Before the Bobbies. The Night Watch and Police Reform in Metropolitan London, 1720-1830

(^102) Before the Bobbies
Home Office by interested citizens and the steps taken by government and
local authorities after the failure of the 1812 Night Watch Bill tried to
improve parochial policing.^110 Patrick Colquhoun himself suggested that if
the Home Secretary wanted to improve the watch, he should follow the
example of Hackney.^111
Essentially, the 1812 Night Watch Bill proposed the establishment of a
greater degree of centralization and uniformity than either the Whigs or
local authorities thought necessary. Centralization was acknowledged as
beneficial for some things, facilitating collection and sharing of information,
for example. But the advantages of local control of policing, such as respons-
iveness to local needs, continued to be preferred. However, the strongest
parochial opposition was not the product of hostility to the idea of central-
ization and uniformity but its cost. Local officials believed that their systems
could effectively and economically prevent and detect crime without having
to be exactly alike or under central supervision.
In the eighteenth century, local and national authorities were usually given a
respite from higher crime rates during war but the Napoleonic Wars were
different. Contemporaries did not see the usual wartime decline in crime,
and the ideological nature of the war with revolutionary France and the rise
of home-grown radicalism heightened fears about vice and crime. This led to
a new wave of volunteer law enforcement but even patriotic enthusiasm
could not overcome the familiar problems of amateurism. These same
fears also helped professional law enforcement gain respectability, as evi-
denced by the establishment of the Police Offices and the Thames River
Police. The idea of centralization, however, was viewed as unnecessary, in
spite of Patrick Colquhoun's persistent advocacy.
Parish authorities generally shared the counter-revolutionary patriotism of
the time and most were more than willing to support King and Constitution
and deplore vice among the lower classes. The nightly task of street policing,
however, continued to challenge local night watch authorities. With poor
harvests and rising populations, they had to cope with rates of crime above
even those previously experienced in peacetime.^112 At the same time, war-
time inflation led to financial difficulties for many. Forced to pay higher
wages, parish vestries had to retrench on expenses or increase rates. The
financial strains meant the new enthusiasm for better policing could not be
translated into lasting improvements in many parishes and led to the defeat
of the 1812 Night Watch Bill. The differences in policing between rich and
poor neighbourhoods, and most obviously between the West and East End,
became more pronounced, a situation even more evident in the post-war
years.