THE forlorn family were all there, occupying a bench in the public gallery as Albert Mabey once more appeared in court - and not for the first time.

As a seaman, the serial offender specialised in marine crime. If he wasn’t stripping boats, he was sailing them away.

Now there was another catalogue of theft, looting one boat in Fareham creek of its contents and selling the metal in Portsmouth.

In another instance, he coolly boarded a dinghy at his moorings, though he never got far with it.

Whether it was at the behest of his family that he appeared as a character witness or he was simply giving Hampshire Assizes in 1908 information of his background, Superintendent Carman described Mabey as the odd one out in the family.

“He had been very respectfully been brought up in Southampton,” he related. “All his brothers and sisters are doing well and he is the only one who has been in trouble.

“He has caused his relatives much anxiety.

They have obtained good employment for him but he has sadly abused their kindness.”

The mariner was jailed for nine months - but it could have been worse.

Mr Justice Bucknill told him other similar charges would lie on the file and he would not hear of them provided he behaved himself on his release from prison.