Berkshire Constabulary is a former

Home Office The Home Office (HO), also known (especially in official papers and when referred to in Parliament) as the Home Department, is the United Kingdom's interior ministry. It is responsible for public safety and policing, border security, immigr ...

police force which was responsible for policing the

county A county () is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposesL. Brookes (ed.) '' Chambers Dictionary''. Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, 2005. in some nations. The term is derived from the Old French denoti ...

Berkshire Berkshire ( ; abbreviated ), officially the Royal County of Berkshire, is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Oxfordshire to the north, Buckinghamshire to the north-east, Greater London ...

Southern England Southern England, also known as the South of England or the South, is a sub-national part of England. Officially, it is made up of the southern, south-western and part of the eastern parts of England, consisting of the statistical regions of ...

. Berkshire Constabulary was merged with four other adjacent police forces in 1968 to form the Thames Valley Constabulary, later known as

Thames Valley Police Thames Valley Police is the territorial police force responsible for policing the Thames Valley region, covering the counties of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire in South East England. It is the largest non-metropolitan police force ...

. Formed in 1856, the Constabulary was headquartered near Forbury Gardens in

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, until it moved in 1952 to Sulhamstead House (then called the "White House"), purchased by the Berkshire County Council five years earlier for £53,000. The house is currently the Thames Valley Police Training College and Thames Valley Police Museum. Berkshire Constabulary subsumed several smaller police forces during its existence, including the Abingdon Borough Police, Maidenhead Borough Police, Newbury Borough Police, Wallingford Borough Police and Wantage Borough Police. The Windsor Borough Police remained an independent force until in 1947. In 1965, Berkshire Constabulary had an establishment of 603 and an actual strength of 480. On 1 April 1968 Thames Valley Constabulary was formed by amalgamating Berkshire Constabulary with Buckinghamshire Constabulary, the

Oxford City Police Oxford City Police was the police force of the City of Oxford, England. It policed the city from 1 January 1869 until 31 March 1968. It was established to succeed a "watch and ward" force that had been founded in 1835. On 1 April 1968 it and fo ...

, the Oxfordshire Constabulary and the Reading Borough Police.

Chief Constables

*1856–1863 : Colonel James Fraser *1863–1902 : Colonel Adam Blandy *1902–1932 : Lieutenant-Colonel Arthur Faulconer Poulton *1932–1953 : Commander the Hon. Humphry Legge *1954–1958 : John Lovegrove Waldron *1958–1968 : Thomas Charles Birkett Hodgson''Daily Telegraph Reporter''. "Chosen from 59 Applicants." ''Daily Telegraph'', 26 Nov. 1958, p. 14. The Telegraph Historical Archive, https://link-gale-com.rp.nla.gov.au/apps/doc/IO0702472343/GDCS?u=nla&sid=GDCS&xid=b9a44361. Accessed 2 Dec. 2019. (later Chief Constable of the Thames Valley Police) *''1968 : Merged with other forces to form Thames Valley Constabulary''

References

{{Reflist
A pre-history of Thames Valley Police

Defunct police forces of England

Constabulary Constabulary may have several definitions: *A civil, non-paramilitary (police) force consisting of police officers called constables. This is the usual definition in the United Kingdom, in which all county police forces once bore the title (and s ...

1856 establishments in England 1968 disestablishments in England

Chief Constables

See also

References