Night Watch to Police, 1811-28 117watch committee established an early evening patrol as 'the best means of
preventing Street Robberies within these Parishes ... between the hours of
five and eight o'clock in the Evening'. The chairman of the watch committee
wrote to Lord Sidmouth six months later that 'Street Robberies in our Parish
are less frequent since we have had our additional Patrol .. .'.^72 In 1825, St
Giles and Bloomsbury established a day patrol of ten street beadles and one
superintendent, especially charged to keep the beggars and vagrants off the
streets.
John Rawlinson, police magistrate and Bloomsbury vestryman, was so
impressed that he sent a copy of the day patrol regulations to Robert Peel.
Rawlinson credited the patrol to his fellow vestrymen, 'gentlemen who have
bestowed much time & labour in bringing it to maturity'. Rawlinson worked
at the Marylebone Police Office and wrote to the St Marylebone vestry in
March 1825, suggesting they too might want to set up a day patrol. The
vestry thanked Rawlinson but told him that St Marylebone's local acts did
not authorize the parish to do this.^73 This did not deter the vestry, however,
the following December when it decided to employ six street keepers to
patrol the streets during daylight hours. Very well-paid (30s. a week), these
officers were chosen from the 'sergeants and watchmen of the best character
whose age shall not exceed 40 years'. The vestry ordered them to wear plain-
clothes and carry 'a badge ... to be exposed or concealed as circumstances
may require'.^74
This custom of sharing information shows increased evidence of the
interest and involvement of the Home Office and police magistrates in
parochial policing in the 1820s. Rawlinson sent his suggestions to St Mary-
lebone unsolicited but other parishes actively sought out information and
assistance on how to improve their policing. The residents of St Mary,
Islington, had been making noticeably more complaints to the watch com-
mittee about the negligence and ineffectiveness of the watchmen. In 1826 the
vestry appointed a committee to study the problem and suggest reforms
which examined how other parishes conducted their watch systems. It
asked the parishes of StJames, Clerkenwell, and St Marylebone for copies
of their regulations. The committee recommended the total overhaul of the
watch, and in particular, establishment of shifts. The committee reasoned
even if watchmen were well-paid, they would still have daytime jobs which
would impair their effectiveness at night. But if they were on duty six hours
instead of eight or ten, 'there will be ample opportunity for them to do their
daily labour and to perform the Night duty with satisfaction to the Parish'?^5
In his Treatise on the Police and Crimes of the Metropolis in 1829, John Wade
called Islington's reform 'the most judicious system'?^6
Even the vestry of St Luke, Old Street, one of the leaders of the opposition
to the 1812 Night Watch Bill, adopted shifts of watchmen in 1828. St Luke
borders on Islington; it is not unreasonable to assume that the watch trustees