A bit of a bumper month for new content on the website, so time for our occasional reminder that in the ‘Pages’ column to the right of the screen we have a link called ‘Website Updates’.
Unsurprisingly this links to the Website Updates page. If you are a regular visitor to the site it’s a handy page to look at to see what new articles and items of interest have been added to the website recently.
Of course smaller items, such as photographs in the Photo Gallery, are being added all the time – so it’s still worth having a look around the site to see what you might find!
Sending our deepest sympathies to Her Majesty The Queen, and the Royal Family, on the sad passing of His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.
For the first time an ex-BTP officer has been appointed as the Surveillance Camera Commissioner AND as the Biometrics Commissioner. Both posts were created under the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 and are high profile public appointments. Dr Fraser Sampson will take up his work later in March 2021. The Home Secretary said: “It is vital the government works to empower police to use technology to keep the public safe while maintaining their trust and Fraser Sampson’s extensive experience in law and policing makes him the right person to take up this role.”
Fraser joined the BTP in the early 1980s and served in the North East Area. He was later seconded to the Home Office Central Planning Unit at Harrogate (now the College of Policing) where he worked as a legal researcher specialising in the application of the criminal law in operational circumstances. He returned to the force and later, in 1992, became an Inspector at the Tadworth Force Training Centre. His work included introducing many innovations in training as well as leading the training team in their own development. His time at Tadworth coincided with a particularly active PIRA campaign so he led operational deployments in the south east when required. He returned to Leeds as an Inspector and was later seconded back to central service. He left the force as a superintendent in 1996. After BTP he qualified as a solicitor working in the area of police law. He wrote several of the Blackstones Police Promotional Manuals and is a prolific author. He became Director of the Civil Nuclear Police Authority and went on to carry out similar roles with West Yorkshire and North Yorkshire Police. During his time at Tadworth he offered support to officers who were working to preserve and collect material relating to the history of the force. We wish him well in his new job.
This photograph appeared on Facebook the other day, and I felt it worthy of highlighting. A policeman stands beside a Royal Mail coach at Waterloo Station.
This is an embedded image, but there are many other photos in our gallery.
March is Women’s History Month and the BTP is taking the opportunity to celebrate women in the railway police.
It is especially fitting as this month sees the appointment of the BTP’s first female Chief Constable, Lucy D’Orsi.
The BTP History Group were pleased to be able to assist the BTP Communications Department in this endeavour. BTP will be sharing regional highlights on various social media channels – keep an eye out.
There will be two Memorial Events for the 20th Anniversary of the Great Heck Rail Crash on Sunday 28th February 2021.
The 20th anniversary of the Great Heck Rail Crash will be remembered with commemorative events taking place at Newcastle upon Tyne Central Railway Station, the Great Heck Memorial Garden, and in Selby Abbey.
National coronavirus regulations and lockdown restrictions in England severely limit what is legally permissible, so these acts of remembrance will be live-streamed.
Sadly, due to the Covid-19 Coronavirus outbreak we will be unable to hold our Annual General Meeting as we would normally do in March.
Therefore we are going to have to do things a lot differently this year. In line with the Constitution the committee have agreed to hold it via email.
(Full details will be circulated to members in the March edition of History Lines).
Another new BTP related book has been placed on our Virtual Bookshelf.
This time from our very own Secretary, Bill Rogerson M.B.E.
Old Bill
Old Bill’s Tales of the Railway Old Bill
Forty Nine Years of Working for the British Transport Police (1971 – 2020)
Description:
“Interested in the reality of policing? Interested in railways? The heart-warming tale of the life of a British Transport Police Officer and steadfast community worker. Bill looks back at his 49 years working with the British Transport Police working as a warranted officer, a civilian and a volunteer, which was sometime humorous and sometimes serious. Unlike a lot of police related stories, Bill’s is not one of high-speed car chases, high level drug busts, shooting bank robbers and the like, but details the everyday life of an ordinary railway copper, policing Britain’s railways in England, Scotland Wales and on the high seas to Ireland, along with a couple of trips to the Netherlands. There are some gentle humorous memoirs from Bill contained in the book including his experiences of teaching well over one million school children on the dangers of the railway. Why not purchase the book to relive Bill’s tales.”
The book is available to purchase now from Amazon.
This is not Bill’s first book, having co-authored two books – ‘Police Dog Heroes‘ and ‘The Hooligans Are Still Among Us‘ – with Michael Layton.
