Charles Wells – The man who broke the bank at Monte Carlo

Charles Wells (1841-1926), gambler and confidence trickster, is one of the men that broke the bank at Monte Carlo.

François Blanc, the owner of Monte Carlo’s casino, wanted the publicity from stories of big winnings. In French, if a gambler wins more than the chips on the table, he was said to have “faire sauter la banque”, which was translated as “breaking the bank”.

In July 1891 Wells went to Monte Carlo with £4000 that he had defrauded from investors. In an eleven-hour session Wells ‘broke the bank’ twelve times, winning a million francs. At one stage he won 23 times out of 30 successive spins of the wheel. Wells returned to Monte Carlo in November of that year and won again. During this session he made another million francs in three days, including successful bets on the number five for five consecutive turns. Despite hiring private detectives the Casino never discovered Wells’s system. He later admitted it was just a lucky streak. His system was the high-risk martingale, doubling the stake to make up losses.