This bibliography of literature on the History of Scottish policing will be extended as the project proceeds. We also plan to add a database of primary source material. If you have any suggestions or additional works that could be added, please contact us.
Archibald, Tom W., ‘A History of the Lothian and Borders Police’ Edinburgh: Edinburgh and East of Scotland Military Collectors’ Society, 1990
Avery, M.E., ‘Patrick Colquhoun 1745-1820: “A being clothed with divinity”, Journal of Police History Society, No.3 (1988)
Barrie, D. G. (2010) ‘A Typology of British Police – Locating the Scottish Municipal Police Model in its British Context 1800-35’, British Journal of Criminology, Vol. 50, No. 2 (2010)
Barrie, David G., ‘Anglicization and autonomy: Scottish Policing, Governance and the State, 1833 to 1885’, Law and History Review, Vol. 30, No. 2 (May 2012)
Barrie, D. G., Britain’s Oldest Police Force? – a political and social history of policing in Glasgow 1779-1846 (Glasgow: Strathclyde University, 2000)
Barrie, David G., ‘“Epoch-Making” Beginnings to Lingering Death; The Struggle for Control of the Glasgow Police Commission, 1833-1846’, Scottish Historical Review, Vol. LXXXVI, 2: No. 222 (October 2007)
Barrie, D. G., ‘Patrick Colquhoun, the Scottish Enlightenment and Police Reform in Glasgow in the Late Eighteenth Century’, Crime, History & Societies, Vol. 12, No. 2 (2008)
Barrie, David G., Police in the Age of Improvement: Police Development and the civil tradition in Scotland, 1775-1865 (Cullompton, 2008)
Barrie, David G., ‘Police in Civil Society: Police, Enlightenment and Civic Virtue in Scotland, 1780 – 1833’, Urban History, Vol. 37:1 (May 2010)
Bennet, S. & Wilkie, R., ‘Managerial Problems of Scottish Police Sergeants’, Police Studies, 4 (1981)
Buick, C., 1824-1974: City of Dundee Police 150th anniversary (Dundee: Tayside Police, 1974).
Carson, W.G. ‘Policing the Periphery: The Development of Scottish Policing, 1795-1900’ (Part I) Australian and New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 17 (Dec. 1984)
Carson, W.G. ‘Policing the Periphery: The Development of Scottish Policing, 1795-1900’ (Part II) Australian and New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 18 (March 1985)
Carson W.G. and H. Idzikowska, ‘The social production of Scottish policing 1795-1900’ in Douglas Hay and Francis Snyder (eds.) Policing and Prosecution in Britain 1750-1850 (Oxford, 1989)
Chambers, W., ‘How crime is investigated in Scotland’, The Fortnightly Review, Vol. 2 (1865)
Clark, A., Reminiscences of a Police Officer in the Granite City (Aberdeen: Lewis Smith, 1873)
Davies, A., ‘Street Gangs, crime and policing in Glasgow during the 1930s – the case of the Beehive Boys’, Social History, Vol. 23, No. 3, (1998)
Dinsmor, Alastair, ‘Glasgow Police Pioneers’, Journal of the Police History Society, No. 15 (2000)
Dinsmor, Alastair and Robert Urquhart, ‘The Origins of Modern Policing in Scotland’, Scottish Archives: The Journal of the Scottish Records Association, Vol.7 (2001)
Dinsmor, Alastair and Alastair Goldsmith, ‘Scottish Policing – A Historical Perspective’ in Daniel Donnelly and Kenneth Scott (eds.) Policing Scotland (Cullompton, 2005)
Golden, Marice C., ‘Criminality and the Development of Policing in Dundee, 1816-1833’ (unpublished MPhil thesis, University of Dundee, 2003)
Goldsmith, Alastair, ‘The Development of the City of Glasgow Police 1800-1939’ (unpublished PhD thesis, University of Strathclyde, 2002)
Goldsmith, A., ‘Glasgow on Show and the Boys in Blue, 1888-1938’, History Today, Vol. 47, No. 2, (February 1997)
Gordon, P., Policing Scotland (Aberdeen Peoples Press, 1980)
Grant, D., The Thin Blue Line: The Story of the City of Glasgow Police (London, 1973)
