The Village Police Service

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click The Police Service for other articles about this service

click Huntingdon. The house used for village policemen until 1969.

The Village Police Service local notes are added below.

Hallmark January 1990. Reported by Miles Marshall

This is another one of the public service articles written by Miles Marshall before his death in May of this year. The cover drawing by Dennis Claydon is, as Miles instructed, of the badges of the old Buckinghamshire Constabulary and the present day Thames Valley Police, kindly loaned to us by ex-police constable David Allworth. (click Dave & Ann Allworth for more about David Allworth)

In my article on the Parish Council (Hallmark Jan/Feb 1988), I touched briefly on the role of the Parish Constables, traditionally appointed by the Parish Council and whose duties in many ways anticipated those of a regular police force and were to overlap them by almost a hundred years. But now my story starts with the inauguration of the Buckinghamshire Constabulary in 1857, and for the bulk of this information I am greatly indebted to retired Police Inspector Alfred G. Hailstone who was, for many years, a proud and much respected member of that august body of men.

Alf Hailstone generously offered me the free use of his 'Centenary History of the Buckinghamshire Constabulary' published in 1957 at four shillings but now unhappily out of print. An Act of Parliament in 1856 had made it compulsory for the County Councils to form a County force of full time paid police for the maintenance of law and order in their own territories. Captain Willoughby Harcourt Carter, late of the Royal Bucks (Kings Own) Militia, was appointed Chief Constable of Buckinghamshire and a County Police Committee was formed at the Epiphany Sessions on 6^th February 1857. The Chief Constable was granted the handsome salary of £300 a year plus £100 expense allowance, which was to include the cost of providing his own horse. Five Superintendents each got £115, Inspectors £85 a year and five Sergeants were paid 23 shilings a week each. Thirty lst Class Constables had a pound a week, 2nd Class nineteen shillings, but a 3rd Class Constable had to get by on seventeen shillings.

The new force was to be known as the Buckinghamshire Constabulary and the County was split into five divisions with Headquarters at Aylesbury, Fenny Stratford, Steeple Claydon, High Wycombe and Slough. The housing situation, though desperate, was tackled squarely by the Committee and other County Authorities and an early building programme of both Police Stations and Police houses was to lay a foundation for what, in later years, was to become the envy of a great many other police authorities. But at the start, housing was primitive, many constables having to find and rent their own cottage which then became the local police house. The conditions which do sound a bit primitive today - no water, no drainage and, of course, only oil lamps or candles - were the common lot of all but the wealthy country dweller until well after the 1914-18 War and in many cases much later.

Captain Carter was a strict disciplinarian, indeed a despot, but he set a pattern of honesty and devotion to duty which was to become a proud tradition of our County Police Force. He was succeeded, ten years later, by Captain John Charles Tyrwhitt Drake of Shardeloes, just south of Amersham, where his family had lived for 300 years. The new Chief Constable was also to leave his mark upon the force, for whilst a disciplinarian like his predecessor he was a man of great understanding and compassion and did much for the welfare of his men besides insisting on the proper treatment of offenders and suspects in police custody.

The working day of a constable on the beat at that time was long and arduous, seven days a week, with little time allowed for proper meals. They were allowed to carry some food with them but men often fell ill through overwork and under- nourishment. The beat entailed a number of rendezvous at stated times with a sergeant or senior officer at what were officially known as 'conference points’. A minute late at such a meeting could result in a fine of half a crown.

Despite Captain Drake's concern for the well-being of his men, he was for years against the use of the bicycle. This eventually led to the surreptitious use of a cycle which could be concealed in a hedge, just short of the conference point. Sometimes a superintendent, travelling in a pony trap to meet a constable would convey the unfortunate man back to the station in his trap where he would quietly say "Better go an fetch your bike now, chap." But bicycles were often instrumental in the apprehension of criminals and eventually the Chief Constable was obliged to alter his opinion.

Regular weekly rest days for constables were not a legal obligation until 1910 but even then the Bucks Standing Joint Committee grudgingly granted them one day in 28 and it was another four years before Bucks Policemen were to enjoy one day off in seven and special permission was still necessary to leave their beat on a rest day. Small wonder that many of them would spend the day. in bed!

In 1896 Captain Drake was succeeded by Major Otway Mayne who had had previous police experience in Norfolk and had earlier served with distinction with the Norfolk Regiment in India. It was Major Mayne who inaugurated the County Police Sports early in the present century.

There is so much more of great human interest that I could retell from Alf Hailstone's book but I should need the whole of Hallmark to do so. I dare not attempt even to list all the Chief Constables, let alone the many deputies and other senior officers who all played their part in moulding the Buckinghamshire Constabulary into the exemplary force which it undoubtedly became. Men were proud to belong to the Buckinghamshire Constabulary. There was an esprit de corps throughout the force, felt and recognised by all ranks, which was exemplified by their action during such emergencies as a Parliamentary Election during the first few weeks of its existence, their fine work in World War I, their refusal to answer a call to strike by the Police Union in 1919, their firm morale in the General Strike of 1926 and, of course, their well-remembered work in the last War.

