Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1871-07-12

THE POLICE OF LoNDON.-The London Daily
News thus describes the lpolice of the metropo-
lis:
Col. Henderson, the chief commissioner of the
metropolitan police, is at the head of little
army. The huge bulk of London outside the
city is under his charge, and he has to garrison
it, in the name of law and order, by force of
916O men. This garrison is perpetnally in
creasing. Year by year this huge metropolis
grows huger, pushing out on all sides like Il
growing boy; rich and poor, successful mer-
chant and needy adventurer, honest workman
and beggar, all swarm to London, so that in
the eleven months from February to December,
1870, a new square and two hundred and TWEEN
ty new streets were added to its area. This
mere growth of eleven months added forty two
and half miles to the length of streets over
which the metropolitan police have to walk in
their regular beats. The police themselves
must, of course, increase in number with the
increase of their work. They have been too
few for years past, and now the chief commits.
sSsioner reports not only that they haye been
increased, but in far greater proportions than
the area they watch. In pursuance OF last
years promise 262 were added during the year
and since the close of the year 9160 have been
augmented by 100 added during the first quar-
ter and 300 who are now in course of enlist
nent. But even when this 1850 are all en-
plOyed, the number will only reach what
was feckOucQ 10 De essential 10 the LOn-
don of 1869. The police are not all en-
ployad in walking beats. On the 31st of De-
cember, 1869 policemen were employed in hired
duty. There were nineteen at the houses
of parliament, forty-fve at South KensingtOn
museum, one hundred in the royal parks and
grounds, eighteen at the crystal palace, and
Others employed at various private establish
ments all over London. These men are paid for
by the authorities or private persons whose
property they guard, and the advantage gained
on both sides is that the public have a reserve
of police on which they can draw in an emer-
gency, and the shops, offices, theatres, etc., are
duly looked after by men accustomed and
trained to the work. A special detachment OF
metropolitan police is employed in the dock
yards Gil, altogether, are distributed between
Woolwich, Portsmouth, Deptford, Chatham and
Pembroke. The work of watching the metrop-
oils is therefore done by ~ superintendent, 207
inspectors, 800 sergeants, and $685. constables-
force of 1889 men, all told. This little army
has the metropolis in charge, it must be remem-
bered, not only by day but by night. 1t is, in
fact, by night that its chief work is done, The
commissioner has to report that, out of $3.50
men, only twenty-one were charged before the
magistrate during the year, and of these thir-
teen were charged by the commissioner himself.
During the same period the commissioner has
had TO give 626 rewards for special good service,
while on thirty-two occasions police ether than
detectives have had commentator and rewards
from magistrates and judges. The police are, in
fact, increasing in their usefulness and efflcien-
cy as well as in their numbers.