Harris, S., Dundee City Police Pipe Band 1905 -1975 (Glasgow: Styletype, 1984)
Harrison, J. G., ‘Policing’ the Stirling area, 1660-1706’, Scottish Archives, Vol. 7 (2001)
Hunter, J., ‘Glasgow Police Training School’, The Police Journal, Vol. IV (1931)
Irvine, H., The diced cap – the story of Aberdeen City Police (Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press, 1972)
Lenman, Bruce & Geoffrey Parker, ‘Crime and Control in Scotland, 1500-1800’, History Today, Vol. 30 (1980)
Livingston, I., History of Policewomen in the City of Glasgow Police (Glasgow: Internal Police Report, 1975)
MacFarlane, Willie, The History of the Perthshire and Kinross-shire constabularies, (Perth: Perth & Kinross Libraries, 2010)
McConnagh, J., How the City of Aberdeen is policed [pamphlet] (1953)
McGowan, John, ‘The Emergence of Modern Civil Police in Scotland: A Case Study of the Police and Systems of Police in Edinburghshire, 1800-1833’ (unpublished PhD thesis, Open University, 1997)
McGowan, John, Policing the metropolis of Scotland: A History of the police and systems of police in Edinburgh and Edinburghshire, 1770-1833, (Mussleburgh: Turlough, 2010)
McGowan, John, ‘A Tale of Two Cities: Concerning the Robbery in July 1811 of the Paisley Union Bank at Glasgow; and also Reflections on the New Police of Edinburgh and Glasgow and on the Habits of the Early Detectives, with Implications for the Modern Police Service’ (Musselburgh: Turlough, 2012)
McLeod, K., Dunbartonshire Constabulary 1858-1958: a short history of a century’s policing with an account of earlier forms of policing employed (Dumbarton: Dunbartonshire Joint Police Committee, 1959)
Mill, J., The Scottish Police: An Outline of their Powers and Duties (Edinburgh: W. Green & Son, 1944)
Muncie, W., The Crime Pond: Memoirs of William Muncie [ex-Assistant Chief Constable, Strathclyde Police] (Edinburgh: Chambers, 1979)
Nisbet, M., ‘The Movement for Women Police in Scotland’, Policewomen’s Review, No. 1 (1928)
Ord, J., (1906) ‘Origins and History of the Glasgow Police’, Old Glasgow Club Transactions, Vol. 1 (3), Session 1905/06, 20th March 1906
Pieri, J., The Big Men: personal memories of Glasgow’s police (Glasgow: Neil Wilson Publishing, 2001)
Rait, R., ‘Scottish Police in Early Times’, Police Review, Vol. III (1930)
Rodger, S., The Secret Memoirs of the Glasgow Teetotal Bobby, 1846-1901 (Glasgow: People’s Palace Museum, 1979)
Ross, D. A., ‘Scottish Police Administration in town and county’, Police Journal (1930)
Scottish Police College, 50 Years of Training the Scottish Police Service at Tulliallan Castle (Kincardine: Scottish Police College, 2003)
Sillitoe, Sir Percy J., Cloak without Dagger [autobiography of Chief Constable of Glasgow, 1931-43] (London: Cassell, 1955)
Smale, David M., “Alfred John List and the development of policing in the counties of Scotland, c. 1832-77”, Journal of Scottish Historical Studies 33.1, 2013, pp. 52-80
Smale, David M., ‘The Development of the New Police in the Scottish Borders c. 1840-1890’ (unpublished PhD thesis, Open University, 2008)
Stead, P.J., ‘Patrick Colquhoun: Preventive Police’ in P.J. Stead (ed.), Pioneers in Policing (Berkshire, 1977)
Stevenson, J. V., Chief Constable in Municipal Glasgow: Its Evolution and Enterprises (Glasgow: Glasgow Corporation, 1914)
Stewart, M. M., ‘A Policeman’s Lot’: Police Records in Dumfries and Galloway, 1850-1950’, Scottish Archives, Vol. 7 (2001)
Thomson, John, The Edinburgh Town Guard: the story of the capital’s first police force, (Edinburgh: Monty Books, 2001)
Withers, C., ‘“The Long Arm of the Law”: Migration of Highland-Born Policemen to Glasgow, 1826-91’, The Local Historian, Vol. 18, No. 3 (August, 1988)
