2 See Fairburn, Account of the Dreadful Murder of Mr. Marr and Family, etc. (4th ed., n.d.), p. 6.

3 Mr. Johnson (of Fenchurch Street) in a letter to R. Ryder (Secretary of State for the Home Department), Dec. 20, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

4 Extract from a handbill announcing a meeting of the inhabitants of Long Alley and the adjacent places, in a letter from Joseph Moser to J. Beckett (Home Office), Jan. 1, 1812, in H.O. 42/119.

5 See Pelham, Camden, The Chronicles of Crime, etc. (1841), vol. 1, pp. 515–516Google Scholar; Knapp, A. and Baldwin, W., Newgate Calendar (1826), vol. 4. p. 52Google Scholar; New Newgate Calendar, vol. 5, p. 371. See also the letter of R. Capper (a magistrate of Shadwell) to J. Beckett, Dec. 21, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

6 See “Collection of Newspaper Cuttings,” f. 45 (British Museum), “More Murders,” Dec. 22, 1811, Wapping.

7 See letter from the magistrates, Thames Police Office, to J. Beckett, Dec. 24, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

8 See letter from the Thames magistrates to the Lambeth Street magistrates, Dec. 20. 1811, in “Book of Letters,” 1811–1819, preserved at the Thames Police Office.

9 See letter from R. Capper to J. Beckett, Dec. 21, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

10 See letter from Mr. Johnson (of Fenchurch Street) to R. Ryder, Dec. 20, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

11 Letter from Mr. Lovegrove (of Wallingford) to R. Ryder, Dec. 20, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

12 Letter from Mr. Cook (of Birmingham) to R. Ryder, Dec 23, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

13 “Letters have been received,” stated the magistrates, “from various and distant parts shewing the great anxiety of the public mind”; see letter from the Thames Police Office to J. Beckett, Dec. 18, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

14 See letter from J. Moser to J. Beckett (with returns for the watch of Shoreditch), Dec. 25, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

15 See letter from J. Harriott to J. Beckett, Dec. 8, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

16 Letter from J. Harriott to the Home Office, Dec. 8, 1811, in “Book of Letters,” 1804–1822.

17 See Fairburn, Account of the Dreadful Murder of Mr. Marr, pp. 12 and 18–21. See also a letter from J. Harriott to J. Beckett, Dec. 16, 1811. and from E. Markland (magistrate of Shadwell) to J. Beckett, Dec. 21, 1811, both in H.O. 42/118.

18 On December 20, 1811, the Thames magistrates sent the following note to the Lambeth Street magistrates: “The Magistrates of the Thames Police present their compliments to the Magistrates of Lambeth Street requesting their meeting them at the Thames Police Office this day at 2 o'clock to consult together on the most effectual measures for discovering the atrocious midnight murderers that infest the neighbourhood of their respective Offices, which from the murder of three people in a house in the Gravel Lane last night gives an appearance of a gang acting on system.” A similar note was also sent to the magistrates at Shadwell Office; see “Book of Letters,” 1811–1819.

19 Letter from E. Markland to J. Beckett, 7 o'clock, Dec. 24, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

20 In 1811 representations were made to Ryder that brawls were continually taking place between the English and Portuguese sailors at Wapping and in the neighbourhood of the West and East India Docks, and he asked that steps might be taken to put a stop to them before they produced “most fatal effects”; letter from the Home Office to the magistrates of Thames, Whitechapel and Shadwell Offices, Oct. 10, 1811, in H.O. 65/2. But the same state of affairs seemed to continue. In 1814 the commander-in-chief was asked to give the necessary authority for troops from the Tower to be ready to intervene, since serious disturbances had broken out between British and foreign seamen. In 1815 sailors assembled in large numbers and protested against the employment of foreigners on ships, and the Shadwell Office was authorised by the Home Office to ask for help from the Thames Police Office if necessary. A few months later serious trouble waB expected at the docks for the same reason and the magistrates of Whitechapel and Thames Offices were instructed to direct an adequate force to the dock area. See letter from the Home Office to the Shadwell Office, July 28, 1815, in H.O. 65/2, and one to the magistrates of Whitechapel and Thames Offices, Sept. 18, 1815, ibid.

