Early life and background
Frederick Gerald Foreman was born on 5 March 1932 at 22 Sheepcote Lane in Battersea, London, the youngest of five brothers born to Herbert Edward George Foreman and his wife, Louisa Elizabeth (née White). His father, a First World War veteran of Irish extraction who had served several prison sentences for assault and battery, sustained a severe shrapnel injury to his arm at the Somme, which ended his prospects of working as a blacksmith and left him with a lifelong resentment of authority that he passed on to his sons. Conversely, his maternal uncle eventually attained the rank of chief constable of Durham, creating a domestic rift whenever he visited London. Growing up, Foreman regularly witnessed bare-knuckle street fights and brawls, looking up to the local street fighters, which included his father; his paternal grandmother also regularly fought with neighbours following nights out at the local pub. His father strictly taught him that it was acceptable to strike a police officer but never to communicate with them.
Foreman spent his initial years in a modest terraced house situated beside a local pub named The Flag, where all five siblings shared one bedroom. In 1939, this terraced property was pulled down, prompting the family's relocation to a newly built municipal flat in Wandsworth. With the arrival of the Second World War, his elder brothers joined the armed forces while Foreman faced multiple war dislocations, undergoing five separate evacuations including stays in Woking, Northampton, and Hove, where he first developed skills in thievery. Upon returning to the capital to find his family residence obliterated by a bomb, he took advantage of wartime air raids to plunder local shops.
To manage his aggressive behaviour, he was enrolled in boxing classes at Jack Solomons gym in Soho. He developed into an effective amateur welterweight, eventually boxing on the same tournament programme as future heavyweight champion Henry Cooper, and befriended contemporary British, European, and Commonwealth titleholders such as Jack Gardner and Freddie Mills. At the age of 14, Foreman left school to take up employment as a delivery assistant for South London Railways. Looking back on this period, he later reflected, "I didn't have an education. If I had, my life could've turned out differently." The regular sight of gold bullion shipments during his shifts significantly shaped his long-term criminal aspirations. He later moved into various manual roles, including warehouse work and scaffolding, exploiting these positions to coordinate opportunistic thefts, which included stealing dozens of rolls of sheet copper from a building site before a serious fall forced him to resign the position.
Foreman subsequently established himself as a black-market operator, or "spiv", navigating the constraints of postwar rationing by orchestrating vehicle thefts, highway cargo robberies as a "jump-up" merchant, and post office raids using stolen rationed goods. To cover up these vehicle thefts, he obtained fraudulent logbooks and official registration stamps from an associate inside County Hall. His first major judicial encounter occurred in 1948 at the age of 16, when he appeared at the Old Bailey and was bound over and fined £5 for inflicting grievous bodily harm during a brawl at a youth club. Following a subsequent stint in a youth detention centre, Foreman successfully evaded compulsory National Service by feigning psychiatric illness before a military medical board upon his release, though later in life he expressed regret over missing the potential adventures military service offered. He deeply doted on his mother, who subsequently discovered a hidden handgun in his bedroom when he was 18. Recalling her reaction, he noted, "She knew what kind of boy I was," and remembered her warning him explicitly: "Fred Foreman, you're going to end up hanging from a noose."
Career and criminal history
Following his youth, Foreman set up multiple commercial ventures across south London to conceal and launder profits of his unlawful operations, believing that "villainy relies as much on sound business practice as any other business enterprise." These enterprises encompassed a boxing gym, a network of bookmakers, and a Balham gambling club that featured an opening appearance by American actor George Raft. He also managed a firm dealing in imported fruit machines and formed the Bookmakers' Guardian Association, which offered financial backing, legal representation, and loan insurance to bookies. Additionally, he took over the tenancy of the Prince of Wales public house on Lant Street in Southwark, operating as its landlord. During the 1950s, he operated closely as a minder for underworld boss Billy Hill, who was widely known as the "King of the Underworld".
By the early 1950s, Foreman had established a south London gang that included individuals who would later execute the Great Train Robbery, such as Buster Edwards and Tommy Wisbey. During this period, he worked as a security coordinator, getaway driver, and protector for the Forty Thieves, an all-female shoplifting gang that targeted major West End department stores like Harrods, specifically targeting expensive furs and stuffing their underwear with stolen jewellery. In 1963, Foreman turned down a proposal, reportedly linked to British Intelligence, to carry out a heist in Panama City alongside Panamanian politician Roberto Arias; the plan involved moving the proceeds onwards to Mexico, though the operation never manifested and Arias was subsequently shot and paralysed the following year. While he consistently maintained that he did not participate directly in the 1963 Great Train Robbery, he admitted to being approached beforehand. Rumours circulated that he avoided arrest due to acting as an informant for Detective Superintendent Frank Williams. Foreman asserted that he placed £60,000 in cash from the heist proceeds inside a holdall within a telephone kiosk as a "drink" or bribe for Williams, who ultimately handed the money in. Foreman subsequently organised the dramatic 1965 prison breakout and transit to Australia for train robber Ronnie Biggs, while also providing refuge to Buster Edwards. In 1963, his firm also successfully carried out the Paul Street bullion raid, stealing £200,000.
