Common name Horney Dicks Formed 1848 | Abbreviation LBP Dissolved 1870 | |
Preceding agency Londonderry Corporation Policing Committee Superseding agency Royal Irish Constabulary | ||
The Londonderry Borough Police was a police force in the city of Londonderry, County Londonderry, Ireland from 1848 to 1870. The force were nicknamed the Horney Dicks after the bones used in their helmets. They replaced the earlier town watch and were in turn replaced by the Royal Irish Constabulary. The police force was established by the Londonderry Improvement Act 1848. Its abolition was recommended by a commission of inquiry into sectarian riots in the city in 1869. The commission felt the force, having the form of a town watch, was inadequate to policing serious crime; it also noted, but did not endorse, allegations that the police discriminated against Roman Catholics.
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History
Historically, policing in Ireland had been carried out by a town watch. By the 1830s in County Londonderry, the watch was posted so irregularly that citizens resorted to manning the watch themselves or hiring their own night watchmen. In 1832, the Londonderry Corporation created a Policing Committee made up of thirteen constables to police the city of Londonderry but this was later deemed inadequate. In 1848 a private bill titled the "Londonderry Improvement Act 1848" passed through the Parliament of the United Kingdom granting the Londonderry Corporation the powers to raise their own police force. Gradually policing in Ireland was centralised under the Royal Irish Constabulary except for Londonderry Borough Police, Belfast Borough Police and Dublin Metropolitan Police who retained their independence owing to each being statutory police forces.
Disbanding
On 28 April 1869, Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught and Strathearn visited County Londonderry, where a Catholic reportedly waved a flag bearing a harp with no crown and shouting for an "Irish Republic" at him. Members of the Protestant Apprentice Boys of Derry were angered by this as they felt it was a deliberate insult towards the Monarchy. This led to a sectarian riot between the two factions that evening where three Apprentice Boys were shot dead by the Londonderry Borough Police. A Commission of Inquiry was set up to examine the riots. During the hearings, the Commission ruled that the Londonderry Borough Police were inadequate to police the city. This was cited owing to only 38 officers working for them and distrust from working-class Catholics who felt they were a partisan police force owing to the majority of constables being Protestant. The inquiry made the recommendation to "substitute it for a more efficient force".
In 1870, the Constabulary (Ireland) Amendement Act 1870 was passed which abolished the Londonderry Borough Police and passed the responsibility of policing in the borough to the Royal Irish Constabulary. The area previously policed by the Londonderry Borough Police would become a separate police district of the Royal Irish Constabulary and provided that there would be 45 police constables in addition to the 38 from the Londonderry Borough Police. Following the passage of the act, the Londonderry Corporation lost its power to appoint constables but was still responsible for paying for the former Londonderry Borough Police officers' pensions. The Corporation requested that the Royal Irish Constabulary honour the service of the former Londonderry Borough Police constables who were transferred but this was refused with the Royal Irish Constabulary stating they were going to hire 50% Protestant and 50% Catholic for the district. In response, the Londonderry Corporation refused to help fund a female searcher or hand over the former police force's records, citing the 1870 act stating they were not obliged “to make any payments for Constabulary purposes other than the moiety of the Constables pay to be charged as mentioned in the statute.”