A History of Police in England

by W. L. Melville Lee

The continuance of disorders, which Rewards and Royal Proclamations were unable to check, and the prospect that the Jacobites would not tamely accept the rule of the House of Hanover, combined to make the question of peace-maintenance a very difficult problem for Queen Anne's successor. It is not surprising, therefore, that one of the first legislative enactments of George the First had for its object the suppressing of public tumults. The Act referred to is commonly called "The Riot Act,"[144] and became law in 1715. This Statute introduced no new principle—similar enactments, or at any rate measures which had the same object in view, had been frequently brought forward by Tudor sovereigns and by their predecessors, but in 1715 the offence of rioting (together with the penalties attaching thereto) was more clearly defined than had formerly been the case, and extended powers were conferred on a single Justice of the Peace or other authorized officer, acting alone, for "preventing tumults and riotous assemblies, and for the more speedy and effectual punishing the rioters."

After reciting that "the punishments provided by the laws now in being are not adequate to such heinous offences" the Statute enacts, that if any persons to the number of twelve or more, being unlawfully, riotously, and tumultuously assembled together, to the disturbance of the public peace, at any time after the last day of July 1715, and after being commanded by any one or more Justice or Justices of the Peace, or by the sheriff, etc., by proclamation in the Kings name, to disperse themselves, shall unlawfully continue together for the space of one hour after such command, then such continuing together to the number of twelve or more, shall be adjudged felony without benefit of clergy, "and the offenders therein shall suffer death as in the case of felony without benefit of clergy."

The method of making the proclamation is as follows:—The Justice of the Peace or other authorised person "being among the said rioters, or as near to them as he can safely come" shall command silence, and after that shall openly and with loud voice make proclamation in these words:—"Our Sovereign Lord the King chargeth and commandeth all persons, being assembled, immediately to disperse themselves, and peaceably to depart to their habitations, or to their lawful business, upon the pains contained in the act made in the first year of King George, for preventing tumults and riotous assemblies. God save the King." To constitute a riot it is essential that alarm should be caused amongst the King's subjects, and if the four last words of the proclamation are omitted the reading of the Riot Act has no virtue. If after proclamation has been made the rioters do not disperse within an hour, any or all of them may be apprehended by force, and if they make resistance, the persons killing or injuring them are indemnified and discharged of all liability with respect to any death or lesser injury they may happen to inflict.

The general tone of public opinion was constantly being lowered by the degrading spectacles that were everywhere displayed. Government itself set the example of brutality and violence by countenancing the procession to Tyburn, the use of the pillory, and the setting up of whipping-posts in the public streets; with the result that imitators sprung up in abundance to practice the lessons so sedulously taught by the authorities. The punishment of the pillory was in itself sufficiently severe, but the method of its infliction practically amounted to the official legalising of Lynch Law, because the populace were permitted to torture the sufferer almost to any extent; stone-throwing was nominally forbidden, but the prohibition was not enforced, and, if a victim died of the ill-usage to which he was subjected, no one was punished.

The police, who were feeble and timid when danger threatened, and who could never be trusted to quell the most insignificant riot, grew bold on occasions, when, without risk to themselves, they could pounce upon some weak or unpopular individual. Although whipping could be legally inflicted only by order of the magistrate, it was no unusual occurrence for a constable to take a man to the nearest whipping post, and there have him thrashed without reference to any superior authority whatever.

For the safeguarding of prisons, banks, and other important places, military guards were often used to reinforce the ordinary watchmen, and, when so employed, the soldiers were accompanied by constables, whose duty it was to question passers-by, to hand suspicious characters over to the guard, and to bring them before a Justice of the Peace on the following morning. These duties, simple as they were, seem to have been negligently performed by the peace-officers, for complaints of neglect of duty were frequent; when Brigadier Mackintosh and his companions escaped from Newgate, they were lucky enough to pass the guard without examination, because the constable was absent from his post, and, in his absence, the military sergeant in charge had no authority to detain fugitives.

Further evidence, were any required, of the unsatisfactory condition of the parochial constabulary in London is abundant—not only was delinquency on the increase, but internal squabbles were everywhere rife amongst the local bodies intrusted with the preservation of the peace. In 1727 the Vestry of St George's, Hanover Square, for example, established a force of thirty-two watchmen and four bedels for that parish; several of the inhabitants, however, refused to pay the Watch-rate, and set up an opposition establishment which they called "The Inhabitant Watch" consisting of some sixteen persons, who repudiated the authority of the existing constables, and, on one occasion, flatly refused to arrest certain offenders even when required to do so by the High Constable.

An ineffectual attempt to reform the police of London was made in 1736, in which year an Act of Parliament[145] was passed, giving powers to the Common Council of the City to raise a sum of money sufficient for all police purposes, to appoint as many peace officers as they thought proper, and to issue new and improved orders for the guidance of the nightly watch. By the same statute, Aldermen were made responsible for their respective wards, constables were empowered to arrest night-walkers, malefactors, and other suspected persons, and watchmen, in the absence of the Constable, might perform the duties of that functionary. Liability to watch and ward extended to all the inhabitants of London who were not "rated and assessed," by virtue of the Statute of Winchester.

At about the same time, the police administration of the rural districts was the subject of legislation, it being enacted[146] that any constable neglecting to make Hue and Cry shall be fined five pounds, and the liability of the hundred, in which a felony has been committed, for the escape of the felon is again insisted upon. By another Statute,[147] passed four years later, High Constables were ordered to levy a County Rate in the provinces and to pay the proceeds over to a treasurer appointed by Quarter Sessions, to be applied by him to the general police purposes of the County.

It is obvious that the Civil Power ought to be prepared for any possible emergency, but before 1829 this was far from being the case, and we find that when any exceptional conditions arose, temporary expedients had to be hurriedly devised to meet the crisis, affairs being allowed to slip back into their normal state of unpreparedness immediately the pressure was relieved. Such was the nature of the arrangements improvised during the rebellion in favour of the Young Pretender in 1745, when London prepared to defend itself against the enemy that marched southwards from Perth as far as Derby, almost without a check. The trained bands, who a hundred years before had barred the advance of Charles I. at Turnham Green, were called out, and, for a period of five months, the City Militia superseded the normal police establishments.