On line newspapers

[Terri]

If anyone has access to any online newspaper sites, could you please see if the Penny Illustrated Paper is there, dated 1st October 1910?

I am desperate to get a look at a copy!

Thank you x

[kiterunner]

You can search the British Newspaper Archive for free, Terri; you only have to pay if you want to view something, and there is usually a very cheap 1 month sub offer available if you hunt around. But they only have 1861-1870 for that paper so far. FMP will be the same.

Strangely enough, that edition of the paper is available on "19th century British Newspapers" although it is 20th century! I didn't realise they had a load of 20th century papers on there (and I thought everything on there was also in the British Newspaper Archive) but I got there some long-winded way from the British Library website. But the 19th Century British Newspapers site is a Gale one where you usually need your library to subscribe.

Is it a particular article on that date that you are looking for?

[Terri]

Thanks Kite.

(Ex-detective sergeant) Great uncle William Henry Harris apparently wrote an article in that particular publication titled "police and perjury" where he accused his ex-bosses of accepting bribes, malpractice etc. etc.

Needless to say, I'm just dying to see this article! lol

[kiterunner]

I can't see an easy way of downloading the image but it is very interesting so I am typing it up. This is the first half:

POLICE AND PERJURY
The Inner Working of the Police Force from a Detective's Point of View,
by ex-First Class Detective-Sergeant William Henry Harris.

Some eight years ago I threw up the police service in utter disgust and despair, for I had long known that I could not conscientiously live in it.
I had served fourteen years in all, part of that time in uniform and the remainder in the CID. For ten years I was a sergeant, a considerable portion of which period was spent at Scotland Yard. Previous to that I had been British Chief Constable at Alexandria, Egypt, and had some experience in collecting evidence and dealing with serious crime in a cosmopolitan city.
I was, therefore, not of that raw material of which the police recruit is usually made, but had every hope and wish to become a decent officer.
A few years' Army experience, during which I had seen several campaigns and had been in close touch with brilliant military officers, also added to my knowledge of what was required of me.

EVIDENCE SUPPRESSED BY POLICE
Ex-Inspector Syme has exposed mostly what the Police Commissioner already knows, and he writes as a trained policeman. If the higher ranks deal with the lower in the manner he describes, how much must the public, who contribute so heavily to keep up the Force, suffer at the hands of the unscrupulous officer of the upper class!
In order to expose the whole wicked system so clumsily administered I collected the whole of the evidence placed by Lord Russell before the first Royal Commission on the Police, the arrangements of which inquiry were purposely engineered so as to prevent me exposing what I now propose to do; for I shall never rest until the whole story becomes public property.
I should have rested content to earn a quiet, peaceful living after throwing many years' Government service away. But I was driven to the course I have taken by more than one effort on the part of the Police to get me into custody, perhaps to penal servitude - where many another innocent man has gone - in order to shut my mouth for ever.
I can detail five distinct attempts, and give the names or numbers of the subordinate officers directly concerned in these attempts, which continued until November of last year, and would probably be continuing now were it not that my employment keeps me out of reach of the villainy of the unscrupulous.

POLICE VENGEANCE THAT FOLLOWS INTO PRIVATE LIFE
My most serious revolt against the powers that be was when I refused to sign a statement of evidence which was a tissue of lies. What manner of man the individual who handed it to me thought I was made me laugh bitterly at the moment, but I did not foresee that the retaliation for my act would follow me out of the service.
I knew I had done with it, and that my being "outed" - to use a police term - was only a matter of time. I was quite content to put up with that, being glad to have relief from constant touch with unscrupulous rascality.
To tell my story in its entirety would entail too long a space at present. What I now write I have already written to the Police Commissioner, subsequent to my abortive attempt to get before the Royal Commission. Had I become a witness I would have rendered their work less farcical than it proved to be, and have shown up the methods taken by the higher ranks of the service to prevent the real truth coming out in any shape or form.
The facts of my direct and open rebellion against perjury are as follows:-

TAKING EVIDENCE TO PLEASE AN OFFICIAL
A certain Treasury official, prominent in the Adolf Beck case, has a mania for prosecuting coiners. To pander to this, it has been usual to put a chief inspector from the Yard in close touch with Divisional CID men who were supposed to be expert in such cases. The experience is gained in this manner.
A sergeant was brought in to the Yard from the "L" Division, and in a short time coiner after coiner was arrested, and the game went merrily on. What puzzled me and other older officers was the fact that the sergeant and his assistant appeared to do no work.
Their daily task, so far as could be seen, was a couple of hours' work in consultation(?) at the Yard, a stroll along Whitehall, the Strand, and Fleet Street, and over Blackfriars Bridge to home and rest. And this was arrived at by noon-day. They may have worked during the night. Officer after officer, generally the raw detective-constables from the Yard, were called upon to aid in the arrest of marked-down coiners, who were always ex-convicts, and give evidence against them at police-court and sessions. Having exhausted the patience of these long-suffering ones, the expert in coining finally turned to me for assistance.

