Metropolitan Police Museum

Last updated

Metropolitan Police Heritage Centre
Former Metropolitan Police Heritage Centre (geograph 915665).jpg
The Centre's 2009-2020 home in the annexe to Empress State Building.
Greater London UK location map 2.svg
Red pog.svg
Location within Greater London
Established1949
Location Sidcup, London Borough of Bexley, England, United Kingdom
Coordinates 51°26′01″N0°06′07″E / 51.4336°N 0.1019°E / 51.4336; 0.1019
Public transit access Sidcup railway station, 51, 160, 229, 233, 269, 286, 492 and 625 bus routes
Website https://www.met.police.uk/museums

The Metropolitan Police Museum is the museum, library and archive of the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS), conserving and curating documents, books, objects and uniforms relating to the organisation's history. [1] [2] [lower-alpha 1] Over the course of its existence it has also been known as the Police Museum, Bow Street Museum, the Metropolitan Police Historical Collection and from 2009 to 2022 as the Metropolitan Police Heritage Centre. It and the Crime Museum are both run by a team within Centrally Delivered Support Services, itself part of MO11. [1] [5] It also assists with the care of the Metropolitan Police Historic Vehicle Collection, since 2023 at the same site.

Contents

History

The first appeal for objects was put out by Chief Superintendent Arthur Rowlerson of E Division in 1949 to mark the bicentenary of the Metropolitan Police's forerunners the Bow Street Runners. [6] The resulting collection was housed at Bow Street Police Station, but a curator was not appointed until 1967, the year which also saw the foundation of both a Historical Society and a Museums Advisory Board (initially solely covering the Police Museum, but later with a remit extended to the Crime Museum and other collections within the Met such as that of the Thames River Police at Wapping). [7] The first curator Audrey Sams was an existing member of the Met's civil staff at Bow Street who had previously been a police officer. [7] She organised loans to an exhibition at the Museum of London in 1979 to mark the Met's 150th anniversary and instigated research into a potential new site at an empty Met building in Wapping. [7] [8]

In September 1981 Sams was succeeded as curator by Marcelle Marceau. [9] [8] Later that year the exhibition space at Bow Street closed and the collections store moved to a former Met clothing store on the third floor of a former piano factory (now known as Piano House) on Brighton Terrace in Brixton, moving to another store in Charlton in 1993. [8] No new display space was found until July 2009, when a new gallery space and research room opened in an annexe to Empress State Building, an MPS office building in west London, headed by curator Maggie Bird and renamed the Metropolitan Police Heritage Centre. [6] [10] With the planned change of use of Empress State Building to a counter-terrorism hub, [11] the gallery space at West Brompton closed in early 2020. The collection then moved to Marlowe House in Sidcup, where a new research room opened in October 2022 and a new gallery in spring 2023. [1]

Notes

  1. Most of the Metropolitan Police's centrally-produced official records from 1829 to 2012 are instead at The National Archives under the reference MEPO, [3] with some also filed under HO - this is because until the creation of MOPAC in 2012 the Metropolitan Police fell under the Home Office and therefore its records were included in the Public Records Act 1958. [4]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Metropolitan Museum of Art</span> Art museum in New York City

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the fourth-largest museum in the world and the largest art museum in the Americas. With 5.36 million visitors in 2023, it is the most-visited museum in the United States and the fifth-most visited art museum in the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Art museum</span> Building or space for the exhibition of art

An art museum or art gallery is a building or space for the display of art, usually from the museum's own collection. It might be in public or private ownership, be accessible to all, or have restrictions in place. Although primarily concerned with visual art, art museums are often used as a venue for other cultural exchanges and artistic activities, such as lectures, jewelry, performance arts, music concerts, or poetry readings. Art museums also frequently host themed temporary exhibitions, which often include items on loan from other collections.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brixton</span> District in the London Borough of Lambeth in south London

Brixton is an area of South London, part of the London Borough of Lambeth, England. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London. Brixton experienced a rapid rise in population during the 19th century as communications with central London improved.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">London Borough of Lambeth</span> London borough in the United Kingdom

