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Mr Woolley began by explaining that the modern style of police force ( or perhaps I should call it 'police service') only started in the mid-nineteenth century. He went on to explain why the new system was introduced first in the London Metropolitan area. Primarily it became necessary to have an organised system because of the increase in crime in general and in particular the amount of rioting which was prevalent from the latter part of the 18th century and the early part of the 19th.
The Agricultural Revolution which saw an increase in enclosures of the common fields leaving many of the copy holders and tenants of small holding having to sell up, increased mechanisation of farming methods meaning fewer jobs for farm labourers. The result was rioting in southern counties as unemployed and starving people tried to get some kind of change. At the same time in the north the Industrial Revolution attracted the unemployed in the south to move northwards with every increasing bands causing fear and alarm as they stole and terrorised small villages. Added to the numbers of unemployed were soldiers and sailors discharged after the defeated of Napoleon in 1815. With penalties for anyone convicted of a crime harsh, the death sentence was mandatory for a felony and stealing anything above the value of one shilling was a felony, meant that the gangs became armed and used their numbers to escape capture.
The law enforcement system of parish constables and town watchmen was of little use in the circumstances. To start with the pay for such jobs meant that few people volunteered for the work and those who did were often the least able or, in many cases, the biggest villains in the area. The case Brill a village on Oxon/Bucks border who was the chief organiser of illegal dog fights illustrates this and explains why these law men were held in very poor regard by the public.
Rioting presented another problem. The Gordon Riots of the 1770's highlighted the problem because the only means at the disposable of the authorities was to use the Army and that meant the local Yeomanry whose ranks were made up of neighbours and friends of some of the rioters. The tragedy of the 'Peterloo Massacre' where gathering of people, mainly families in Manchester was dispersed by sabre wielding cavalry with women and children among the dead and injured showed that the use of military units who had no idea of crowd control raised the spectre of bloody revolution on the lines of the French.
In 1820 the prime minister asked for ideas on the forming of some method policing London. The Bow Street Runners and River police force, while small in numbers during their life time, provided a model to work with. The result was that in 1829 a London police force was authorised. Young men were recruited and issued with clothing which made them look like well-to-do gentlemen and they were deployed on the streets on the 29th September. At first they were not well received. The public perception started to improve after a riot in Clerkenwell in 1833 was effectively contained by the force. It was realised that this was a much more effective method of dealing with such situations than the army.
Of course this was restricted to London. The rest of the country was still largely unprotected. At the same time areas which a few years before had been small towns or eve villages were growing. Liverpool had grown to a city of over 250,000 but had only 75 watchmen. The government gave boroughs the authority to set up similar forces in 1833 but, being voluntary and costing money, few places did. Twenty-five years later it became compulsory and a large numbers of forces were created, some from the grouping of small boroughs together.
These early forces were much freer than the modern forces. Pay was based on the local averages and in Oxford area it was around 17shillings for a seven day week. Discipline was strict. A policeman could be sacked just for entering a pub and loss of pay for lateness was extreme. In addition the uniform, which had been changed to the familiar style of the last century, was the resposibily of the office to maintain. Much of the strong regimental system stemmed from the fact that many of the early Chief Constables were ex-army officers who brought the military ideas to which they were used to the police.
This pattern of local forces being fairly independent of central control has changed with the Home Office have some in-put while regulations, pay etc. have been standardised across the country. At the same time the number of forces has gradually declined.
One feature of the modern force which was absent in the early days was the presence of women. The needs of World War 1 saw women recruited into the police but peace time saw the numbers fail to increase and by 1939 there were still only about 200 hundred women police officers. That has gradually changed and now they are to be found at all levels of the modem service.
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