The crisis of manpower in the police during the First World War

@drmaryfraser

In March 1915 a crisis of manpower in the police was said, by the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, Sir Edward Henry, to be urgent and looming. He portrayed the Metropolitan Police as recruiting large numbers of policemen during 1889-1890, who would shortly complete 26 years’ service and so be due to retire on a pension. Not only would the force shortly lose these men, but 3,015 younger policemen had been withdrawn from the Metropolitan Police as Reservists into the Army, or for other employment on special military duties or for the protection of the dockyards and military stations. Sir Edward Henry’s statistics showed that since the outbreak of war, an additional 380 policemen had left between 1^st August and 31^st December 1914, due to being unfit or on voluntary retirement. His letter to the Secretary of State pleaded that he had received notice from a further 60 policemen who were due to retire at the end of April and expected that within a year this number would have risen to 652 experienced police officers, due to retirement. To help to retain many of them, he recommended suspending the right to retire, unless on a medical certificate or with the consent of the Chief Constable. He said this had the support of the police generally. The Police (Emergency Provisions) Act, 1915 enacted this request, removing the right of most time-expired officers to retire with a pension. This delayed, for officers in England, Wales and Scotland, their right to retire on a pension until the end of the war, unless they had private means to be able to afford to retire without their police pension.

With the continual call up of younger policemen into the army, retaining those beyond pensionable age was one reason that the profile of the police during the First World War increased in age.

Further reading

Fraser, M. (2019) Policing the Home Front 1914-1918: The control of the British population at war. Routledge research monograph

Hodge, J.M. & Garside, T.H. (1918) War Pensions and Allowances. London: Hodder and Stoughton, pp. 147-150

Letter from Sir Edward Henry to The Under Secretary of State, 30^th March 2015. Metropolitan Police and National Defence. TNA MEPO 2/7205

Robb, G. (2015) British Culture and the First World War (2^nd edition) London: Palgrave

 
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