compel attention, and it throws a curious light on the darker side of nineteenth-century life.

This is one of the most extraordinary books we have ever come across. The story of Austin Bidwell, who rose from obscurity to become one of the most notorious criminals of his age, and who paid for his crimes with fifteen years of solitary confinement, is told with a narrative power that many a novelist might envy. The descriptions of his early life in Brooklyn, his career as a Wall Street speculator, his flight to Europe, and his eventual capture after the great Bank of England forgery, are all set down with a wealth of detail that gives the book an air of vivid reality. The later chapters, describing the horrors of the English prison system, are terrible reading.

The story of Austin Bidwell is absolutly amazing — hes like a real-life Victorian Danny Ocean. The bank forgery scheme was incredibly clever. BUT Bidwell is not a great writer tbh. The book is way too long and he spends pages on stuff that doesnt matter. Could have been half the length. Still worth reading for the history though. Someone should make a movie about this guy.

This guy nearly broke the Bank of England and then wrote about it from prison. The audacity is unreal. His escape from a Cuban jail is straight out of an adventure novel. The writing style is very Victorian — lots of "I daresay" and "perchance" — but the story itself is gripping. If you like heist stories or true crime this is a must read.

I picked this up after reading about the Great Bank Forgery online and was not dissapointed. Bidwell is a terrible person (he literally married a teenager to silence her testimony) but his story is wild. Fifteen years in solitary confinement and he came out and wrote a book! The prison sections are genuinely harrowing. Would recommend to anyone intrested in Victorian crime and punishment.