Lambeth is a London borough in South London, England, which forms part of Inner London. Its name was recorded in 1062 as Lambehitha and in 1255 as Lambeth. The geographical centre of London is at Frazier Street near Lambeth North tube station, though nearby Charing Cross on the other side of the Thames in the City of Westminster is traditionally considered the centre of London.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">London Borough of Tower Hamlets</span> Borough in east London, England

The London Borough of Tower Hamlets is a borough in London, England. Situated on the north bank of the River Thames and immediately east of the City of London, the borough spans much of the traditional East End of London and includes much of the regenerated London Docklands area. The 2019 mid-year population for the borough is estimated at 324,745.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brixton Market</span> Street market in south London

Brixton Market comprises a street market in the centre of Brixton, south London, and the adjacent covered market areas in nearby arcades Reliance Arcade, Market Row and Granville Arcade.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">State Library Victoria</span> State library in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

State Library Victoria (SLV) is the state library of Victoria, Australia. Located in Melbourne, it was established in 1854 as the Melbourne Public Library, making it Australia's oldest public library and one of the first free libraries in the world. It is also Australia's busiest public library and, as of 2023, the third busiest library globally.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Winnipeg Art Gallery</span> Public art museum in Winnipeg, Manitoba

The Winnipeg Art Gallery (WAG) is an art museum in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Its permanent collection includes over 24,000 works from Canadian, Indigenous Canadian, and international artists. The museum also holds the world's largest collection of Inuit art. In addition to exhibits for its collection, the museum has organized and hosted a number of travelling arts exhibitions. Its building complex consists of a main building that includes 11,000 square metres (120,000 sq ft) of indoor space and the adjacent 3,700-square-metre (40,000 sq ft) Qaumajuq building.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bristol Museum & Art Gallery</span> Museum in Bristol, UK

Bristol Museum & Art Gallery is a large museum and art gallery in Bristol, England. The museum is situated in Clifton, about 0.5 miles (0.8 km) from the city centre. As part of Bristol Culture it is run by the Bristol City Council with no entrance fee. It holds designated museum status, granted by the national government to protect outstanding museums. The designated collections include: geology, Eastern art, and Bristol's history, including English delftware. In January 2012 it became one of sixteen Arts Council England Major Partner Museums.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Museum of the Home</span> Museum in London, England

The Museum of the Home, formerly the Geffrye Museum, is a free museum in the 18th-century Grade I-listed former almshouses on Kingsland Road in Hoxton, London. The museum's change of name was announced in 2019. The museum explores home and home life from 1600 to the present day with galleries which ask questions about 'home', present diverse lived experiences, and examine the psychological and emotional relationships people have with the idea of "home" alongside a series of period room displays.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marine Policing Unit</span> Policing Unit of London

The Marine Policing Unit (MPU) is the waterborne policing unit of London's Metropolitan Police Service, forming part of the Met Taskforce (MO7) within Met Operations. Its 22 vessels are responsible for waterborne policing of the River Thames in Greater London and supporting the rest of the Metropolitan Police and to the City of London Police when dealing with incidents in or around any waterway in London. A specialist underwater and confined-spaces search team carries out searches throughout the Metropolitan Police District. The unit also has 24 officers who are trained in rope access techniques and trained to carry out searches and counter-demonstrator operations at height.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Women's Library</span> Library and museum resource on women and the womens movement

The Women's Library is England's main library and museum resource on women and the women's movement, concentrating on Britain in the 19th and 20th centuries. It has an institutional history as a coherent collection dating back to the mid-1920s, although its "core" collection dates from a library established by Ruth Cavendish Bentinck in 1909. Since 2013, the library has been in the custody of the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), which manages the collection as part of the British Library of Political and Economic Science in a dedicated area known as the Women's Library.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Doon Heritage Village</span> History and living history museum in Ontario, Canada

