Like many close knit communities, the Officers of the Metropolitan Police would often record their participation in an investigation in a way that indicated their membership of an elite group. In such a fashion, the teams involved would often have a necktie designed to record their membership of the investigating team. In the Balcombe Street case, the tie design was a Metropolitan Police blue background with a gold Z surrounded by chains. Why a Z? Former Bomb Squad Detective Ron Chapman explained the evidence collection process to the author:

"Fragments of fingerprints would be recovered from time to time from unexploded devices that were made safe or from safe houses….

Unfortunately, you never get four fingers and thumb; you get a tip of a finger or maybe a finger and thumb.  Every time we came across a new print, it was given a letter of the alphabet code to identify the suspect, such as suspect Q or Z."

Z was the code letter applied to the most wanted man in Britain – Michael Wilson. The police investigating the IRA reign of terror had recovered his prints from the IRA safe house found at Fairholme Road after the shooting of PC Stephen Tibble following the chase of William Joseph Quinn. The landlord told the police the name of the tenant – Michael Wilson – which was the first name lead the police had managed to link with collected forensic evidence. Wilson's prints were also recovered from the stolen car used as a getaway after the murder of Ross McWhirter…and in the bag of gun parts dropped in Rossmore Road on the Night of December 6^th. The police believed Wilson was the mastermind behind the terror operation and hoped they had him trapped in number 22b.    The Z was an appropriate symbol to commemorate the events at Balcombe Street.

Who was Wilson? In order to discover the full story behind this element of the story, you will need to read the book…

I am indebted to Lord Peter Imbert for supplying a photograph of his own Z tie, a photo of which is shown on this page.