A History of Police in England

by W. L. Melville Lee

CHAPTER XV
POLICE REFORM IN COUNTIES

Before describing the successive steps by which the County Constabulary progressed towards its long-delayed reorganization, it will be convenient to follow the method before adopted, when dealing with the somewhat similar march of events in the Metropolis, and to preface such description by a short account of the unreformed county police, thereby shewing how disastrous were the consequences of the faulty system in vogue, as revealed by the deplorable condition of rural England under its influence. The great source of information on this subject is the exhaustive report of the Royal Commission, appointed in 1839, to inquire as to the best means of establishing an efficient constabulary force in the counties of England and Wales. In the course of their enquiry (which was the most complete investigation of crime, its causes, and the means of its prevention, ever undertaken in this country), the Commissioners not only interrogated heads of business-houses, their commercial travellers and foremen, country magistrates, policemen, and coastguards, but examined thieves, receivers, and all kinds of gaol-birds.

The immediate result of the activity of the new metropolitan and municipal police forces was found to be, that habitual criminals had migrated in large numbers from London, and from those towns where an improved constabulary had superseded the old parish watch, and had begun to ply their trade in the unprotected districts. Country magistrates unanimously reported that the bulk of the more serious offences recently committed in their respective neighbourhoods was the work of strangers from the great towns. The superintendent of the Liverpool dock police stated that about a thousand well-known thieves, who had been evicted from the city, were now continuing their depredations in the suburbs and small towns near. Questioned on this subject, a prisoner confessed—"I considered that in London and Liverpool, or such places as have got the new police, there is little to be done, unless it be picking pockets; people there think that they are safe under the eye of the new police, and will take large sums of money in their pockets." Another prisoner, in corroboration, said "The most important obstructions that could be placed in the way of depredations is a more efficient police similar to that in London and Liverpool—very few robberies in the centre of Liverpool,—all in the outskirts, out of the police districts." A second cause that contributed to the migration of both thieves and receivers to the provinces was the extension of the railway and canal systems, which, besides facilitating the rapid movement of plunderers from place to place, exposed quantities of valuable merchandise on truck and canal boat without protection. Merchants were indifferent to the fate of their goods when once a receipt had been obtained from the carriers; and they again, in common with the shipping agents, found it extremely difficult to put a stop to the petty thieving that went on, partly because the loss was generally undiscovered until the goods reached their destination (which as often as not was in a foreign country), and partly because the number of people through whose hands the property passed was so great, that the attempt to fix the responsibility on any individual would have been to incur a laborious and expensive system of checking and counter-checking that the value of the articles stolen did not seem to justify. Of all these petty thieves, the bargemen were the worst offenders, and the opportunities they met with, combined with the impunity they enjoyed, attracted many thieves to the calling; all over the country receivers of stolen property set up shop near the canals; burglars would bring their spoil by night to a pre-arranged rendezvous, and hand it over to the bargees, who took it aboard, concealed it under the cargo, and disposed of it at the fence's shop as occasion offered.

Much ingenuity was displayed in this traffic. For instance, an ex-bargeman convicted of theft explained to the Commissioners how he and his mates used to extract valuables from bales, casks, and boxes without risk of discovery, every trip they made. Silk could be withdrawn from the centre of a bale by means of a hook specially designed for the purpose; chests of tea were carefully opened, a few pounds extracted, and the remainder made to occupy the original space by means of judicious damping. In the case of casks of wine or spirits, the following ingenious method was resorted to; first one of the hoops was removed, and two holes were bored on opposite sides of the cask, one for drawing off the liquid, the other for letting in air; when a considerable portion of the liquor had been taken, the cask was filled up with water, the holes were pegged up, and all traces covered up by replacing the hoop. Nor did canal-thieves confine themselves to pilfering from boats, but as they travelled the country, they slaughtered sheep, snared game, and milked farmers' cows.

