This film is part of Free

Thames Division

Discover the history of the Thames River Police with a rather different tour of London's iconic river.

Documentary 1955 16 mins

From the collection of:

Logo for London's Screen Archives

Overview

"The London Waterway, the Thames, is the most efficiently policed in the world", proclaims the narrator, and so this film provides an engaging history of the Thames River Police, the first policing body ever formed. Framed by a trip down the river and interweaved with historical and more contemporary context, the film offers a great insight into their work as well as the River's murky past.