Northside author’s new book recalls Dublin’s old city watch

NORTHSIDE author Barry Kennerk’s new book, ‘The Peeler’s Notebook – Policing Victorian Dublin: Mad Dogs, Duels and Dynamite’, is a collection of stories about the city’s sometimes troubled past.

‘A flickering lantern casts an arc of yellow light, illuminating the warped glass panes and fanlights of houses that have seen better days. It falls onto the care-worn face of an old city watchman, dressed in a great-coat and three-cornered hat. Past quaint gable-fronted Dutch Billy houses, long past their prime, he cries out the weather and the hour. ‘Past eleven and a calm night’! 

The Dublin Metropolitan Police (also known as the DMP) was formed in 1836. It was the brainchild of Chief Secretary, Sir Robert Peel, thus giving rise to ‘Peeler’ and ‘Bobby’. The force replaced the old, and very inefficient, city watch, whose members had the mammoth task of patrolling miles of lanes and alleys.  The watchmen were dressed in long frieze coats and low-crowned hats and they were armed with pikestaffs and wooden rattles which they used to summon help in times of danger.

By the end of the 18th century, there were about 300 watchmen in Dublin but it was impossible for them to adequately patrol vast parts of the old city with its miles of streets, lanes, alleys, courts and yards.

In December 1775, a watchman was warned by two duelists not to ‘stir’ from his box on pain of ‘instant death’ if he interfered. Thus, for the most part, the watchmen spent quite a lot of time in them smoking pipes and sleeping. They were given an allowance of coal so that they could fuel their braziers during cold winter nights and inevitably, many of them were afflicted with rheumatism or chest complaints.  

Students from Trinity College used to creep up and attempt to steal their rattles or pike staffs which they then displayed in their dorm rooms; not dissimilar to today’s student trophies such as traffic cones and road signs.  The biggest prize of all was to find a ‘Charley’ sleeping on duty and tumble his box over, face first of course, so that when he suddenly woke, he found that he couldn’t get out.  

The DMP replaced the old city watch in 1836 and with it, a large slice of Dublin’s ancient past disappeared forever. The city was entering a new era of Georgian splendour, characterised by wide thoroughfares such as Dame Street, Sackville Street and Parliament Street on which experienced members of the constabulary might give directions to a tall-hatted gentleman or lady in crinoline. 

Meanwhile, the young recruits or ‘Johnny Raws’ were left to patrol the forgotten back streets of the old city where danger still lurked; a lost medieval maze peopled by blind balladeers, rabies victims, street gangs and garrotters.

• The Peeler’s Notebook – Policing Victorian Dublin: Mad Dogs, Duels and Dynamite’ is published by Mercier Press and is available in all good bookshops at €14.95.