SOON AFTER THE formation of Special Branch, it took on the responsibility for checking the bona fides of applicants for naturalisation. In those days enquiries would normally be confined to confirming the applicant’s place of employment and address, that he was of good character, establishing the reasons for the application and ensuring that the referees were suitable. A typical report for the Home Office would take up no more than one side of a sheet of foolscap but, in the days before technology ruled, this was a time-consuming and frustrating distraction from the task of catching Fenian bombers.
As time went on, the attraction of British citizenship flourished, despite the first faint signs of weakening in Britannia’s control over her hitherto ever-expanding Empire, to such an extent that in 1909 and again in 1914 the Commissioner cited naturalisation enquiries as a reason for seeking to increase the establishment of Special Branch.1
After the war, applications for British naturalisation continued to increase, with 686 cases being dealt with in the first six months of 1925. Enquiries were now more thorough than hitherto and, according to the Commissioner, entailed ‘an enormous amount of enquiry, which is done by officers in between performing such duties as lines of route, attending meetings and making special enquiries’;2 little changed in this respect during the next eighty years. The advent of World War Two saw an acceleration in the rate of applications to 140 a month but, thankfully for the hard-pressed officers of Special Branch, no fresh applications were accepted by the Home Office during the course of the war.
In 1884, in an attempt to plug the gaps through which the Fenians were importing explosives, Edward Jenkinson dispatched droves of police officers to ports all round the country, and on the Continent, to supplement the efforts of local customs officers. The initial draft of eighty-four included thirty officers from the Royal Irish Constabulary, withdrawn in 1886, and nine from the Metropolitan Police Special Irish Branch (whose places in the Branch were filled by less experienced officers); five of the original force were deployed to cities on the Continent (Antwerp, Rotterdam, Paris and Hamburg).3
Gradually, men from local forces took over from the ‘outsiders’ and by 1888 only about forty-five Met officers, including a mere handful from Section C, the new SIB ports section, comprised the ‘port police’ unit, with officers stationed at the following ports: Gravesend, Dover, Southampton, Harwich, Newhaven, Plymouth, Weymouth, Folkestone, Queensborough, Le Havre, Bremerhaven, Antwerp, Rotterdam, Amsterdam, Cherbourg, Copenhagen, Hamburg, Christiansand.4
As Special Branch grew, ports were increasingly staffed by Section C personnel; by the early 1900s the initial threat from the Fenians was considered to be over and the watch at ports had been relaxed to such an extent that in 1909 Superintendent Quinn reported to the Commissioner that there were nine vacancies in Section C which he was not proposing to fill for the time being.5
At the outbreak of World War One, thirty-four of the Special Branch establishment of 114 officers were employed at port; during the course of the conflict, however, frequent changes of personnel took place, according to the exigencies of the moment. For example, Folkestone rapidly became the chief British port for passenger services to and from the Continent and its pre-war establishment of a sergeant and a constable had been raised to one inspector, five sergeants and two constables.6
After the war was over, the Special Branch presence at ports became more settled and by 1925 remained virtually unchanged from the 1914 figure; of its establishment of thirty-five men, five were stationed on the Continent. Officers performed duty at the following ports: Newcastle, Hull, Grimsby, Harwich, Gravesend, Dover, Folkestone, Newhaven, Southampton, Port of London, Paris, Brussels and Rotterdam.
In that year the Commissioner outlined the work performed by SB officers at air and sea ports, which remained virtually unchanged until 2006:
Liaison with Home Office immigration officers – recording arrivals and departures of British and foreign criminals and revolutionaries – preventing the importation of revolutionary propaganda – pointing out suspected persons to the Customs for search – recording the arrival and addresses to which proceeding of criminal deportees – searching passenger lists and examining passports for the purpose of arresting individuals circulated as wanted for crime (many criminals have been arrested by port officers) – facilitating the arrival and departure of British and foreign royalties and notabilities.
The Commissioner, in describing the duties of those officers serving abroad, stated that they acted as liaison officers between the Metropolitan and foreign police forces, monitored the activities of revolutionaries, smugglers and ‘dope’ traffickers and made enquiries for ambassadors and consular officials.7
By 1934, holidays abroad had become so popular that extra men were required in the summer to perform what became known as ‘summer relief’. In 1934, for example, nine men were so employed but every year this number increased, which put an additional burden on those remaining at Scotland Yard. After the war, the Ports Unit assumed a not inconsiderable section of Special Branch, both in size and functions, with a commander in charge and its own training section.
1 Letter from Commissioner to Home Secretary, dated 7 December 1909. TNA MEPO 2/1297
2 Commissioner’s report to the Secret Service Committee in 1925. TNA CAB 127/366
3 Assorted correspondence on TNA HO 144/133/A34848B, subs. 1–12
4 Letter from the Commissioner to the Home Secretary, dated 20 November 1888. TNA HO 144/222/A49500M, sub. 3
5 Memorandum from Quinn to Commissioner, dated 7 July 1909. TNA MEPO 2/1297
6 Memo from Quinn to A.C.C., dated 5 January 1915, and letter from Home Office to Commissioner, dated 24 February 1915. TNA MEPO 2/1643
7 Report compiled for the Secret Service Committee by the Commissioner in 1925. TNA CAB 127/366.