London's Police in 1900: The River Police at Wapping

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Arthur H. Beavan continued his survey of London's Police in Imperial London, published in 1901, with a look at the River Police:

Then there are the river, or water-police, some 250 strong, whose headquarters are at Wapping New Stairs, close to the river; a force whose district extends from Chelsea Bridge to Dartford Creek, a matter of twenty-one miles or so.

The Thames police have jurisdiction over the river, which legally is a highway like any other London thoroughfare, in somewhat the same manner as the Metropolitan Force, of which they are a branch.

No longer have they to look after the "Rogue Riderhood" type of rascality, nor the "horsemen," mudlarks, scuffle-humters, and other rogues who formerly infested the river, and whose depredations at one time were estimated at over half-a-million sterling annually; but they have plenty to do, for the Thames has still its mysteries and crimes that require unravelling and repression.

At the Wapping Station is kept a gruesome book containing photos of the hundreds of drowned men, women and children that have been picked up in the Thames.

Only the faces are portrayed, and there are many pages of them, a ghastly sight.

Next: London's Police in 1900: Scotland Yard