468 • ROYAL PREROGATIVE
Street, Soho. The premises were put under surveillance bySpecial
Branchdetectives and a notorious anarchist, George Charpentier,
was watched while he conducted a burglary. He was arrested and im-
prisoned in March 1894.ROYAL PREROGATIVE.In the absence of any statutory authority,
MI5, theSecret Intelligence Service, andGCHQexisted under the
Royal Prerogative until the passage of theSecurity Service Actin
1989 and theIntelligence Services Actin 1992. Literally, this was
a legal dispensation granted by the Sovereign to conduct operations
without other approval.
ROYAL ULSTER CONSTABULARY (RUC).The provincial police
force serving the six counties of Ulster, the RUC’s name was
changed during the peace process to the Police Service ofNorthern
Ireland. The RUC Special Branch has had unrivaled experience at
combating republican and loyalist terrorism, but its failure to culti-
vate sources within the nationalist community in the early 1970s left
a vacuum that was filled by the army and later the Security Service.
ROYAL VICTORIA PATRIOTIC SCHOOL (RVPS).Originally
built for the daughters of soldiers killed in the Crimea, RVPS accom-
modated theLondon Reception Centreduring World War II to
screen refugees from enemy-occupied territories. All arrivals were
interrogated about their antecedents, and their details were checked
byMI5againstiskandisosdecrypts. Those identified as spies were
transferred toCamp 020for further questioning. After the war, a
Dutch interrogator, ColonelOreste Pinto, published three books de-
scribing the skills he had used to identify enemy agents, but he ne-
glected to mention the advance notice he was given by MI5 of
particular suspects who had been compromised even before their ar-
rival in London.
RUTLAND, FREDERICK.Known as ‘‘Rutland of Jutland’’ because
of his exploits during World War I in the Royal Naval Air Service,
pioneering the flight of aircraft off warships, Frederick Rutland was
arrested in December 1941 under Defence Regulation 18B and de-
tained at Brixton Prison. In June 1942 he was transferred to the Isle