Scotland Yard

London's Metropolitan Police Office, Criminal Investigation Department, is more commonly known throughout the world as Scotland Yard, because this was the name of the short street in London on which the agency was first headquartered. Scotland Yard was once the site of Whitehall Palace, a residence used by visiting Scottish kings. Although much of the compound burned down in 1698, the area continued to be known as Scotland Yard.

The police agency currently nicknamed “Scotland [Page 1452]Yard” made its second home on Victoria Embankment. In 1884, a bomb destroyed the building, forcing the agency to move to a new facility that was nicknamed “The New Scotland Yard.” When the agency moved to Westminster Bridge in 1967, that name moved with it.

Robert Peel (1788–1850), founder of the Conservative Party and three-time prime minister, founded the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) in 1829. He was highly innovative, and he developed some ideas that are still used by the modern Metropolitan Police force. The first heads of the new department were Colonel Charles Rowan and a lawyer, Richard Mayne. One of Peel's plans was to centralize the police force in London and to use their staff as a crime prevention force. Peel also required that senior uniformed ranks be filled by promotion rather than by hiring inexperienced and/or unskilled individuals who were members of London's higher social classes. To create a sense of strong, centralized authority, Peel required that all police officers report directly to him. As a result of this practice, the public nicknamed policemen “Peelers” or “bobbies.”

Scotland Yard originally employed 1,000 officers, who were responsible for patrolling an area within a seven-mile radius from Charing Cross. As a comparison to this 1829 data, the present Metropolitan Police Service, which employs 25,550 officers, 10,800 civilian staff, and 844 traffic wardens, is the largest of the three police forces operating in the greater London area. Since London's police boundaries were adjusted in April 2000, the agency has been responsible for approximately 7.2 million residents, living in an area of 620 square miles. In 1999, passage of the Greater London Authority Act formed the Metropolitan Police Authority (MPA). Responsibility for Scotland Yard was transferred from the Home Secretary to the MPA on July 3, 2000. The Home Secretary remains responsible for some Metropolitan Police Service functions.

Scotland Yard was a national repository for crime statistics, and for information on criminal activity, missing person reports, fingerprints, and juvenile delinquent data.

One of the more macabre features associated with Scotland Yard is the agency's Black Museum. This unusual area is the repository for crime scene materials from a wide variety of criminal activities. The museum originally served as a laboratory in which officers could learn about investigations. The nickname “Black” was given to the museum in 1877 when a reporter was refused entry to the facility. The nickname is still occasionally used today, although the museum is now called the Crime Museum. Although it is still not open to the public, celebrities who have visited the museum have included the comic acting team of Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, and the American magician Harry Houdini.

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