History of the Metropolitan Police

Genealogy

The Metropolitan Police was established by Act of Parliament in 1829 by Sir Robert Peel who appointed 2 Commissioners and an establishment of 895 Constables, 88 Sergeants, 20 Inspectors and 8 Superintendents. The numbers increased as the force grew to include the Greater London area (excluding the City of London) parts of the Home Counties, and all the Royal Naval Dock Yards throughout the country. The first officer was given the warrant number ‘1’ and today the service is reaching near to a quarter million. The warrant number is unique to the officer and is different from the shoulder number which changes as the officer moves stations.

Many records from the past have been retained by the Metropolitan Police and most ex officers can be traced. Assisted by The Friends of the ‘met collection’ the MPS has invested resources to make these records searchable and available to the public.

Staff at the ‘met collection’, will search and provide service information for ex-officers and produce either a copy of the Central Record of Service, or other details including date of birth, joining date, rank, leaving date, warrant number, shoulder number, division where they served and pension number. This is useful if you want to search records at the National Archives at Kew who hold pension ledgers. Sometimes more information is available including, previous occupations, town they came from and address they lived at.

No information is given on living individuals and certain documents are protected by a hundred year rule. The following records are kept.

• Central Record of Service sheets from 1930’s to 1980’s
• Names Database 540 000 entries from 1829
• Pension Cards 1930’s to 1960’s
• Joiners and Leavers Records 1829 to 1920’s
• Divisional Ledgers for certain periods between 1880 and 1920 for the following Divisions A, B, E, F, G, H, K, L, M, N, R & Y.
• Census Databases - 130 000 records of address and family information of people with a police connection.

Limited enquiries are made to try and establish a match with the information provided. Except for personal callers a fee of £15 is charged for searches and information provided. Enquiries should be e-mailed to historicstore@met.police.uk . Please provide any information you have about the individual and a day time telephone number as you will be contacted and asked to provide credit/debit card information. The information will then be sent to you by sent by e-mail.