X Samuel SMITHDear Betty,Thank you for your nicely worded request forinformation concerning Samuel you would besurprised how many enquires we get from people whonever say please or thank you, but first I have topoint out a few things. Sadly we do not have aphotograph, that is to say we may, there areliterally hundreds of photographs of officers, buttheir names were never recorded on the reverse ofthe photograph. Having said this I am of a mind tosay that the likely hood of Samuel appearing on agroup photograph at the Museum is probably fairlyhigh, but I will speak more a little later aboutthe Museum.The Cheshire Constabulary was formed in April1857; there are many thousands of records, theseare held by the Cheshire Record Office, Chester. Ias a retired Police officer and voluntary PoliceMuseum Researcher am slowly extracting theserecords. Cheshire Police Officer Enrolment Recordsare held under Reference CJP7 Volumes 1-5. Thesefive volumes are very large and in poor condition,run from 1857- 22 March 1913; I mention CheshireConstabulary here because Samuel's initiallyserved with Cheshire Constabulary and also thereason why we have his marriage record to Martha.The information you seek on his Cheshire serviceis recorded in CJP7 Volume 3. The informationregarding his marriage is retained in CJP24/2,1847-1966. His service with Warrington BoroughPolice is recorded under CJP20/12/ Volumes 1 and2.I say all this because I want to try and reassureyou that what I give you is as it appears in therespective volumes. However if you so wish, youcan of course have the records confirmed by theChester Records Office Archivist. But it would beremiss of me if I did not point out that TheRecord Office will charge you a minimum of £27 persearch per volume; therefore your total bill wouldbe £108, so please be aware. The Museum charges,for searching the four volumes are on a reducingscale i.e. dependant on the information recorded,the maximum amount payable is £10, whichrepresents good value. Your remittance is £10 andas we are working on a trust basis please forwardpayment via cheque made payable to the 'Museum ofPolicing in Cheshire' and send it to The Curator,Mr. Peter Wroe, Museum of Policing in Cheshire,Warrington Police Station, Arpley Street,Warrington, Cheshire. WA1. 1LQ. With regard to theMuseum it is normally open to the public via priorappointment with the Curator every Monday andFriday, however at this present moment buildingwork and the Christmas closure are underway, so ifyou make contact again in the New Year I am surePeter will be happy to show you around, it will beof particular interest to you with yourGrandfather having served at Warrington.If you also read the history of the CheshireConstabulary "To the Best of Our Skill andKnowledge" which is on the Museum Web Site, underthe drop down menu marked History, I feel certainthat a useful picture can be obtained of life inthe force at the time and there was littledifference between a Borough or County PoliceForce, my own opinion is that discipline wasdraconian and those who strayed outside the rule'swere fined way above what they earned ordismissed. Also the restrictions on their privatelife, an officer was not allowed to drink on oroff duty even in his own home.I trust you will enjoy what follows and can I askyou when you get a moment would you send a quickmail so I can mark of your enquiry as completed.If you have any further questions please don'thesitate to contact me. Jim Talbot. Trustee andResearcher, Cheshire Museum of Policing.CHESHIRE CONSTABULARY POLICE RECORDCollar Number/Rank. PC 292 Samuel SmithBorn. 1856 Middle Shropshire.Date of Entry. 4th January 1878Date of Leaving. 12th May 1882Final Date of Leaving. 12th May 1882How Discharged. Resigned stating he was to jointhe Liverpool Police Force. (He in fact did notjoin the police in Liverpool instead joined theWarrington Borough Police)Initial Posting. HQ Chester.Other Postings and Dates. March 1878 Wirral. June1878 Runcorn.Miscellaneous Information. Previous OccupationLabourer. Religion Protestant, Height 5' 8", Age22, Eyes Grey, Hair Light Brown, Complexion Fresh,Build Proportional. Scar on right arm. Certificateof Service with character marked "Good" sent tohim 15th May 1882.Address taken from the 1881 Census, The Cottage,Preston on the Hill, Daresbury, near. Runcorn.Promotion/Misconduct. No Misconduct reportsrecorded.Weekly Pay. January 1878 23/11d. June 1878 24/6d.December 1879 25/8d. February 1881 26/10d.Awards/Good Conduct/Other information. No GoodConduct reports recorded.Marriage RecordOfficer. Samuel SMITHOccupation. Police Constable.Age. 22 years.Condition. Bachelor.Place of residence at Marriage. Runcorn, Cheshire.Date of Marriage. 