Memoirs of a Bow Street Runner by Henry Goddard

“Because of the shortage of real information, so little fact and so much fiction has been written about the Runners that they seem like characters from legend rather than history. This book goes some way to restoring them to life...”

The first autobiography of a Bow Street Runner to ever be published, Henry Goddard’s memoir provides an interesting insight into life as one of Britain’s ‘first police-detectives.’

When this title popped up in my news feed - and I was intrigued. Having come across the Bow Street Runners in various Victorian Crime Fiction tomes, I was interested to see what else was out there by fictional and non-fictional accounts.

So here is a select few titles that may interest:

• The First English Detectives: The Bow Street Runners and the Policing of London, 1750 - 1840 by J. M. Beattie
• The history of the Bow street runners, 1729-1829 by Gilbert Armitage
• Before the Bobbies: The Night Watch and Police Reform in Metropolitan London, 1720-1830 by Elaine A. Reynolds
• A History of English Criminal Law and Its Administration from 1750: The clash between private initiative and public interest in the enforcement of the law by Leon Radzinowicz
• Crime and Society in England, 1750-1900 by Clive Emsley
• The English Police: A Political and Social History by Clive Emsley
• The Great British Bobby: A History of British Policing from the 18th Century to the Present by Clive Emsley
• Police Detectives in History, 1750-1950 by Clive Emsley
• The Ascent of the Detective: Police Sleuths in Victorian and Edwardian England by Haia Shpayer-Makov
• The Rise of Scotland Yard: A History of the Metropolitan Police by Douglas Gordon Browne
• Scotland Yard and the Metropolitan Police by Sir John Fitzgerald Moylan
• The Birth of the British 'Bobby': Bow Street Runners, Scotland Yard & Victorian Crime by Don Hale
• A Certain Share of Low Cunning: A History of the Bow Street Runners, 1792-1839 by David J. Cox
• Chronicles of Bow Street Police-office: With an Account of the Magistrates, "runners," and Police; and a Selection of the Most Interesting Cases, (2 Volumes) by Percy Hetherington Fitzgerald
• Crime, Policing and Punishment in England, 1660-1914 by Drew D. Gray
• Policing Victorian London: Political Policing, Public Order, and the London Metropolitan Police by Phillip Thurmond Smith
• Crime, Policing and Punishment in England, 1750–1914 by David Taylor
• The Queen's Peace: The Origins and Development of the Metropolitan Police, 1829-1979 by David Ascoli

There will by many more tomes out there for the interested reader - or budding author.