Foreman relocated his criminal activities to the East End of London following a furniture shop raid in Southampton, looking to lie low when he met Ronnie and Reggie Kray. The Kray twins supplied him with a flat located directly opposite The Blind Beggar public house in Stepney. Introduced to the East End underworld by Charlie Kray, Foreman integrated into their syndicate, known as "The Firm". His involvement escalated to armed robberies targeting banks, payrolls, and transit wages, utilising pickaxe handles, masks, and oxyacetylene cutters, known as "fizzers". The crew frequently targeted postal vans on Thursdays for pension cash, a method referred to in the underworld as "pavement artistry", with Foreman sometimes disguising himself as a postman while waiting outside target locations. Following the 1966 shooting of George Cornell by Ronnie Kray at the Blind Beggar, Foreman actively intimidated witnesses to hinder the police investigation.
Operating as a principal enforcer for The Firm, Foreman played a central role in several notable underworld deaths. In 1965, he shot and killed used-car dealer Tommy Marks outside a Bethnal Green nightclub owned by the Krays using a .38 revolver, with the victim's body subsequently vanishing from Stepney, east London. The killing remained an unsolved mystery for a decade until an informant named Foreman, though a lack of positive identification initially prevented a guilty verdict, leading to an acquittal at the Old Bailey in 1975. This execution was carried out because Marks had previously shot Foreman's brother, George, in the groin during a domestic argument; an associate named Evans was used as a human shield by Marks during the hit. Foreman concealed Marks's body in weighted chicken wire and disposed of it at sea, later claiming the act was direct revenge for his brother's injury. In December 1966, following the prison breakout of Frank Mitchell, The Firm grew anxious regarding Mitchell's erratic behaviour. Mitchell was lured into a transit van where Foreman and an accomplice, Alfie Gerrard, shot him between 12 and 15 times in the head. His body was similarly wrapped in chicken wire, weighted down, and dumped into the English Channel, never to be recovered. Foreman later justified the killing by claiming Mitchell "was going to shoot six coppers" and asserted that he "should get a medal" for the deed.
In October 1967, Reggie Kray killed gang member Jack McVitie at a flat in Stoke Newington after McVitie failed to fulfill a £1,000 contract from Ronnie Kray to assassinate former partner Leslie Payne. Following the killing, associate Tony Lambrianou wrapped the corpse in a bedspread and abandoned the stolen vehicle containing the body in Rotherhithe after running out of fuel. When the twins learned the corpse was left in open view, Foreman was contacted at his Southwark pub and told to remove the car and the body, which he collected at dawn and disposed of at sea near Newhaven in the same manner as Mitchell. Following the 1969 convictions of the Kray twins—who received life sentences from Justice Melford Stevenson with the remark, "In my view, society has earned a rest from your activities"—Foreman was sentenced to ten years in prison as an accessory for his role in hiding McVitie's body, serving six years before his release.
Following his release in the mid-1970s, police questioned Foreman regarding the 1974 disappearance of Lord Lucan, though no charges were brought against him, an association he later claimed left him disappointed at his inability to assist further. He briefly returned to legal commerce after acquiring 60 pool table sites using a £10,000 loan supplied by two friends, which brought in £3,000 per week. In 1979, following an investigation into a raid where a customs officer was killed, Foreman left the United Kingdom using a forged passport. He settled in Allentown, Pennsylvania, where he ran a slot machine and vending business for two years before returning to London, where he received a two-year suspended sentence as an accessory.
In 1982, Foreman relocated to Marbella, Spain, where he ran a local entertainment club and lived near prominent figures such as footballers Bobby Charlton and entertainer Max Bygraves. On Easter Monday, 25 April 1983, while still residing abroad, Foreman participated in the Security Express robbery in Shoreditch. A team of six masked men stole £7 million in cash, weighing five tons, after dousing a security guard in petrol, blindfolding him, tying him to a chair, and threatening to burn him alive unless he surrendered the vault combinations. Foreman later noted of the raid: "We gave the guards tea, and no one went to the hospital, and I am proud of that." Following the heist, Foreman escaped back to the Costa del Sol along with Ronnie Knight, taking advantage of the absence of an Anglo-Spanish extradition treaty following its collapse in 1978.
Foreman's life in Spain ended in 1989 when Spanish authorities apprehended him. He was extradited back to the United Kingdom, being bundled onto a plane in shorts and flip-flops by eight officers, and, while acquitted of executing the physical robbery, he was convicted of handling the stolen proceeds alongside co-defendants Ronnie Knight, John Mason, Ronnie Everett, and Clifford Saxe. He received a nine-year prison sentence, bringing his total lifetime imprisonment to 16 years across 15 separate facilities. During a subsequent incarceration at Brixton Prison, he was housed alongside Gerry Conlon of the Guildford Four. Foreman was the first to break the news to Conlon that the Crown would not contest the Guildford Four's successful appeal; when a skeptical Conlon doubted the claim, Foreman made him a cup of tea and sat with him until the announcement broadcast on the radio. Reflecting on the moment, Foreman stated, "To experience someone's joy like that is unbelievable."
