Great observations, as usual, mate. Remember most of those. Here's a few more. A generally unpopular South London DS was known as TCP - That C**t Price (not his real name, but same initial), an unfortunate PC who had a motorbike accident and fractured his skill vertically, which healed offset,. This earned him the sobriquet 'Isiah', because one eye's ''igher' than the other. My favourite, that one. Then there was the Uniformed Inspector who was a famous panicked, and who was known as Commercial Union, after a TV ad of the time, where in contrast to the titular insurance company, he WOULD make a drama out of a crisis. There was another , very nice but very boring Inspector, who was known as Mogadon Ron, after a common sleeping pill of the time. Finally, there was young WPC on F who was very free with her favours, as was, of course, her right. She was known as Martini, after the 80s ad campaign 'Any time, any place, anywhere..
At Training School I was nicknamed Moses by two of the PT Instructors, both of whom were Jewish, because I had a beard and because I was the only class member who knew that Wingate FC was named after the Jewish leader of the chindits in Burma, Orde Wingate. As a PC at GA I was christened Guido Fawkes, or Gweed for short. My favourite nickname was told to me by one of my DCs, who was the son of Polish immigrants. He once worked in an office in West London where all the staff were of Polish descent except the Inspector in charge, who was very unpopular. It was a running joke among the staff to punctiliously greet the Inspector as "Guvnor", because "Govno", pronounced much the same, means "turd" in Polish.
*cough* SO13 *cough* I started a rumour they were installing Elizabeth Duke vending machines on the 17th floor in the run-up to the harmonious CTC amalgamation to keep them happy.
A colleague became very flustered under cross at a VAT tribunal and ended up agreeing with the opposition brief and torpedoing his own case in around 10 minutes. He became known as Jigsaw...'cos he comes apart in the box.
Also Bungy, for the challenged of thought, ' cos there's not much upstairs.
Great piece. Your take on reality is so true and so easy to understand that you ought to send it to Rishi and Suella and her team - it might just spark their interest. Sadly, I think it would be wasted on many of The Met's senior management because, frankly, I'm not sure they have the confidence to think for themselves unless the views have been approved by Mr Khan't. Thanks again 👍
The extreme politically correct brigade have practically taken over policing, inappropriate humour is one of their main targets. This is sad news, humour that is not cruel or offensive creates a team spirit and makes often dull work enjoyable. I know someone who is in the job, he has ginger hair, no, you can’t call him ginge or swan vesta, he and his team have happily agreed his nickname will be rusty! Senior officers and the station cleaner refer to him as Rusty.... Maybe there is a small chance that humour and high morale are fighting back?
Spot on Dom. I miss nicknames, two memories spring to mind.
N District in the eighties, PC was unfortunate enough to have been stabbed on three separate occasions (one serious, two technical). Whether that was bad luck or his magnetic personality we'll leave to another day. After the third, he was awarded the moniker 'Del' as in 'Derek' as in 'