The history of the creation of the Malacca police
A.H. Dickinson, a senior Malayan civil servant and O.B.E. holder, published this article in 1941 tracing the origins and early development of the Malacca police force from its creation under British civil government in 1827 through the 1870s. The article argues that the Malacca police was born from the fusion of a Dutch-era Burgher Watch, the traditional penghulu system, and the practical demands of a frontier settlement plagued by piracy, and that its formative years were shaped as much by personal conflict between the first Superintendent and the Resident as by any coherent institutional design.
Summary
Dickinson’s narrative begins with the appointment of W.T. Lewis as the first Superintendent of Police in July 1827, a post created by Governor Robert Fullerton who saw in Malacca a neglected but strategically valuable settlement. The article reconstructs the conditions under which Lewis inherited his responsibilities: a population of roughly 35,000 spread across a territory of about 790 square miles, a settlement running a deficit of over 80,000 Sicca Rupees, and a policing vacuum left by the Dutch withdrawal. Lewis was expected to supervise the penghulus as constables, manage the jail, organize a fire brigade, control prostitution, investigate the legal status of slaves, and combat piracy along a coastline riddled with pirate strongholds. His proposal to establish fixed coastal guards—effectively the first police stations—was only partially approved, with a Havildar’s guard at Pulau Besar proving successful in deterring piracy and encouraging settlement.
The article’s most vivid passage concerns the bitter personal conflict between Lewis and Resident Samuel Garling, which Dickinson presents as a case study in how administrative friction undermined institutional development. Lewis’s complaints about the intensity of his duties, his recommendation to discontinue penghulu payments on the grounds that they were “of no use for Police service,” and his proposal to expand the force to 150 peons all fed into a dispute that the Resident escalated into a formal demand for Lewis’s removal. The Governor’s refusal to act left the force in a state of institutional paralysis during its most critical formative period.
The later appendices trace the force’s evolution through the tin-mining era of the 1850s, when a separate country police was funded from the tin tithe and stationed at Bukit Bedarra and Pondoh Compass, and through the 1870s, when the force faced its first major test in the form of Chinese secret society riots in 1875. The progression from a 63-man establishment costing 1,025 Rupees per month in 1828 to a force capable of deploying European inspectors and coordinating with military detachments by 1875 illustrates the transformation of Malacca from a depressed frontier settlement into a modernized Straits colony.
Key Findings
- The first Malacca Police establishment (1828–1830) comprised 63 men at a total monthly cost of 1,025 Sicca Rupees, including 28 peons, 21 penghulus, 4 headmen of the Burgher Watch, and two constables (pp. 258–259).
- Malacca’s 1827 establishment expenditure was 126,678 Sicca Rupees against revenue of only 44,080, a deficit that constrained all institutional development including police expansion (p. 255).
- The coastal guard at Pulau Besar, established in 1829 with a Havildar’s guard, was credited by Lewis with inducing families to resettle in the southern districts and was described by the local population as “the greatest blessing that could be afforded them” (p. 257).
- By 1854 the force had grown to 117 town police (2 Jemadars, 7 Duffedars, 66 peons in three classes) plus a separate country police of 40 men (1 Constable, 2 Jemadars, 4 Duffedars, 34 peons) funded from the 13¼% tin tithe, at a combined monthly cost of approximately 1,665 Rupees (p. 280).
- In 1875, Chinese secret society riots (principally the Ho Beng) required the deployment of 12 police and 12 European troops of the 10th Regiment to beat a gong through the suburbs, followed by a detachment of 200 men of the 3rd Buffs to the Settlement (p. 283).
- The 1827 census recorded a total population of 34,968, comprising 233 Europeans, 2,289 Siraniens, 5,006 Chinese, 2,342 Klings (1,492 Mahomedan and 850 Hindoo), and 23,292 Malays plus 1,595 servants, slaves, and debtors (pp. 260–262).
Conclusion
Dickinson’s definitive takeaway is that the Malacca police was not created by a single act of institutional design but emerged organically from the collision of Dutch administrative legacy, British legal expectations, and the immediate security needs of a frontier settlement. The personal animosity between Lewis and Garling, far from being a mere anecdote, represents the structural tension between a police officer who understood the ground realities of a Malay frontier and a Resident who operated within the formal hierarchies of the Honourable Company’s civil service—a tension that would recur throughout the colonial period.
Context
- The article draws primarily on the Malacca police records and colonial correspondence held in the archives, including Lewis’s 1827 census report, the Dutch “Orders to Penghulus,” and the despatches of Residents Garling and Ferrier.
- Dickinson writes as a contemporary senior officer with direct institutional knowledge; the article functions partly as an internal history for the Malayan police service and partly as a contribution to the colonial administrative record, with a clear interest in legitimizing the police’s historical claim to the penghulu system and to frontier policing.