1 Anonymous letter to R. Ryder (from Pentonville), Dec. 23, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

2 Letter from J. Harriott to J. Beckett, Dec. 8, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

3 Letter from the Portuguese consul to R. Ryder (marked private), Jan. 2, 1812, in H.O. 42/119.

4 Letter from E. Markland to J. Beckett, Dec. 21, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

5 Parl. Deb. (1812), vol. 21, cols. 215–216. He also censured the Shadwell magistrates for conduct of which, however, according to the evidence, they wpre not guilty, namely, that they “were not ashamed to act up to it in all the meanness and bigotry of its indignant spirit, viewing the murder in no less a light than that of a Popish plot. They commenced an indiscriminate hunt after the Irish people; and when they had them before them, in order to come at once to the plot, they began with the deep leader of ‘Are you a Papist?’ or ‘If you deny that you are, show that you don't know how to cross yourself’”; ibid., col. 216.

6 Letter from Patrick Colquhoun, Queen Square Police Office, to J. Beckett, Dec. 16, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

7 Letter from D. Crokard and Jacob Gale (of Devizes) to R. Ryder, Dec. 28, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

8 Letter from John Clarke to R. Ryder, Dec. 25, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

9 Report from the Thames Police Office to J. Beckett, Dec. 18, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

10 See Parl. Deb. (1812), vol. 21, cols. 211 and 212.

11 There was some doubt whether his real name was not Murphy.

12 Thus, two police officers from Shadwell went to Marlborough Street to arrest a man named Cobill; an investigation also took place of another suspicious character, one “Long Billy”; and several Portuguese were still detained. As late as August, 1812, Lord Sidmouth requested the magistrates to inform him whether, in the course of their examinations relating to the Ratcliffe murders, there had appeared any circumstance which would lead to a belief that a man of the name of John Gibson, detained on the Royal William at Spithead, having been sent to this country on suspicion of being concerned in those crimes, was really involved in them; letter from J. Beckett to the magistrates, Shadwell Police Office, August 8, 1812, in H.O. 65/2.

13 Letter of George Storey, Edward Markland and Robert Capper (magistrates of Shadwell Police Office) to R. Ryder, Dec. 27, 1811, in H.O. 65/2.

14 In a note to Beckett before Williams's death but after his first examination, the Shadwell magistrates stated: “tho' many circumstances arise against him we are not yet certain that he will prove the Man.” After Williams had hanged himself they stated that, on the basis of his examination before his suicide, and of further inquiries subsequently, they believed it certain that he was the murderer and that he alone was responsible. See letters from G. Storey, E. Markland and R. Capper to Beckett, Dec. 26, 1811, and Dec. 27, 1811, both in H.O. 42/118.

Strangely enough, Sir George Stephen referred to the case some twenty-five years later, and without adducing any new evidence maintained that Williams's guilt had not been established: A Letter on the Probable Increase of Rural Crime addressed to Lord John Russell, etc. (1836), at p. 27.

15 Letter from J. Beckett to R. Capper, Dec. 28, 1811, in H.O. 65/2.

16 See History of English Criminal Law, vol. 1, p. 198, where the procession is described. It is interesting to note that on December 29, Sir John Carr suggested a public parade of the body of the dead man so that a “salutary example might … be presented to the lower orders.” Constables were to be used to keep the public from the parading cart; the murderer's instruments were to be shown with him. See letter from Sir John Carr to R. Ryder, Dec. 29, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

17 Quoted by Chandler, Frank Wadleigh, The Literature of Roguery (1907), vol. 1, p. 183.Google Scholar

18 See Quincey, Thomas de, “On Murder considered as one of the Fine Arts,” in Confessions of an English Opium-eater and other Essays (ed. by Pollard, A. W., 1901), pp. 261–296Google Scholar, at p. 290.

19 “Supplementary Paper on Murder considered as one of the Fine Arts,” ibid., pp. 297–311, at p. 301. According to de Quincey, if the magistrates had at once made public the initials of the ship's carpenter's mallet which Williams left, together with a chisel, at Marr's house, he would have been caught earlier and the murder of the Williamsons would not have taken place. “Yet the magistrates kept back this fact from the public for the entire twelve days and until that second work was accomplished”; ibid., p. 291.

20 Printed report of the meeting of the parish of St. Paul's, Shadwell Dec. 24, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

1 Printed report of the meeting of the parish of St. Paul's, Shadwell, Dec. 24, 1811; return of Shadwell Public Office, Dec. 28, 1811; letter from the magistrates, Thames Police Office, to J. Beckett, Dec. 24, 1811; return of watch, parish of St. Paul's, Shadwell, to J. J. Mallett, Dec. 27, 1811; letter from John Harriott and John Langley (Thames Police Office) to J. Beckett, Dec. 30, 1811; letter from William Baker (vestry clerk of St. Anne's, Middlesex) to chief clerk, Shadwell Public Office, Dec. 27, 1811. All in H.O. 42/118.

