Natal Police CID 1898

[bigjarofwasps]

One of the notable achievements of this new force was the introduction for the first time in Africa of finger-printing for forensic identification purposes. The world's first forensic fingerprint office had been established in Calcutta, India, in 1897. Sub-Inspector (later Chief Commissioner) W J Clarke of the NP's Criminal Investigation Department (CID) was convinced of the value of the system in law-enforcement and in 1898 he tried to introduce fingerprinting in Natal. Clarke received no support from his superiors but he was so convinced of the merits of the system that he launched it at his own expense. Eventually, the system was officially approved and, after increasing numbers of arrests and convictions, finger-printing became standard police procedure in Natal. By about 1910, there were more sets of finger-prints on file with the NP's CID than there were at any similar office in the British Empire, including Scotland Yard.

 

Given that the NP had a CID department, did they ever use the rank Detective? 

This Long Service medal is named to 8886 (F) 2/C Det/Sgt. L. W. de Kock. I believe this medal was first issued in 1923, given that KOCK was serving during the Boer War, albeit not in the police granted. I'm curious to know when they first adopted the rank? 

I assume the (F) means foot & 2/C means second class? Does Det/Const exist or did you have to be a Sgt before you could join CID in those days?