Milicent

“ Let it be here explained for the benefit of the lay reader that when an officer is accused of a crime, or even of a misdemeanor, he is placed in arrest, which means that he is suspended for the time being from the exercise of command, must not wear a sword, and must confine himself to certain limits—to his tent or quarters if in close arrest, as for one week the officer generally is, and to the limits of the parade or garrison if allowed out for exercise. ”

“ You will be shadowed by the police until you quarrel with them—like a free American—and you are conducted to the frontier. Perhaps you will strike an officer who has insulted you, and then you are finished on the spot. ”

“ Many of the police are unmarried men, living in barracks as much as soldiers, and are no more fit to be invested with absolute control of the streets, which, after all, are the drawing-room of the poor, than are the Guards. ”

“ A dozen police agents were underfoot somewhere, being pitilessly stamped and trampled by the frantic mob. The platoon that had charged was wiped out as a platoon. Those who were hemmed in fought like demons. Men [236] throttled each other and swayed back and forth and yelled imprecations and fell in struggling masses and got upon their feet again and twisted and squirmed and panted, like so many monsters, half serpent and half beast, seeking to bury their fangs in some vital part or tear each other limb from limb. ”

“ In the thousands upon thousands of square miles in which these dauntless military police have to enforce law and order, the inhabitants know that never yet has the arm of justice not proved long enough to bring an offender to book. ”

“ Shall we substitute for an institution so noble, so admirable, a changeable police, whose numbers can be extended or curtailed at pleasure? Or, shall we have a legion of agents, who will be discharged the moment they are thought past service? It is generally known that the police of safety is recruited even at the present time from the prisons and Bagnes, which are a sort of preparatory school for spies on robbers, and the nursery whence they must be drawn. ”

“ Each felon draws a whistling breath, "Time's up with Colt! he's done The sheriff looks his watch again, Then puts it in his fob, And turns him to the hangman,— "Get ready for the job." The jailer knocketh loudly, The turnkey draws the bolt, And pleasantly the sheriff says, "We're waiting, Mister Colt!" No answer! no! no answer! All's still as death within; The sheriff eyes the jailer, The jailer strokes his chin. ”

“ Ay, ay, and they were happy days, wench, when the captain was a lean poor humble thing, and the soldier tame, and durst not come within the city for fear of a constable and a whipping-post. They know the penal statutes give no quarter. Then Buff was out of countenance, and skulked from alehouse to alehouse, and the city had no militia but the sheriff's men. In those merry days, a bailiff trod the streets with terror, when all the chains in the city were rusty but Master Sheriff's; when the people knew no evil but the constable and his watch. ”

“ All officers, of what condition soever, have power to part and quell all quarrels, frays, and disorders, whether among persons belonging to his own or to another corps, regiment, troop, battery, or company, and to order officers into arrest, and non-commissioned officers and soldiers into confinement, who take part in the same, until their proper superior officer is acquainted therewith. And whosoever, being so ordered, refuses to obey such officer or non-commissioned officer, or draws a weapon upon him, shall be punished us a court-martial may direct. ”

“ Any officer or soldier, who shall, without urgent necessity, or without the leave of his superior officer, quit his guard, platoon, or division, shall be punished according to the nature of his offence, by the sentence of a court-martial.
Art. 51. No officer or soldier shall do violence to any persons who brings provisions or other necessaries to the camp, garrison, or quarters, of the forces of the United States, employed in any parts out of the said states, upon pain of death, or such other punishment as a court-martial shall direct. ”

“ Was seized 'midst men with weapons in their hands.
'Art thou of these?'—The child said, 'Yes, I am.'
'Good!' said the officer, 'thou shalt be shot:
Await thy turn.' Then blinding flashes past,
And his companions fell beneath the wall,
While he looked on. 'Permit me that I go'—
Thus to the officer at last he said—
'And to my mother in our house, give back
This watch of hers.'—'Ah, thou wouldst fly?'—'Not so,
I shall return.'—'These children of the street
Are cowards, after all. ”

“ With a guard acting as cowboy, shepherd dog, or convict compeller, we shuffled in a continuous line down the iron stairways and across the hall into the dining room, a cement-floored barred-window desert sown with tables in rows, seating eight men each; guards with clubs standing at coigns of vantage or pacing up and down the aisles, and in one window, commanding the whole room, a guard with a loaded rifle, licensed to shoot down any misbehaver. At no time and in no part of this model jail are you out of range of a loaded rifle, in the hands of men quick and skilful in their use. ”

“ The soldier hates the policeman, and the policeman fears the soldier. If the policeman detects the soldier in any little peccadillo, he without more ado arrests him, if he be alone, and there is no prospect of falling in with any of his captive’s comrades; but, woe betide him! if in an unguarded moment he has counted without his host—they flock around him with wondrous alacrity, take off their belts, and with these effective weapons soon beat off the police with their staves, and decamp in triumph. ”

“ The circumstance has been communicated in confidence to every man in our division, except the officers and one non-commissioned officer, and we have, one and all, sworn to come to your relief, and, by driving these bloody Middlesex men out of the city, protect you from the violent death which is intended for you. ”

“ As there was no method known for the prevention of crime by an organised force of police, and no deterrent exerted on would-be criminals by the existence of a standing body of soldiery, the only possible weapon to be used against them was to be found in the law courts. ”

“ The corporal of the guard will arrest all suspicious looking characters prowling about the post or camp, all persons of a disorderly character disturbing the peace, and all persons taken in the act of committing crime against the Government on a military reservation or post. All persons arrested by corporals of the guard, or by sentinels, will at once be conducted to the commander of the guard by the corporal. ”