[kiterunner]

Second half:

THE EX-CONVICT AND THE FALSE MONEY
I must here say that I had been several times brought into contact with an informant in these matters, an ex-convict whom I knew as "Darky". In one marked instance, when I was doing reserve duty - interviewing all callers at the Yard - he was shown in to me and produced five base crown-pieces, remarking that they were of very good make. I directed him to call again when those whom he was dealing with were present to meet him. He made me feel creepy.
I expressed my willingness to accompany the sergeant and his assistant, and with two other officers also assisting, we took up observation at King's Cross about eleven o'clock one dreary morning.
Soon afterwards "Darky" turned up in the distance, accompanied by two poor, insignificant-looking old men, whom I knew at a glance were ex-convicts - their dazed, senseless look and inert bearing required no interpretation.
The expert and his assistant darted across the road and I followed. Each seized one of the old fellows. I grasped "Darky" who was immediately pulled out of my hands by the expert, and bolted. I apologised for my mistake (sic), and saw the two prisoners searched.
They were escorted to an adjacent police-station and detained. One was told by the expert that he had been watched from his address, which was known, and he admitted living there. "But," he added, "you have not got the right man now. 'Darky' made all the things, and brought them there; this is the first day I have been out with coins on me."
We left to search the house at the address given, and neither of the officers concerned knew where to look for it. I had to enquire for it from the inspector on duty at the station. It was not far away.
The expert simply walked in, opened a cupboard, picked up a handbag containing many coins, moulds, etc, remarking, "'Darky' did not bring these till Wednesday night," and the search wa s over.
The whole thing was a plant.

A STATEMENT I WOULD NOT SIGN
Returning to the Yard, I felt utterly disgusted at having allowed myself to be mixed up in such a case. However, the expert had apparently not noticed my want of sympathy, for he eventually produced a statement of the evidence expected from me, assuring me, with oiliness - for he reeked with oil inside and out - that I was sure of a reward.
On reading the statement I found it to be a tissue of lies from beginning to end. I put it aside, and drew up another statement, setting forth that I had been present at the arrest, saw the coins taken from the men, and, later, visited the address and saw the coins and moulds taken from a cupboard.
I handed this to the expert.
"Oh, this won't do," he said.
"I do not commit perjury," I replied; "those are the facts, and this is my evidence."
"I shall have to see Mr.__" (mentioning the Chief Inspector in charge of the coining cases) "and tell him," he said.
He did so, and soon afterwards told me, to my great relief, that I was not required to give evidence.
The prisoners, with others who went through the same process, were returned to penal servitude at the ensuing sessions.
It is not only ex-Inspector Syme's story that has brought the foregoing so vividly in my memory, but the fact that a few days ago I read casually in a newspaper of a man being arrested for having counterfeit crown-pieces in his possession.

THE DARK MAN IN THE CASE
Now, the crown-pieces which I have mentioned as being in the hands of "Darky" were, some days after the above occurrence, used to convict a man at the same sessions of having these very coins in his possession.
The story is too wicked to relate here; but it is a significant fact that the individual apprehended a few days ago is stated to have said, when taken into custody, "You did not arrest the dark man who was sitting near me. He had more coins on him than I had," or words to that effect.
Of the coining cases I have written to the Commissioner, but not of the many attempts on my liberty, for I well know that he is surrounded by an impenetrable wall of lies, through which the unfiltered truth fails to reach him.
W. H. HARRIS.

[Terri]

OMG!!!! I didn't realise you had access to it Kite!!!

And you've gone to all the trouble of typing it up for me. THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!
(I'm actually crying here). This means so much to me - now I live in Cornwall, I'm a very very long way from the British Library and the local library is in a glorified shed so I wasn't holding out much hope of help there.

LOVE YOU KITE!!!! MWAH MWAH