I wish I could tell you when the first Village Policeman was appointed to Lacey Green, but I do believe that he lived originally in the south-facing side of the old Graham Cottages in Main Road. They were built back-to-back sideways-on to the road and were originally farm cottages for the labourers of William Saunders of Stocken Farm, but at this time were owned by his daughter, Mrs. Ethel Dell. It was not long before Mrs. Dell realised that she had let them the wrong half, for whilst they basked in the sunshine, she was shivering on the north side. She soon persuaded them to swap and the north side of Graham Cottages became the Village Police House for many years, during which the village was well served in succession by Police Constables Cox, Mathews, Harris, Farr and Drage.

Judging by the general architectural style, it must have been about 1936 that the Police Authorities of the County decided to build us a new Police House on the other side of Main Road. Many will remember its rather austere concrete porch, with a blue front door, now happily obliterated by a tasteful brick and tile extension. The new house was first occupied, I believe, by P.C. Fitton, an ex-Guardsman who tried to re-enlist at the start of the War, but they wouldn't release him. He was followed sometime in the middle of the War by P.C. Frank Goldsmith who was well known in the village and remained until well after the War to be followed by P.C.'s Herbert, Adams and Munger (about 1966) who was the last village policeman residing on his beat. He is now an Inspector.

Between 1966 and 1969 there was a considerable programme of amalgamations throughout the British police, but a proposal to merge Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire together with the Oxford City and Reading Borough Police was vigorously opposed by the Bucks County Council and the Standing Joint Committee backed unhappily with equal vigour by the then Chief Constable Brig. J.N. Cheney, and many of his senior officers who all resigned as one man when the Home Office finally pushed through the inevitable change. Perhaps with a little less stubborn loyalty to an already lost cause, and a little more foresight, Buckinghamshire by retaining more of its senior officers in the new force, might have enjoyed a good deal more say in what happened next.

However, in 1968 for a short period Bucks came under the Thames Valley Police only to have its title changed to the Thames Valley Constabulary and finally back again to the Thames Valley Police. The mind boggles at the stacks of Stationery wasted by this vacillation. The teething troubles of the new Force were to continue for nearly ten years until the Home Office appointed an experienced senior Metropolitan Police Officer Peter Imbert (now Commissioner of the Met.) as Chief Constable who succeeded in transforming the Force into the efficient, thoroughly modern, co-ordinated organisation that it is today.

But to return to the village in 1966. This was the time that the 'Unit beat policing system' was introduced which meant that we shared two constables (David Allworth and J. Purdy) with Princes Risborough, Monks Risborough, Bledlow, Speen and the Hampdens, but neither of them lived in the village. This extensive beat was originally covered by motor cycle and later with the now familiar white vans. Their duty was to maintain contact with the public, as far as possible in the traditional way, calling for help when necessary from the mobile blue and white Panda cars.

The village police house was now to remain empty for a considerable period until it was again used as a police residence but not by the local man. The first of these was P.C. Andy Warman who manfully attacked the waist high grass on the back lawn. Eventually it was sold an converted to a private residence in the mid 70's,

With its Headquarters at Kidlington, Oxford, the Thames Valley Police now guard the Queen's peace in an area of 2,220 square miles in the very heart of England with a population of around 2 million. The six divisions cater for Aylesbury, Banbury and Oxford, Slough, Milton Keynes, Reading and Southwest Oxfordshire with Newbury. A back up force of unpaid, volunteer Special Constables, ready and willing to assist the regular police during emergencies has been a feature of our County Police since 1920 and their work is as valuable today as ever. With all the modern aids to police work, up to the minute communications and computers, forensic experts, helicopters, divers, river launches, fast cars and motorcycles, to say nothing of highly trained police dogs and even horses at Milton Keynes, it is no wonder that the crime detection rate is improving.

A '999' call will bring rapid help from the men in the nearest radio police car. With luck they may be with you in time to apprehend the intruder before he hits you over the head but many of us who are old enough remember that comfortable feeling of having a man on the beat whose very presence may often have prevented the "breaking and entering" in the first place.

But let us pray with the Force 'Sit Pax In Valle Tamensis' (Let there be peace in Thames Valley).

NOTE.   Further research by Joan West.

HOUSES. Graham Cottage no 2 (the south facing side) was the first ‘Police House’ in Lacey Green.   It was built in 1885 by John Forrest in the front field of Stocken Farm.   John Forrest had owned the Grymsdyke estate and in 1877 had purchased Stocken Farm from Charles Brown.

POLICEMEN

There are no policemen residing in Lacey Green prior to 1891.  The first, P C Esau Thorne is named in the 1891 census, P C Kirby in 1901 and P C Cox in 1911.   William Saunders bought Stocken Farm in 1911.  His married daughter Ethel Dell is living in no. 2 Graham Cottages in 1939 and the ‘Police House’ is now no. 1 (north facing side) with P C Farr in occupation.