Keeping the peace on Vancouver Island : the colonial police and the Royal Navy, 1850-1866

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dc.contributor.authorThackray, William Swantonen_US
dc.date.accessioned2024-08-15T20:08:00Z
dc.date.available2024-08-15T20:08:00Z
dc.date.copyright1980en_US
dc.date.issued1980
dc.degree.departmentDepartment of History
dc.degree.levelMaster of Arts M.A.en
dc.description.abstractDuring most of the first decade of the existence of the Colony of Vancouver Island responsibility for keeping the peace rested primarily upon the Governor. Richard Blanshard was the first to hold that office and thus was the first representative of British common law; both he and his successor, James Douglas, were sometimes the only law offices in the colony. Blanshard appointed the first Justice of the Peace and began the practice of appointing special constables for specific, short-term duties. When Douglas assumed the office of Governor he was determined that Vancouver Island would remain British despite the threats of American expansion and a large, and possibly hostile, native population; everyone should be made to respect and obey British law. Douglas tended to be autocratic. He was a firm believer that civilization, as the British knew and practiced it, was immensely superior to the way of life of the indigenous Indian tribes. Therefore the safety of life as well as the economy of the colony depended upon British justice firmly and energetically dispensed by himself or the courts he established. With the help of the Royal Navy supporting the civil power, he was remarkably successful in controlling the native population. The power of the navy--seamen, marines and ships--whether in major expeditions or in later years in semi-regular coastal patrols, was applied first to impress the Indians with the necessity of obedience to British law through force provided by technical superiority and second, to instil a sense of safety and confidence in the minds of the white settlers. This power was physically applied almost exclusively against the Indians, occasionally with more vigour and enthusiasm than the various cautious Secretaries of State for the Colonies felt was strictly necessary. Nevertheless the use of the Royal Navy was always to be in accordance with the principle of the application of overwhelming superior force. The British Government, the navy, and Governors recognized that anything less was to court disaster. As Victoria grew in size, it became apparent that a police force was necessary for the maintenance of good order. A full-time constable was appointed in 1854. Four years later a regular police force was established under the experienced direction of Augustus F. Pemberton, who also assumed responsibility for the Victoria Gaol. The police were to function for years under the twin disabilities of insufficient pay and a transient establishment. Dedicated and hard­working senior police officers, supported by the courts, provided the real basis for law and order until long hours and low pay eventually caused these officers to succumb all too frequently to graft or bribery. The gaol, which was often overcrowded and badly run, was frequently under attack by the newspapers while the government of the day occasionally admitted to a sense of embarrassment over the matter. A regular policeman was stationed at Nanaimo during much of the 1860s while special constables were employed in other rural and remote areas. Unfortunately all of these police were dismissed, from time to time, due to a lack of sufficient funds to support them. Governor A. E. Kennedy, although an experienced colonial administrator, and despite the appointment of the reliable Philip J. Hankin as Superintendent of Police, soon found out that without an adequate budget policing the town was at best a haphazard undertaking. Under Hankin, the force was reduced at one time to a single constable with deleterious results to the principles of the protection of life and property. In due course the merger of Vancouver Island and British Columbia brought the police in Victoria technically into the ranks of the British Columbia Colonial Police. After Confederation they were, for a short time, Provincial Police. In 1873 the City of Victoria formally acquired control of the police within the city, leaving the Superintendent of Police as the only police representative of the senior government in Victoria. The Vancouver Island Colonial Police existed, through the British Columbia Provincial Police, by then the oldest such force in Canada, until 1953 when it was amalgamated with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.en_US
dc.format.extent244 pages
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/1828/19888
dc.rightsAvailable to the World Wide Weben_US
dc.titleKeeping the peace on Vancouver Island : the colonial police and the Royal Navy, 1850-1866en_US
dc.typeThesisen_US

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