The Regal was a Billiard Hall in Eric Street, Mile End, and was the twins first career move when they acquired it in 1954, both aged twenty.
Initially very run down, the twins renovated it and turned it into not only their base for The Firm, but a moderately successful billiard hall.
History
Formerly a cinema before the war, and in the 1930s it homed a snooker hall, the twins took over the hall in 1954, where they converted it into a fourteen table Billiard hall.
Ronnie and Reggie first came to know of the run down hall, when news spread that local small-time gangs were meeting there. Unloved and unpainted, it was a meeting place for gangs who fought there and tried cadging money from the manager. The insurance companies were wary of insuring it, and there were rumours of it closing down.
The twins had recently left the army, and had more time on their hands they paid the hall a visit. The manager soon payed the twins five pounds a week to manage the hall. Weekly violence soon stopped, and the twins became the legal tenants of The Regal Billiard Hall. The hall slowly became popular again after a smart refurbishment by Reggie. They soon became the main attraction to the hall, with local villains and ex-cons visiting them on a regular basis.
It was in 1954 that the twins' reputation was established. They had taken over the Regal billiard hall in Eric Stree, off the Mile End Road, and Ronnie cutlassed members of a Maltese gang that tried to extract protection money from them. Word spread. They soon saw their future in clubs, either owning them, extracting protection money from them, or - in Ronnie's case - wielding them. By 1957, they had their own establishment, the Double R, in Bow Road, east London. The Firm, the name by which their gang was known, was born.
(From left) Billy Donovan, Pat Connolly, Reg Kray, Charlie Kray, Johnny Davis, Tommy Flat, far right unknown, bottom two unknown at Regal Billiards Hall in Bethnal Green, London.
The Regal gave them a foothold and made money by being used as a storehouse for other criminals' knock-off gear and weapons. The hall has long since been demolished and an old people's home now stands peacefully on the site.