Hi John, You have to remember that in times past there were numerous very small police forces. Some boroughs had their own force. these were gradually amalgamated into the forces we know today. When I was engaged to my husband (1970) he had to live in the section house. |Women were not allowed over the threshold and as I lived in the nurses home and men were not allowed over that threshold either meeting up was somewhat difficult. Partners were vetted to see if they were suitable people. We were told we had to live in a police house and we were told where this would be. There was no choice. It could be anywhere within the force area and you could be moved across the county at a moment's notice. Children's education was immaterial. It did us a favour that no houses were available and we had to buy our own. A house came as part of the salary. On our war memorial project working party we had 3 ex police officers one of whom had served a considerable time ago. Our memorial man had resigned after 20 years service. In my husband's day they paid 11% of their salary into the pension fund and could retire with a reduced pension after 25 years service. According to the oldest police officer this was also the case at WW1 time. I wondered why someone married with children in a tied house would resign when he only had 5 years to go to get his pension? There had to be a story there - and there was! He upset his sergeant by failing to meet beat points on several occasions. This was before radios. He then was caught drinking in the local pub on duty. BYW when you retired you were out of the police house on your ear. Re the archives for you. I think your first port of call should be the Treasure House at Beverley and WYAS catalogues. If they do not have anything try the force HQ covering the area now. There may be an archivist - I doubt it now as they have had such budget cuts but it is worth a try, I went initially to Surrey History Centre to be told that the archives had been requested back by Mount Browne (HQ). I then contacted Mount Browne to find that they had been returned to the History centre. These were not digitised documents so I read the originals. You get a brief description of the man, all his postings and his grade. I learned that there were 3 classes of constable starting with 3rd class. Even minor misdemenours could result in a reduction in tank. HTH Chris l----Original message---- >From : [email protected] Date : 20/11/2014 - 22:45 (GMTST) To : [email protected] Subject : [YORKSGEN] YORKSGEN Digest, Vol 9, Issue 319 - Police Records, East Riding and West Riding. HI The message in today's digest about police force records interested me. My maternal grandfather (Fred WEATHERILL 1880 Great Broughton - 1951 Hatfield nr Doncaster) was a policeman. He first served with the East Riding Constabulary, but when he wished to marry he moved to the West Riding because their officers could get married accommodation (that's my mother's account). I assume that his ERY record would be at Beverley, but when with the West Riding police he was stationed at Wombwell, North Anston, Denaby and Hatfield. These are all in the modern South Yorkshire as far as policing is concerned. Would his West Riding record be at Wakefield or somewhere else? John Lindley NRY . . . Subject: Re: [YORKSGEN] help with parish records Patrington To: pauline alden <[email protected]>, [email protected] Message-ID: <[email protected]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Hi Pauline, In researching our local war memorial, I discovered that one of our men and been a policeman, The archives of the local police force are at the county archives and I was able to get his complete work record. If you can get hold of your gt grandfather's record and need help with understanding it, I am willing to give it a go. My late husband was in the job, as is my son in law now so I do know something about how the police work. There have been several amalgamations of small police forces. Perhaps your first port of call should be the catalogue at Beverley and then the HQ of the now force for the area (sorry I do not know which one covers ERY). ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message