The next matter investigated by the Commissioners was the lack of proper protection to travellers on the public highways. By this time highwaymen, the terror of the last century, had been practically suppressed, but footpads were more common than ever; countrymen returning from market used to make up parties, and wait for hours for company rather than go home alone, whilst after dark many a commercial traveller would go armed with a pistol, and accompanied by a dog, for fear of being robbed. More serious still were the revelations brought to light with regard to wrecking. It was proved that almost all the inhabitants of the coast were wreckers; children were brought up to consider the practice legitimate, and women prayed that the winter would bring a rich harvest. When the weather was stormy, hundreds of people would crowd to the beach, not with any thought of rescuing the drowning, but only eager for plunder; as wreckage neared the shore men might be seen swimming out to be the first to touch any article that appeared to be of value, for by local tradition undisputed ownership was in this way acquired. Witnesses testified to all kinds of atrocities. A ship called "The Grecian" went to pieces off the Cheshire coast—the captain was drowned, and his body was found stripped naked by the wreckers, who, not content with his clothes, cut off one of his fingers to obtain possession of the ring. Even this act of savagery was surpassed at a village called Moreton, where it was proved that a woman had bitten off the ear-lobes from a female corpse for the sake of the earrings.

Mr Dowling, the Commissioner of the Liverpool police, stated that in Cheshire parish constables never interfered with wreckers, and on occasions when the borough police were employed on salvage duty they had to go armed to protect themselves against the hostility of the neighbouring villagers. In Cornwall, public opinion was so well disposed towards wreckers, and so superstitiously hostile to shipwrecked sailors, that the coastguard were frequently intimidated and forced to desist from their efforts to save life. It is related how, on one occasion, after communication had with much difficulty been established with a stranded ship by means of the rocket apparatus, the onlookers rushed down and cut the hawser when only one man had been saved, because they believed that if the crew was rescued, ill-luck would befall the district.

The Commissioners' summing-up on this part of the subject was couched in the following words: "It is our duty to report, as the result of the extensive inquiries we have made, as to the mode in which the primary duties of a civilized community, in the protection of the persons and property of wayfarers and strangers, are performed, that the barbarous practices above described are not confined to particular districts, but prevail among the population of our coasts wherever wrecks occur...."

Another matter which occupied the attention of the Commission had reference to the lawlessness prevailing in the manufacturing districts. As is well known, the introduction of machinery, or, more correctly speaking, the quarrels and consequent cessation of work to which the innovation gave rise, brought much suffering to the wage earning classes. In 1826 the hand-weavers of Lancashire rose in rebellion, and the combinations entered into by the operatives in mines and factories were at first remarkable for the extreme violence of the methods employed, being signalised by an epidemic of machine-breaking in some counties, and by the crime of vitriol-throwing in others. The right of every man to sell his labour at his own price, or to cease work altogether if it pleased him to do so, was at this time recognised, and the legality of combination was no longer denied; but the organizers of labour were not willing to grant to the independent artisan the same measure of liberty that they demanded for themselves and for those whom they claimed to represent. The result of this attitude on the part of the leaders of trades-unionism was that cases of coercion, accompanied by violence, were of common occurrence, and the need of an efficient police force to protect life and property, as well as to prevent intimidation, was very urgent. In this connection the Commissioners remark "some of the strongest corroborative evidence in favour of the efficiency of a well-organized constabulary or police force, might perhaps be found in the extreme bitterness of invective with which the parties implicated in illegal practices in these districts treat any proposition for its introduction, whilst they view with complacency any actual increase of the military force." The "illegal practices" above referred to had their origin, not only in differences between employers and employées, such as the rate of wages and hours of labour, but certain organizations, confident that they were stronger than the representatives of the law, presumed to take the law into their own hands, and to dictate terms right and left. At Sevenoaks, in Kent, a colony of journeymen paper-makers determined to pay no poor-rate, and terrorised the local constables when they came to levy distress. The authorities having sought the assistance of the Metropolitan police, a small party was dispatched from London, which, though savagely attacked, succeeded in arresting some of the rioters. On their return they proposed to take one of the local constables with them to identify the prisoners, but he was so alarmed at the consequences of incurring the vengeance of the paper-makers, that he tried to escape, and could only be induced to accompany the victorious policemen by counter threats of personal violence.