“ For some time back, in the absence of that restraining influence which an efficient police force might have afforded, people had readily run into factions; and, with arms in their hands, had supported their particular opinions by force, in defiance of all authority, and with a degree of violence that would never have been tolerated for a moment in any community where the value of peace-maintenance was duly appraised and properly insisted upon. ”

“ By this time a number of persons had collected, the younger people calling out to their companions to come and see the mad militiaman.
On crossing the links, the prisoner and his escort encountered one of the officers of the regiment, accompanied by a group of ladies. “Where are you going with that boy?” said the officer, addressing the corporal. “To the guardhouse!” “What? more insubordination?” “Yes!” “This is most dreadful; what has he done?” “He broke the ranks during drill, and although Sergeant Forbes called him back, he ran away after what he calls a butterfly!” ”

“ The wardens and guards, while on their two years' service, shall live and eat together, and the guard who is absent from the daily meals without permission or sleeps out at night, shall be regarded as a deserter, and may be punished by any one who meets him. If any of the commanders is guilty of such an irregularity, the whole sixty shall have him punished; and he of them who screens him shall suffer a still heavier penalty than the offender himself. ”

“ The cruel multitude, united with the soldiery, felt such a desire of slaughtering those they intended to despoil, that the sheriff, repenting of the order, revoked it, but in vain; fanaticism and robbery once set loose will satiate their appetency for blood and plunder. ”

“ No division of the army should ever be without a strong detachment of police, either temporarily or permanently attached to it; and thus crimes would either be prevented through their vigilance, or those guilty of them immediately punished; the resources of a country would then neither be lawlessly seized and frittered away by marauders, nor would the inhabitants fail to bring supplies to the regularly established markets of the army, where they would be sure to find protection from the police. ”

“ On my representation, a commission was appointed to examine into the principles of the organisation of a general police force, and on its preventive as well as repressive action.- We found that the estimated number of some hundred thousand persons living by depredation as well as by mendicancy, from whom the population of the prisons as well as of reformatories is kept up, was chiefly migratory, and that migration, from one end of the kingdom to the other, required the corresponding extent of action of a police force. ”

“ Hundreds as well as tythings had definite police functions to perform: when a crime was committed, information had to be at once given to the hundred-men and tythingmen of the district, and it was their duty to pursue, arrest, and bring to justice all peace-breakers. ”

“ You shall do your best endeavor to apprehend all felons, barrators, and rioters, or persons riotously assembled; and if any such offenders shall make resistance you shall levy hue and cry and shall pursue them until they be taken. You shall do your best endeavors that the watch in and about your town be duly kept for the apprehending of rogues, vagabonds, nightwalkers, eavesdroppers, and other suspected persons, and of such as go armed and the like. ”

“ And since they have chosen the weapons, I declare our loyal and functioning Municipal Police Force to be our army. Any man who deserts will be considered a traitor. But any man who sticks will be rewarded more than he ever expected. ”

“ All force, therefore, rests on these men, who carry out the deeds of violence with their own hands, the men who serve in the police or the army, especially the army, for the police only venture to do their work because the army is at their back. ”

“ Congress has declared the militia to be "all citizens and those who have declared their intention to become such, between the ages of eighteen and forty-five." These constitute what is called the unorganized militia. The military companies and regiments formed by authority of United States and state laws constitute the organized militia. ”

“ All militia officers shall be commissioned by the governor, and may hold their commissions during good behavior, or until they arrive at the age of sixty years. 6. The militia shall, in all cases, except treason, felony, or breach of the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance at musters and elections of officers, and in going to and returning from the same. ”

“ A Soldier, for a trifling Fault, shall have all the Feathers stripp'd off his Back, and a corroding Plaister clapp'd on, which will eat to the Bones in a small Space of Time. For a capital Crime, every one in the Regiment is ordered to peck him as he's ty'd to a Post, till he dies. ”

“ In cases of riot and quarrels in the street, the colonel generally orders the soldiers to fall on with canes, and beat people into their senses. Such being the state of the police, it is, perhaps, more wonderful that murders are so few, than that they are so many. ”

“ In addition to the labor castes, there arose another caste, the military. A standing army of professional soldiers was created, officered by members of the Oligarchy and known as the Mercenaries. This institution took the place of the militia, which had proved impracticable under the new regime. Outside the regular secret service of the Iron Heel, there was further established a secret service of the Mercenaries, this latter forming a connecting link between the police and the military. ”

“ I called the attention of the governor to the fact that the docket, until this day, exhibits only the name of white criminals, and that all information proves that almost all the cases of robbery, murder, &c., were brought in connexion with young men in the country lately returned from military service—just the very same men who, in all probability, would join the intended meetings to form companies of militia. ”

“ It is his duty to take cognisance of, and to present, all offences within his hundred or division which lead to the corruption of morals, breaches of the Lord's Day, Drunkenness, Cursing and Swearing. To bring forward sufficient number of constables to maintain decency and good order during the execution of malefactors or the punishment of offenders, and to attend in person to see that the peace officers do their duty. ”

“ The regiment was to march the following morning, and as all mode of conveyance in the shape of cars or mules, for the wounded or sick, was under the “surveillance” of the worthy magistrate, he apprehended no difficulty in tracing his runaway daughter—but he was mistaken. The cars were examined, the baggage-mules were overhauled, the commissariat mules, carrying ammunition, biscuit, and rum, were looked at, but amongst all these no trace of the fugitive could be found. ”