Following his final release from custody at Maidstone Prison in 1995, Foreman lived on Shoot-Up Hill in Cricklewood, north London, and served as a pallbearer at Ronnie Kray's funeral. He maintained communication with the twins while they were incarcerated and visited Reggie Kray shortly after his release. He published volumes of memoirs, ultimately penning eight books. His first volume, Respect, was published in 1996 following a £10,000 advance and launched at the Café Royal, though he later noted the book's subtitle, Managing Director of British Crime, was entirely his publisher's concept. His subsequent publications include Brown Bread Fred (2007), The Godfather of British Crime (2009), and The Last Real Gangster (2015), which featured a foreword written by actor Tom Hardy. In a 2000 ITV television documentary, The Krays, Foreman explicitly confessed to the killings of Frank Mitchell and Tommy Marks. Due to the historic double jeopardy rule, he could not be retried for murder following his previous acquittals, and subsequent charges of perjury and perverting the course of justice were dropped by the Crown Prosecution Service. Although the double jeopardy rule was subsequently abolished in 2003 for cases with new and compelling evidence, Foreman was never retried. In his later years, he publicly reconciled with arresting detective Leonard Read at a boxing event, noting that Read always treated him fairly and never attempted to frame him. He also served as an underworld advisor for the 2015 biographical film Legend starring Tom Hardy.
An independent, feature-length documentary charting Foreman's life story, titled Fred (also released as Fred: The Godfather of British Crime), was released in 2018. The project was written and directed by filmmaker Paul Van Carter, who was approached with the idea by Foreman himself. Production was handled by Salon Pictures and distribution managed via Lionsgate Home Entertainment. After debuting at the CPH:DOX festival in March 2018, the film made its British premiere at London's Genesis Cinema on 13 April 2018 before it arrived on home media platforms that June. The 85-minute film avoided glamorising the criminal underworld, operating instead as a quiet, reflective examination of Foreman at the age of 85. It relied primarily on a central, comprehensive interview with Foreman alongside rare family photographs and historical film reels. The chronological narrative explored his London upbringing amidst the Second World War, his subsequent evolution into an organised crime figure, and his ties to the Kray twins. To enrich the biographical account, the director incorporated expert commentary from sociologist Dick Hobbs and author Wensley Clarkson. Commentators noted that while Foreman was noticeably careful to sidestep incriminating legal details during filming, the documentary functioned as a sociological study of an isolated former enforcer grappling with his past and the stark isolation of his later years.
In public company, Foreman was known for being quiet, polite, and well-mannered. He maintained a strict criminal philosophy, claiming to actively despise petty criminals who targeted their own kind, specifically voicing contempt for muggers, housebreakers, pickpockets, con men, and joyriders. However, within his own criminal milieu, when confronted by individuals he classified as "liberty-takers and bullies", he frequently struggled to contain an explosive temper. This disposition led him to reach not only for pickaxe handles and coshes but also for revolvers and sawn-off shotguns, utilising them to deadly effect.
Personal life and death
In 1952, Foreman married his childhood sweetheart, Maureen Elsie Puttnam, in Southwark, London. Together, they had three children, two sons and a daughter. Although the couple later separated, they remained legally married until Puttnam's death on 9 April 2014, aged 83. He had eight grandchildren.
Using his criminal earnings, Foreman financed elite independent school educations for all three of his children, sending his sons to Oakfield Preparatory School in Dulwich and Christ's College in Blackheath, later stating, "There is no greater dishonour than not being able to support your family". He remained proud that his children did not follow his criminal path. His younger son, Jamie Foreman, subsequently became a successful British actor, appearing as Derek Branning in EastEnders and films such as Layer Cake and Gangster No. 1, and later married actress Carol Harrison. Jamie recalled his father as "simply the best dad he could be", describing boyhood prison visits as "heartbreaking".
Following the separation from his wife, Foreman entered into a long-term relationship with his partner, Janice King, in 1985. He met King while running a club in Spain. The couple lived together for a number of years, notably residing in a villa near Marbella on the Spanish Costa del Sol during his time as a fugitive, and they remained together as long-term partners following his eventual return to the United Kingdom. King survived him.
Foreman was the godfather of sculptor and musician Nick Reynolds, the son of accounts clerk Bruce Reynolds.
In his later years, an article published by Vice magazine in 2018 reported that Foreman was completely penniless and temporarily estranged from his family. For a long period, he occupied a flat located in Maida Vale, west London. He spent his final years living out his retirement in a nursing home, where he kept a framed photograph of the Kray twins on his bedside table. A few months prior to his death, he was treated at St Mary's Hospital, London, before relocating permanently into the senior care environment. Friends noted that during his later life, he was particularly pleased to have outlived his prominent historical south London crime rival, Eddie Richardson, who died in August 2026.
Following a short illness, Foreman died on 10 October 2026 at a care home in West London, with his eldest son present at his bedside. He was 94. His death was widely reported in the British media, with obituaries published in The Telegraph, The Times, and The Guardian.
