DEADLY CONSEQUENCES

A 10-Day Digital series from Oct. 23 to Nov. 1, 2024, the 100th anniversary of the end of the Ashley Gang

Part 5 of 10

ANOTHER BANK ROBBERY

Hanford Mobley disguised himself as a woman. The ruse didn’t work, as bank employees immediately recognized who was robbing them.

Three Ashley Gang members led by Hanford Mobley in drag pull off one of the gang’s biggest bank robberies but end up captured

BY GREGORY ENNS

Instead of dressing for court and appearing in Tampa to face a charge of piracy on May 2, 1922, Hanford Mobley slipped on a woman’s black dress and white blouse, stockings and high heels and large-brimmed veiled hat.

Clutching a handbag, he headed out with Clarence Middleton, 22, and Roy Matthews, 28, to rob the Bank of Stuart, the same bank Hanford’s uncles John and Bob and Kid Lowe had robbed seven years earlier.

Both Middleton and Matthews had been working bootlegging operations with Hanford. Middleton was the second oldest of seven children of Stephen and Margaret Middleton of Jacksonville. His father had died 15 months before. Middleton’s older brother, Jack, was the Florida heavyweight boxing champion.