Shanghai Municipal Police

Shanghai Municipal Police
Abbreviation SMP

Badge of the Shanghai Municipal Police

Flag of the Shanghai International Settlement
Motto Latin: Omnia Juncta In Uno
All joined as one
Agency overview
Formed September 1854
Dissolved 31 July 1943
Employees
  • 4,739 (1936)
  • 3,466 (Chinese branch)
  • 457 (foreign branch)
  • 558 (Sikh branch)
  • 258 (Japanese branch)
Legal personality Governmental: Government agency
Jurisdictional structure
Map of police area
Size 22.598 km2 (8.725 sq mi)
Population 1,074,794m (1934)
Legal jurisdiction Shanghai International Settlement
Governing body Shanghai Municipal Council
General nature
Operational structure
Headquarters Central Police Station, Foochow Road, Shanghai
Child agencies
  • Reserve Unit (1925)
  • Special Branch (1898)
  • Shanghai Municipal Gaol
  • Russian Auxiliary Detachment (1941)
Facilities
Stations 14

The Shanghai Municipal Police (SMP; Chinese: 上海公共租界工部局警務處) was the police force of the Shanghai Municipal Council which governed the Shanghai International Settlement between 1854 and 1943, when the settlement was retroceded to Chinese control.

Initially composed of Europeans, most of them Britons, the force included Chinese after 1864, and was expanded over the next 90 years to include a Sikh Branch (established 1884), a Japanese contingent (from 1916) and a volunteer part-time special police (from 1918). In 1941 it acquired a Russian Auxiliary Detachment (formerly the Russian Regiment of the Shanghai Volunteer Corps).

History

Origins

The first detachment of 31 Europeans, effectively borrowed from the Hong Kong Police and led by Samuel Clifton, was recruited almost immediately after the formation of the Shanghai Municipal Council (SMC). These men were on patrol by September 1854.[1] Further men were recruited from the Royal Irish Constabulary, London's Metropolitan Police and from the military presence in Shanghai itself, while a structure for recruitment of Britons in the United Kingdom eventually came about through the Shanghai Municipal Council's London agents, John Pook & Co. Once formalised, a steady stream of young men was recruited to serve in Shanghai. Promotion from the lower ranks of the force was, however, limited. Most of the force's commanders were recruited from British domestic or colonial police forces, although a cadre of young British men was recruited as cadets, and held senior ranks in the force in the 1910s-'30s.[2]

In 1936, the last year of near-normal peacetime policing, the force totaled 4,739, men with 3,466 in the Chinese Branch, 457 serving in the Foreign Branch (predominantly British), 558 in the Sikh Branch and 258 in the Japanese Branch.[3]

Though the force was mostly occupied in the routine business of crime prevention, detection and traffic control, it was also seen as the Settlement's first line of defense against Chinese nationalist activity. After the failure of the 1913 Second Revolution against the autocratic presidency of Yuan Shikai, the settlement was increasingly troubled by armed crime. In the build-up to, and aftermath of, the 1926-27 Nationalist Revolution, the force also struggled to contain a wave of armed robberies and politically motivated kidnappings. Throughout the 1930s it faced challenges from the Nationalist Government and the police force of the (Nationalist Chinese) City Government of Shanghai, particularly over rights to operate outside the historical bounds of the Concession and in cases of extraterritoriality.

World War II and disbandment

Between the Japanese occupation of China in August 1937 and the attack on Pearl Harbor on 8 December 1941, the International Settlement became the only neutral area in east China. In this crowded and officially neutral enclave, the SMP struggled to maintain order in the face of a wave of increasingly violent terrorist bombings and reprisals between the Chinese and Japanese Army and their collaborators. With the occupation of the Settlement in December 1941 the police came under Japanese control. Although a number of British officers were arrested as political prisoners and interned in Shanghai's Haiphong Road camp, most British staff in the SMP's Foreign Branch had no choice but to stay in their posts until their eventual dismissal and internment in February/March 1943. The SMP continued after this date, and was incorporated into the police force of the amalgamated Municipality of Shanghai in mid-1943. White Russian, Chinese, Japanese and Indian (many of the latter being dismissed in 1944-45) staff continued to serve, as did some European personnel from Axis or neutral states.

