Our history

The Essex Police Memorial Trust (The Trust) is a registered charity (number 1026884) which was established on 7th October 1993. On that date it was formally incorporated with the much older Essex Police Benevolent Fund, which originally had been set up as the Essex County Constabulary War Memorial Fund on 8th July 1918, and the Essex Police Memorial Fund dating from 1990.

Formal moves to establish The Trust can be traced back to 1991, but it was the tragic murder of Pc Brian 'Bill' Bishop seven years earlier which may be seen as the real catalyst. The murder prompted Brian Hindley, then a Superintendent in Essex Police, to begin researching a Roll of Honour of Essex officers killed on duty in order that their sacrifices could be recognised. Around the Force, other officers shared the same sentiment, realising that there was no memorial to officers killed on duty. Following a proposal by Police Constable Mick Hall in November 1988, these various strands were drawn together and a small fund-raising committee was set up in early 1989 to instigate the erection of a Memorial Stone and Book of Remembrance, initially intended to be in time for the 150th anniversary of Essex Police in 1990.

The committee's work was given added impetus by the deaths of two police divers, Police Constable Andrew Morrison and Police Constable Stephen Taylor in June 1989. Their colleagues in the Force Support Unit were at the forefront of many of the fundraising efforts. These included the sale of specially commissioned and authenticated 'Matchbox' type models of Police vehicles in Essex Police and Colchester Borough Police liveries, and events such as sponsored parachute jumps. In March 1991 a large number of serving officers donated £2 from their monthly pay cheques.

While this work was going on the difficult problem of drawing up practical criteria for determining those eligible for inclusion on the memorials was tackled. Finally, in March 1991 the criteria was defined as follows:

"An officer or employee of the Police Authority who receives injuries in the execution of his/her duty from which he/she subsequently dies, subject to there being no attendant circumstances which might cause the Chief Constable to determine otherwise."

With the criteria now defined, an initial list of 29 officers for the Roll of Honour was formally approved and in October 1992 The Memorial Stone and the Roll of Honour were unveiled by the Lord Lieutenant of Essex Lord Braybrooke, at Police Headquarters. Five years later, in November 1997, The Trust's original vision was fulfilled when the Book of Remembrance was unveiled at Headquarters by the Chief Constable, John Burrow.