2 See J. P. Smith, An Account of a Successful Experiment for an Effectual Nightly Watch, recently made in the Liberty of the Rolls, London: submitted for the Consideration of all Parochial Authorities in the Metropolis and elsewhere, etc. (1812), pp. 26–28.

3 Ibid., p. 24.

4 Letter from William Baker to the chief clerk, Shadwell Public Office, Dec. 27, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

5 Letter from E. Chippendale (of Serjeants' Inn) to the Home Office, Dec. 28, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

6 Letter from J. Beckett to J. Moser, Jan. 15, 1812, in H.O. 65/2.

7 Letter from Baines to R. Ryder, Jan. 12, 1812, in H.O. 42/131.

8 Letter from W. Smith to R. Ryder, Jan. 13, 1812, in H.O. 42/119.

9 Letter from H. Keeble to R. Ryder, Jan. 16, 1812, in H.O. 42/119.

10 Letter from Henry Matthews to R. Ryder, Jan. 18, 1812, in H.O. 42/119.

11 Letter from Edward Moland Emery to R. Ryder, Jan. 24, 1812, in H.O. 42/119. It was stated that in London, except for a few places, lamps went out between 12 and 1 o'clock.

12 “Notes on Watch,” undated, probably January 1812, in H.O. 42/131.

13 Letter from W. Tweddale to R. Ryder, Jan. 25, 1812, ibid.; in it he also deplored that BO many of the watchmen were Irish, while criminals were also mostly Irish.

14 Letter from “a Livery and Inquestman of the City” to R. Ryder, Jan. 20, 1812, in H.O. 42/119.

15 Letter from the magistrates of Hatton Garden to J. Beckett, Dec. 23, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

16 Letter from Robert Hasketh to R. Ryder, Dec. 23, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

17 Such, for instance, as that contained in a memorandum forwarded by B. Dudley, in which apparently the Regent himself took a great interest, expressing thp desire that its author should be enlisted in the police. Another was that every house with a male capable of bearing arms should have “a Hanger, Javelin or Pike”; likewise a small wicker basket shield about twelve or more inches in diameter, with a strong wicker handle projecting from the centre of the concave side, to help ward off a blow from a “Mall or Iron Bar” and give time for “a thrust with the Cutlass, Javelin or Pike”; letter from Garnet Terry to R. Ryder, Jan. 14, 1812, in H.O. 42/119. In an anonymous letter, signed “Diogenes,” one writer attributed the existing state of crime to Catholics and urged the authorities not to allow them the privilege of absolution because they did not regard a crime as such if directed against “hereticks,” and concluded: “I s it then surprising that the votaries of that faith are so prone to commit crimes” (italic in original); letter to the Home Office, Jan. 1, 1812, in H.O. 42/119.

18 See below p. 53, note 16.

19 Letter from “Housekeeper” to R. Ryder, Dec. 12, 1811, in H.O. 42/118, and from Lovegrove (of Wallingford) to R. Ryder, Dec. 20, 1811, ibid. Cook (of Birmingham) felt that £2,000 should have been offered, even to accomplices, in the murders of Marr and Williamson; letter to R. Ryder, Dec. 23, 1811, ibid.

20 Letter from W. Wynyard (of Sloane Street) to J. Beckett, Dec. 23, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

1 Letter from Cook (of Birmingham) to R. Ryder, Dec. 23, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

2 Letter signed “F. W. a very loyal Subject” to R. Ryder, undated, but probably Dec. 29, 1811, ibid.

3 Anonymous letter to R. Ryder, undated, in H.O. 42/118.

4 E. Chippendale to the Home Office, Jan. 2, 3812, in H.O. 42/118.

5 Printed notice of a meeting held in Kensington, Dec. 26, 1811, in H.O. 42/131.

6 Letter from Garnet Terry to R. Ryder, Jan. 13, 1812, in H.O. 42/119. See also the letter from A. Graham to J. Beckett, Dec. 28, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

7 See letter from Johnson (of Fenchurch Street) to R. Ryder, Dec. 20, 1811, in H.O. 42/118; letter from Baynes (a magistrate) to Ryder, Jan. 12, 1812, in H.O. 42/131; anonymous letter to Ryder (n.d., probably Jan. 1812), in H.O. 42/131; letter from Arbuthnot to J. Beckett, Jan. 8, 1812, in H.O. 42/119; letter from T. C. Banks, including a “Plan for the Begulation of Servants with respect to their Characters and the Safety and Convenience of Families,” Jan. 16, 1812, ibid.; letter from J. Keeble to Ryder, Jan. 16, 1812, ibid.; anonymous letter from “A friend to an active and preventive police force” to Ryder (n.d.), in H.O. 42/118.