Interned officers of the SMP had expected to return to their duties at the end of the war but the conclusion of the 1943 Friendship Treaty between the British and Chinese governments confirmed the abolition of the International Settlement. The post-war city police bureau continued the employment of a steadily declining number of the former SMP's Russian cadre, although all Chinese staff remained in post.[4] Foreign members of the SMP were dispersed, some to take up police, civilian or military employment elsewhere. Records in Shanghai indicate that some surviving Chinese personnel of the SMP were investigated as "counter-revolutionary" elements following the communist revolution in 1949.[5]

Legacy

The SMP retains the legacy as a pioneer in the field of police work, and many of its past members remain internationally renowned due to their contributions in the fields of policing and self-defence. Particularly well documented is the SMP's response to a staggering rise in armed crime, whereby serving officers such as William E. Fairbairn and Dermot 'Pat' O'Neil, working with volunteer "Special" personnel such as Eric A. Sykes, developed innovative combat pistol shooting, hand-to-hand combat skills and knife fight training.

As a result of the catastrophic policing failure of 30 May 1925, when Sikh and Chinese members of the SMP were ordered to open fire on Chinese demonstrators and thereby precipitated the nationwide anti-imperialist (and anti-British) May Thirtieth Movement (五卅运动), the SMP developed myriad riot control measures. These techniques led to the introduction of Shanghai's "Reserve Unit" by Assistant Commissioner Fairbairn—the first modern SWAT team. The skills developed in Shanghai have been adopted and adapted by both international police forces and clandestine warfare units. William Fairbairn was again the central figure, not only leading the Reserve Unit but teaching their methods to the US, Cyprus and Singapore.

The Special Branch

A political policing unit had existed within the SMP from 1898, the so-called Intelligence Office, but this was renamed Special Branch in 1925 so as to join the form used in British colonies and concessions.

The office's greatest coup was the arrest of Jakob Rudnik (a.k.a. Hilaire Noulens) and his wife Tatiana Moissenko on 15 June 1931. The arrest, the result of close co-ordination with the Special Branches in Singapore, Britain's Secret Intelligence Service (M.I.6) and French colonial intelligence, broke up the Comintern's secret International Liaison Department in the city. The SMP also correctly identified Richard Sorge as a member of the Third International; he was resident in the city from 1930-33.[6] After 1928 Special Branch worked closely with Guomindang intelligence services, helping to destroy and disperse much of the urban base of the Chinese Communist Party by 1932. The Special Branch's archive was acquired by the Central Intelligence Agency in 1949 and was eventually opened to researchers in the 1980s, although the files had clearly been weeded to remove material that might compromise some figures with a Shanghai past.

Shanghai police ranks

The Shanghai Municipal Police used police ranks based along British lines, and owed much to the Victorian rank-structure of the Metropolitan Police Force. From lowest to highest, the ranks were:

Police stations

Between 1854 and the police's effective end in 1943, some 14 police stations were in use at various times.

The 1930s Longchang apartments building, a former dormitory complex for Chinese constables and their families, is now a government-protected building.

Force commanders

Uniforms

For most of their existence the SMP wore uniforms that were British or British colonial in style. These included custodian helmets for European police until the early 1900s. Uniforms were dark blue serge in winter with khaki drill (including shorts or slacks) in summer. Sikh personnel wore red turbans while Chinese members of the force were distinguished by a conical Asian hat until about 1919. After this date Chinese and European police wore the same dark blue peaked cap with the coat of arms of the International Settlement as a badge. Pith helmets were often worn in hot weather. Sam Browne belts were worn by officers carrying sidearms .[8]

Awards

Members of the SMP were made eligible for several medals for service by the Municipal Council during its history. In addition to being eligible for awards from members' own native countries, these awards held official status and could be worn with other medals with the status of a foreign award. These medals included:

Bibliography

Memoirs

References

  1. ↑ North China Herald, 2 September 1854, p. 8.
  2. ↑ Robert Bickers, pages 31-32 "Empire Made Me", ISBN 0-7139-9684-6
  3. ↑ Shanghai Municipal Council, "Annual Report 1936"
  4. ↑ Robert Bickers, "Empire Made Me", pp. 312-322, ISBN 0-7139-9684-6
  5. ↑ Robert Bickers, "Empire Made Me", p. 15, ISBN 0-7139-9684-6
  6. ↑ Records of the Shanghai Municipal Police, "Foreign Agents of the Third International, D4718" May 18, 1933, National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 263, Entry A1-02, 190/24/30/06, Box 37
  7. ↑ "Meetings: The Shanghai Municipal Council", North China Herald, Shanghai, 14 March 1898, p.24
  8. ↑ Harriet Sergeant, page 146 "Shanghai", ISBN 0-7195-5713-5
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