The main records for the Met Police Officers are the service sheets. These are in the National Archives files MEPO 4/361 – MEPO 4/477 and cover Warrant Numbers 74201 to 97500. This includes officers who joined between January 1889 and November 1909. The majority of files each cover 200 officers and can be downloaded from the National Archives website at no cost. MEPO 4/473 covers numbers 96601 – 96800 which might assist you with calculating the file required for a specific Warrant Number. Service Sheets were still in use for Warrant Numbers 97501 – 100310 (100310 being the last Warrant Number to qualify for the 1911 Medal). The location of these missing records is not know.
The service sheets consists of two pages, the first shows the date of appointment, the divisions served in and any promotions. The service sheet page for Walter Cursons is shown below. Note there is no record of his discharge or the reason for leaving because his record continues on a later format.
The second page gives details of the examination of the candidate with personal information on the individual including date of birth and previous occupation. This includes any previous military service which is useful when trying to research a medal group includes both Police and Campaign Medals. In Cursons’ case he had been in the Railway Police and had also served 3 years in the East Surrey Regt Volunteers.