8 All watchmen over forty-five years of age to be discharged; letter from George Orr to R. Ryder, Dec. 30, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

9 It was felt by some, however, that they should not be armed, as “it would induce a corresponding precaution in the evil disposed”; letter from Price (of Birmingham) to the Home Office, Jan. 23, 1812, in H.O. 42/131.

10 Except when coming on and going off duty, for otherwise they simply warned offenders of their approach.

11 By imprisonment, if necessary. Those dismissed in one parish were not to be enlisted in other districts. One correspondent even went so far as to propose making watchmen liable to imprisonment for any crime committed in their neighbourhood, “subject to [such] case as may bear out his defence”; letter from W. Smith to R. Ryder, Jan. 16, 1812, in H.O. 42/119.

12 “All watch boxes to be removed as they only sleep in them”; letter from George Orr to R. Ryder, Dec. 30, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

13 Each watchman was to be accompanied by an armed patrol, who was to draw his round from a box so that he would not know before going to the watchhouse where he was to be stationed. See “Outline of a Plan for the better regulation of Watching the metropolis, and … protecting its inhabitants against Murders, Burglaries and Street Robberies”; anonymous letter, probably Jan. 1812, in H.O. 42/131.

14 Letter from Arbuthnot to J. Beckett, with enclosure “A few Observations respecting the Police of the Capital,” Jan. 8, 1812, in H.O. 42/119.

15 Letter from A. Graham to J. Beckett, Dec. 28, 1811, in H.O. 42/118.

16 Sir David Williams, of the Whitechapel Police Office, was the only one to suggest that the appointment of the watch should be taken from parishes and given to magistrates; that watchmen should be deemed peace officers and be under the control of magistrates; letter from Sir David Williams to the Home Office, Dec. 28, 1811, in H.O. 42/118. Sir David Williams, it would appear, was implicated in a singularly lax administration of the licensing laws. The evidence against him, collected by the 1816 Committee, was rather embarrassing.

17 He took employment as a coal merchant and dealer in tobacco for public-houses, and was thus under obligations to people whom it was his duty to watch. Moreover, he had been appointed to the office in succession to his own brother, who had absconded with money: “It is seldom except on Militia business, however, that I see him.” For all that he was in command of the eighty constables of the city. See letter from Richard Birnie to J. Beckett, Jan. 14, 1812, in H.O. 42/119.

18 Letter from William Fielding to J. Beckett, Jan. 31, 1812, ibid.

19 He proposed that no watchman should be appointed under thirty-five or over fifty-five years of age; their number was to be in proportion to the number of houses; their allowances never to be less than 16s. per week; the time of their rounds to be varied daily; patrols to be increased and to be on duty as soon as darkness fell, and they were not only to help but also to supervise the watchmen; they should be armed with muskets and the watchmen with staves; each watch should first appoint a superintendent of the whole force, both watch and patrols; justices of the peace at Petty Sessions phould be given power to fine or imprison those who neglected their duty; the high constable should be made a stipendiary officer in order to give all his time to his duties; none should be appointed a constable if he were a publican, if he could not write, or was elderly or infirm. See letter from J. Colquhoun to R. Ryder, Jan. 14, 1812. These were all useful suggestions, but they fell far below his plan of reform as presented to the 1798 Committee, and as outlined in his pamphlet National Police etc. published in 1799. Yet, as he himself stated when giving evidence before the 1816 Committee, he still fully adhered to that plan, although in the memorandum he confined himself to advising “… a uniform system.”

20 In the ministry of Spencer Perceval, from November 1, 1809, to June 1812, he was Secretary of State for the Home Department. He was also ex officio a commissioner of the Board of Control for the affairs of India.

1 See Parl. Deb. (1812), vol. 21, H.C., Jan. 18, “Nightly Watch and Police of the Metropolis,” cols. 196–222.

2 Ibid., col. 196.

3 The Act required that the trustees should appoint none but “able bodied men” and, stated Kyder, “he would leave to their own observation to decide how far this was complied with.” The truth was that those who were too old to earn their bread were appointed to be watchmen in order that they should not become a burden to the parish. Anything approaching uniformity was also far from being secured since, for instance, the parish of St. Pancras was divided into seven districts, each governed by its own local act; see Parl. Deb. (1812), vol. 21, cols. 197–198.

