ABSTRACT
With the coming of war, the police service was put to its greatest test. The war drew men and women away from their accustomed tasks and responsibilities, broke up families and started an unsettling flow of population around the country because of war work, evacuation, homelessless, the internment of aliens and conscription into the armed forces. The police were expected to deal with many of the social consequences of these events, although no major institutional alteration was envisaged. None of the measures considered prior to the war involved any radical reorganization by way of nationalization or regionalization of the police. It was assumed that the British police forces would retain their individual identity and remain under local control.1 But while the structure remained largely unaltered, it was clear that police duties and personnel would be radically affected. There was going to be strong competition from the armed forces and industry for police manpower, while the exigencies of war would inevitably place new protective and organizational tasks on the police. Fairly detailed plans and estimates to meet these requirements had been worked out in the years preceding the outbreak of war by a Home Office committee of selected chief constables and the Air Raid Precautions department of the Home Office, which helped to prepare the Police War Instructions. These instructions were issued in August 1939, and formed the basis of the standing instructions throughout the war. Their main focus was on the formation of police reserves; on measures of internal security such as the control of aliens and the prevention of sabotage; and on duties in connection with air raids and their effect on the civilian population. Target figures on the recruitment of temporary constables were set out, as well as the sources from which these might be met. For internal security, measures concerning aliens and subversive organizations were largely based on an extension and development of pre-war practices, since aliens were already controlled under the various Aliens Restrictions Acts which would simply need strengthening through Orders in Council. Similarly, the pre-war activities of the IRA had resulted in the Prevention of Violence (Temporary Provisions) Act (1939) which gave die police special powers, diat were dien
extended under the Defence Regulations.2 These regulations (even after amendment due to opposition pressure) enormously increased the powers of the police, so that they were now able to arrest without a warrant anyone suspected of breaching the defence regulations, and were given extended rights of search and entry. As far as enemy attack was concerned, the most difficult to forecast were estimates about the scale of requirements for dealing with the civilian population in the event of air raids. It was thought that this latter task would reach mammoth proportions, on the assumption of a general collapse of morale following enemy air attacks - to the extent that the Metropolitan Commissioner envisaged the need for 17,000 regular troops and 20,000 extra police to control the expected exodus from London and prevent panic.3