30th September 1878.Place Married. St. Paul's Wesleyan Chapel,Runcorn.Fathers Name. James SMITHFathers Occupation. Labourer, Salop.Spouse. Martha HIBBERTOccupation. Dressmaker.Age. 22 years.Condition. Spinster.Place of residence. Runcorn.Fathers Name. Richard HIBBERT.Fathers Occupation. Labourer, Flint.WARRINGTON BOROUGH POLICE RECORD.Collar Number/Rank. PC4. SGT 33 and InspectorSamuel SMITH (His collar number from 4 to 33 wouldhave been changed on his promotion to Sgt from PC)Born. 1856 Middle Shropshire.Date of Entry. 23rd November 1882Date of Leaving. 26th November 1908Final Date of Leaving. 26th November 1908How Discharged. To Pension.Initial Posting. Entirely within WarringtonBorough Police District.Miscellaneous Information. Trade or Calling.Labourer. Last employer, Cheshire Constabulary,service of 4 years 4 months. (This obviouslyconfirms we have the correct Samuel Smith from theabove record) Height 5' 9", Age on joining 26years. Hair Brown, Eyes Blue, Complexion Fresh,Distinguishing Marks, Nil. Marital Status,Married, Children Three. Member of any Party orSociety, Nil. Total Service on retirement 26 years3 days.1891 Census address 37 Greenall Street,Warrington. 1901 84 Wilderspool Causeway,Warrington.On joining Warrington Borough in November 1882 hegave his address as Caegwyrle, Flintshire (thehand written record is not that clear enough tosay 100% that this is the correct spelling).You will note that on his marriage record fromCheshire Constabulary his wife's father RichardHibbert is recorded as a Labourer residing inFlint, so presumably when he left CheshireConstabulary on the 12th May 1882, he and his wifemoved to Flintshire until the 23rd November 1882when he then joined the Warrington Borough Police.Promotion/Misconduct. 14th July 1884 reported byIns Berry for making use of insubordinate languageto the Chief Constable on parade at 9am when hethe Chief Constable was speaking generally to themen assembled and on calling Smiths attention tothe fact that a number of grown up youths wererunning on the banks of the river in an understate after bathing, he being on duty at the timeand passing within view of them and not taking anyaction to prevent such or reporting same. the CCremarking to him "If I thought you had seen themwithout taking any notice you should not go uponduty again" Smith replying "If you do not considerme worthy of carrying the clothes I can take themoff now" and stepped out of the parade. Suspendedfrom duty until 17th attended before the WCcautioned and reprimanded for the future andallowed to resume duty forthwith, the loss ofwages due to suspension was considered enoughpunishment.9th March 1887 reported by Ins Spinks for incitingPC's Williams and Caldwell to insubordinate onoccasion of their being fined by the ChiefConstable 2/6d each for parading late for duty at8.30am on Monday 7th for the annual inspection bythe Hon. C. G. Legge, Smith having asked them howthey had got on said "I would not pay it if I wasyou, you should go before the Watch Committee andtell them you had been on duty all night and theywould not fine you. Reprimanded and cautioned tohis future conduct by the Watch Committee.Weekly Pay/Promotion. Saturday 25th November 188225/-, 14th June 1883 26/-, 6th December 1883 27/-,22nd January 1885 28/-, 12th February 1891 29/-,7th January 1892 Promoted Sgt at 31/6d, 18thJanuary 1894 33/-, 17th June 1895 34/-, 9thJanuary 1896 35/-, 7th January 1897 36/-. 7thApril 1898 38/-, 12th October 1905 PromotedInspector at 40/-, 18th October 1906 42/-, 24thSeptember 1908 Inspector 1st class 46/-.Discharged on a weekly pension of 30/8d.Awards/Good Conduct/Other information. No GoodConduct reports recorded.Where the reference BSI appears in the MuseumDatabase this applies to a website known as theBlack Sheep Index (www.blacksheepindex.co.uk) thisis a site that carries newspaper articlesconcerning Police Officers. On occasions theofficer's full name is not given, but we havetried to make a match against what the MuseumRecords show. Samuel appears twice once in 1893when he appears to have been assaulted and in 1909a Biography and Photograph. There are chargesinvolved to obtain these newspaper cuttings directfrom the owner of the website. It is emphasizedthat the Museum does not know the contents ofthese cuttings and takes no responsibility forthem. The Museum is only showing this as an aidthat there is further information from anothersource. If you go ahead and purchase these cuttingplease mention this Museum, whilst you willreceive them any cheaper you may get them a littlequicker.