Doon Heritage Village, located at the Ken Seiling Waterloo Region Museum, is a picturesque 60 acre living history village that shows visitors what life was like in the Waterloo Region in the year 1914. It is located in the former Doon village, now part of Kitchener, Ontario, Canada, next to Homer Watson Park.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery</span> Art and history museum in Hobart, Australia

The Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery (TMAG) is a museum located in Hobart, Tasmania. The museum was established in 1846, by the Royal Society of Tasmania, the oldest Royal Society outside England. The TMAG receives 400,000 visitors annually.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alison Wilding</span> English artist

Alison Mary Wilding OBE, RA is an English artist noted for her multimedia abstract sculptures. Wilding's work has been displayed in galleries internationally.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Black Cultural Archives</span> Archive and heritage centre in London

Black Cultural Archives (BCA) is an archive and heritage centre in Brixton, London, devoted to the histories of people of African and Caribbean descent in Britain. Also known as BCA, it was founded in 1981, by educationalist and historian Len Garrison and others. BCA's mission is to record, preserve and celebrate the history of people of African descent in Britain. The BCA's new building in Brixton, opened in 2014, enables access to the archive collection, provides dedicated learning spaces and mounts a programme of exhibitions and events.

Ajamu X is a British artist, curator, archivist and activist. He is best known for his fine art photography which explores same-sex desire, and the Black male body, and his work as an archivist and activist to document the lives and experiences of black LGBTQ people in the United Kingdom (UK).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Justice and Police Museum</span> Living history museum in New South Wales, Australia

The Justice and Police Museum is a heritage-listed former water police station, offices and courthouse and now justice and police museum located at 4-8 Phillip Street on the corner of Albert Street, in the Sydney central business district in the City of Sydney local government area of New South Wales, Australia. It was designed by Edmund Blacket, Alexander Dawson and James Barnet and built from 1854 to 1886. It is also known as Police Station & Law Courts (former) and Traffic Court. The property is owned by the Department of Justice, a department of the Government of New South Wales. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 2 April 1999.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Dixon Butler</span> English architect (1873–1958)

John Dixon Butler was a British architect and surveyor who had a long, professional association with London's Metropolitan Police. During his 25-year career with the police, he completed the designs and alterations to around 200 police buildings, including ten courts; as of 2022, about 58 of his buildings survive. Historic England describes him as "one of the most accomplished Metropolitan Police architects" and have included around 25 of his buildings on the National Historic List of England and Wales.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bow Street Police Museum</span> Museum in central London

The Bow Street Police Museum, opened in 2021, is based in the former police station in Covent Garden, London. Bow Street has a unique place in the history of policing in London, with the museum presenting the story of policing and criminal justice in the area from the eighteenth century until 1992, when the police station closed.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Official website". Metropolitan Police Service. Retrieved 18 January 2022.
  2. "Friends of the Metropolitan Police Historical Collection - Heritage Centre".
  3. "Records of the Metropolitan Police Office (1803-2012)". The National Archives. Retrieved 18 November 2020.
  4. "How to Search for Metropolitan Police Records". The National Archives. Retrieved 18 November 2020.
  5. "Police Careers - Heritage Centre Assistant".
  6. 1 2 "Londoners get first look at police museum". Evening Standard. 22 June 2009. Retrieved 17 July 2020.
  7. 1 2 3 Paul Williams, 'A Room in Bow Street - The Story of the Metropolitan Police Historical Museum', The Peeler (Friends of the Metropolitan Police Heritage Centre), February 1997, pages 5-7
  8. 1 2 3 Paul Williams, 'A Room in Brixton - The Continuing Story of the Museum - Part 2: "A New Broom"', The Peeler (Friends of the Metropolitan Police Heritage Centre), March 1998, pages 28-30
  9. Paul Williams, 'The Force Museums', Metropolitan Police Historical Society Magazine, 1980-1981, pages 7-8
  10. Campbell, Duncan (22 June 2009). "New museum looks back at 200 years of policing in London". The Guardian . Retrieved 23 September 2021.
  11. "First phase of new state-of-the-art counter terror centre opens in London". ITV. 29 June 2021. Retrieved 24 July 2021.