4 Ibid., col. 197.

5 Ibid., cols. 198–202.

6 Ibid., col. 212.

7 Ibid., cols. 212–213, at col. 212.

8 Ibid., cols. 218–219.

9 Ibid., cols. 206–207.

10 Ibid., col. 211.

11 Ibid., cols. 203 and 210.

12 The amendment to Ryder's motion proposed by J. Abercromby purported to add the words, “and also into the state of the Police of the metropolis.” After some resistance Ryder consented to it, provided that the word “further” be substituted for the word “also,” to which the opposition consented; ibid., col. 210.

13 See “Report on the Nightly Watch and Police of the Metropolis” (127), Parl. Papers, Reports (1812), vol. 2, p. 95.

14 They regretted “that want of unity, that want of dependence of parts on each other, that want of a general superintendence and controul, without which every system of government must be imperfect”; ibid., p. 98.

15 The absence of any reference to this scheme is still more significant when it is noted that in 1810 the Twenty-eighth Report from the Select Committee on Finance of 1798 was printed by order of the House of Commons; see (348), Parl. Papers, Reports (1810), vol. 4, pp. 375–598.

16 “Report on the Nightly Watch and Police of the Metropolis” (127), Parl. Papers, Reports (1812), pp. 98 and 100.

17 Ibid., p. 98.

18 Ibid., p. 100.

19 See Radzinowicz, L., “First steps towards government control over police before Peel,” in Law Quarterly Review, 70 (1954), p. 88.Google Scholar

20 The amendments proposed to the Act of 14 Geo. 3, c. 90, are listed in Appendix 5 of the Report at pp. 123–124.

1 See Memoirs of the Life of Sir Samuel Romilly, etc. (1840), vol. 3, note * at p. 6.

2 See Parl. Deb. (1812), vol. 23, H.C., 8 July, “Nightly Watch Begulations Bill,” cols. 949–951.

3 Ibid., col. 950.

4 Ibid., col. 950.

5 See “A Bill for the better Regulation of the Nightly Watch in the City of Westminster, and the Vicinity of the Metropolis” (May 8, 1812), Parl. Papers (1812), vol. 1, pp. 1041–1058.

6 See “A Bill [As Amended by the Committee] for the better Regulation of the Nightly Watch in the City of Westminster, and the Vicinity of the Metropolis” (May 27, 1812), Parl. Papers, Public Bills (1812), vol. 1, pp. 1059–1076.

7 In his evidence before the Committee of 1828 Sir Richard Birnie, then chief magistrate of Bow Street Office, stated that it was he who had prepared a scheme out of which the Bill of 1812 had been constructed; “Several gentlemen here,” he said, “will remember the murders of Marr and Williamson, at Ratcliffe Highway, some years ago. The then Secretary of State, Mr. Ryder, knowing that I had looked into the parish concerns of the Metropolis a little, asked me for a scheme, I gave him one; he approved of it, and he brought in a Bill founded upon that, and the very parishes that called chiefly for assistance in that neighbourhood were the first, I believe, to petition against it.” See “Report from the Select Committee of Inquiry … on the State of the Police of the Metropolis” (533), Parl. Papers (1828), vol. 6, p. 1, Minutes of Evidence, at p. 37.

8 See J. P. Smith, An Account of a Successful Experiment for an Effectual Nightly Watch … submitted for the Consideration of all Parochial Authorities in the Metropolis, and elsewhere, etc. (1812).

9 An Account of a Successful Experiment, pp. 16–17. In a note he added: “The police of France, say some, is admirable. Then go to France and enjoy it, be the reply of every free-born Briton!”, p. 21. Strangely enough, in this very year the same sentiment was voiced on the other side of the Atlantic: “Much has been said of the great perfection of the police of certain nations, but those eulogists do not advert to the fact, that its agents are restricted by no laws, nor power, but the will of one man, that they can enter, without previous form of law, by day or night, any man's dwelling, ransack it over, and retire without informing him of the object of their visit, and happy is he, if the insult and alarm are all that he suffers, but may our good genius forever preserve us from such perfection and power of police as this; which can only accompany despotism, and is the hateful attribute of fearful tyrants.” See A Brief Treatise on the Police of the City of New York, by a Citizen (New York, 1812), p. 29.

10 An Account of a Successful Experiment, p. 2.

11 Ibid., p. 3. Smith makes the comment that, although the police instructions of Alfred—keeping the peace by the organisation of the hundreds, the security of frankpledge and other preventive measures—were generally praised by modern writers, he was inclined to consider “the police of ancient days an ill exchange for the practical freedom of the Brunswick race”: note A, at p. 20.

12 Op. cit., pp. 12–14.

13 See John William Ward, Letters to Ivy (1905), p. 146