THE LAUNCH of a new book on policing in Worcester welcomed a special visitor, the great-great-great-grandson of the force’s third chief constable.
David Phillips, Worcester-born but now living in Barnard Castle, County Durham, journeyed back to the city for the debut of local author Bob Blandford’s latest book ‘The Spike’.
The book tells the tale of the lives, the crimes and the violent times of the city’s heroic boys in blue.
Mr Phillips brought with him a contemporary water-colour portrait of his ancestor, ex-basket-maker turned watchman, constable and later Superintendent John Phillips, chief of the city force during nine troubled years to 1849 when he died, probably of cholera.
“The timing couldn’t have been better,”said the former lecturer and probation officer whose archivist wife is collaborating with him on a planned biography of his relative.
“We had a few details of John’s life, but the book fills in a lot of gaps – 38 pages on his time as chief.”
“The question still remains ‘what made an apparently successful basket maker who’d married his boss’s daughter and was living and working in Broad Street give it all up to become a policeman?,” he added.
According to Bob’s research, John Phillips was one of the first intake of 15 constables sworn in under the 1835 Municipal Corporations Act.
He was PC4 and was later appointed Sergeant under the second police chief, James Douglas.
The first, tough ex-Metropolitan Police sergeant Henry Sharpe had been beaten-up in the Cock Inn in Tybridge Street after 141 days in Worcester, and never recovered.
By coincidence, both Bob and David were near contemporaries at the Royal Grammar School – Bob started in 1959, David a year later – and represented the same house in sports and other competitions.
After the launch, Bob was able to show the visitors two key sites in John Phillips’ tale – the location of the original police station-house and his final resting place…
Both are now car parks, the former the north-western corner of Cornmarket, the latter the city’s original cemetery, now Tallow Hill car park.
Copies of the The Spike – Worcester City Police: the lives, the crimes and the violent times 1833-1900 are available at the Tourist Information Centre, Waterstones, the Hive, the City Museum, Tudor House Museum, the Commandery and several newsagents.
Signed copies are also available direct from the author at [email protected]
