Famous Ex-Bobbies
When author and former politician Jeffrey Archer was jailed in July 2001 for perjury, one of the great ironies noted by the media was his previous involvement in law-enforcement, rather than law-breaking: he briefly joined the Metropolitan Police Force in 1960. But Archer isn’t the only famous name to have donned a bobby’s uniform…
- Geoff Capes, the 22-stone shotputter turned prizewinning budgie breeder, represented his country 66 times in 11 years, won gold at the 1974 and 1978 Commonwealth Games and five European Championships medals. He was also The World’s Strongest Man - twice. Before that, he served as a constable in Cambridgeshire’s police force.
Jeffrey Archer leaving the High Court, London, June 2001
© TopFoto.co.uk
- Ice skater Christopher Dean had to choose between hanging up his truncheon or his skates. After leaving school at 16, Dean joined the Nottingham Police Force in 1974. By 1980, he and ice partner Jayne Torvill had become British National Dance Champions, and were in medal contention in international competitions. Dean resigned from the police force and the pair went on to achieve their famous win at the 1984 Sarajevo Winter Olympics.
- The most famous British police film of all time, The Blue Lamp, was written by an ex-bobby, Thomas Ernest Bennett (TEB) Clarke. His book on British pubs, What's Yours?, was used as a reference book for the Ealing film Saloon Bar (1940) and he became a regular writer for the studios. His screenplays included The Lavender Hill Mob, A Tale Of Two Cities and Passport To Pimlico.
- Playing a city policeman in The Lavender Hill Mob was another former PC, David Davies. The actor often found himself returning to his previous profession in a number of supporting roles on TV and film, including Gideon’s Way, Z-Cars, Tiger Bay (desk sergeant) and The Three Weird Sisters (police sergeant) – also written by TEB Clarke.
The Lavender Hill Mob 1951
© Topfoto.co.uk - The BBC’s popular forensic crime series, Silent Witness, was created by ex-policeman Nigel McCrery, who used his experiences as a beat copper and stories told to him by a pathologist friend. McCrery has also written a book about… the Bow Street Runners.
- In the late 1950s, Gilbert Harding became the most famous man in Britain, thanks largely to his infamously grumpy appearances on the popular TV panel gameshow What’s My Line?. After graduating from Cambridge, Harding studied law and was befriended by the Deputy Chief Constable of Bradford who, in 1932, invited him to join the force. "There is nothing more horrible in the way of headgear than a policeman’s helmet," he said later.
- As GP Taylor, the Rev Graham Taylor wrote Shadowmancer, a children's book about witchcraft and folklore, and sold his motorbike to pay for it to be published. After being interviewed by The Daily Telegraph, Faber and Faber signed him up in a six-figure deal. The paperback edition of Shadowmancer was published on the same day as Harry Potter And The Order of the Phoenix. It sold 20,000 copies in a month, and topped the book charts for 15 weeks in 2003; Universal Pictures bought the film rights for £314,000. Taylor has since written two more bestsellers, Wormwood and Tersias.
Yorkshire-based Taylor’s history is as colourful as his stories: after being expelled from Scarborough Sixth Form College, he went to London to work in the music industry and got firmly into the sex, drugs and rock’n’roll lifestyle. Sensing he needed a change, he went back to university to study theology but had no ambitions to become a man of the cloth. "I didn't want to get ordained. I wanted to see a bit of life. The police force seemed an ideal place to go. I wanted to get a bit of action and be in the centre of things," he said.
While serving as a PC, he was once put in charge of looking after the then Prime Minister, John Major, during an election campaign but lost him when the PM was mobbed by a throng of female Tory admirers in Helmsley, North Yorkshire!
