A History of Ireland in Song

RIC

RIC, Royal Irish Constabulary, was the all-Ireland police force in the days before partition when the whole island was run from Dublin Castle on behalf of a foreign monarch. It was one of the earliest police forces in the world. "Even in the earliest years of the nineteenth century, Ireland had the rudiments of a police force organised by counties, and in the mid-1830s a centrally controlled national force, the Irish Constabulary, was already taking shape." —F.S.L. Lyons, Ireland Since the Famine

Unlike the good old British Bobby, the RIC man was armed from the outset; and whereas in England the police operate from "stations", the RIC used "barracks", an indicative term. Lyons again: "The RIC was, therefore, almost of necessity an armed police operating from formidable posts scattered at strategic points throughout the countryside." They were never popular with the people, being seen as an alien force, although the rank and file were generally local men and the force always included many Catholics. On the eve of the First World War, the RIC had a strength of some 12,000, to which should be added the 1,200 Dublin Metropolitan Police (established in 1836, and unarmed, curiously).

The RIC was essential to British rule in Ireland, which never recovered from the beating given to the force by the IRA in the first stage of the Irish War of Independence. Its role was largely taken over by two bodies nominally part of the force, the infamous Black and Tans and the less notorious but more lethal Auxiliaries. After the conclusion of that war, the force was disbanded in the Free State, being replaced by the Garda Siochana, and transformed into the Royal Ulster sic Constabulary, RUC, in the six counties.

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