London's Police: The Peelers

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RARE EARLY SNUFF BOTTLE BOOK 1935 BY LONDON ENGLAND PROFESSOR 116 ILLUSTRATIONS
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PAIR FRUITS SERVING SPOONS MADE IN STERLING SILVER IN LONDON 1827-GEORGE IV
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Arthur H. Beavan, in Imperial London, first published 1901, made a brief survey of London's Policing:

In 1827, thanks to Sir Robert Peel, London saw the beginning of its present police force, which superseded the happy-go-lucky system typified by the Bow Street "runners," and the decrepit "Charleys," or watchmen of the past.

At first the "peelers" and "bobbies," as it was the fashion to call them, were intensely disliked, the public having an idea that the "liberty of the subject" might be curtailed; but in time the prejudice died down, the force increased in usefulness, and its numbers grew pretty nearly in proportion to the increase of the population, until now, in 1901, the Metropolitan police that in 1829 numbered but 300 "able men," comprise a small army of 16,000, with an area under their control of 700 square miles, extending over a radius of fifteen miles from Charing Cross; and a population of 7,000,000 to guard, from Colney Heath in Herts, to Mogadore, Todworth Heath, North and South; and Lark Hall, Essex, to Staines Moor, Middlesex, East and West.

The mounted police are few in number, too few perhaps, only about 300 men.

In the old days they were constables first, and then taught to ride, but now the process is reversed and they begin, as a rule, by being cavalrymen.

A good deal of patrol work, chiefly in the suburbs, is done by their force.

Now and again it has to keep order during some heated political meeting, and at all great public gatherings, the Lord Mayor's Show, etc, etc, it gives evidence of its ability, aided by the wonderful sagacity of the horses, who seem to know exactly what is expected of them, when to keep back or when to "move on" the compact and seemingly impenetrable crowd of people.

Next: London's Police in 1900: The River Police