Anna Manthorpe, Archivist, writes: When this journal came up at auction, we soon realised that it was part of a gap between 1861-1905 in a series of similar volumes from Uckfield Police Station (SPS/18). We were very pleased that a grant from the Friends of the National Libraries allowed us to purchase it.
The journal gives interesting information concerning policing in a small town at the end of the 19th century. The population in Uckfield in 1881 was 2,146, and ten years later had risen to 2,497. The book was completed by three successive sergeants, Thomas Willett, James Elphinstone, and Tom Huggett.
There is certainly a contrast between policing then and now. The men were apparently available at the Uckfield Police Station seven days a week. The times that they were on duty were logged into the book, with details concerning the place that they were visiting, to whom they reported, the distance away from the station, state of the weather, and public houses and beer shops visited, with the time they spent there, and for what purpose. Attendance at church service on a Sunday seems to have been obligatory – the reason for not attending is always given.
Uckfield Station seems to have covered an area with a radius of around nine miles, although occasionally it was necessary to venture further afield. The farthest distance was Grantham, Lincolnshire, which PS Willett visited on 18 February 1887 (in plain clothes) and apprehended George McKinley on warrant charged with maliciously wounding a horse which was the property of Sir Spencer Wilson, at Fletching on 29 January 1887. One wonders if this zealous pursuit of the law was connected to the fact that the Maryon Wilson family were local landowners of Searles in Fletching. Sir Spencer Maryon Wilson was made Sheriff of Sussex in 1889.
Many of the crimes reflect the rural nature of the area. In February 1887 PS Willett and a colleague spent three nights staking out a barn at Hunnington’s Farm in Little Horsted because the farmer believed that his oats were being stolen. Many of the reported thefts involved livestock, ranging from horses to hens, ferrets to fox terriers. There are references to poaching. On 27 November 1887 PS Elphinstone was on the trail (in private clothes) of men for night poaching and unlawfully wounding three gamekeepers at Buxted.
Relatively few arrests were made. Much of the time was spent in receiving information concerning stolen goods, serving warrants, and visiting other police stations. Only one murder and an attempted murder were mentioned, neither of which took place in Uckfield. There were many family cases, including bastardy and desertion. On 18 January 1887 PS Willett went to Oldlands Farm in East Hoathly to execute a distress warrant against William Snodgrass for bastardy arrears, and seized one waggon, the cart, and one clod crusher.
These days minor thefts are rarely followed up, but then it seemed that no incident was too trivial to report, including a handkerchief found at East Hoathly (March 1887), the theft of a pair of children’s socks at Rotherfield (October 1887), and a horse cloth lost in Buxted (March 1888). One imagines that the men were constantly reaching for their notebooks.
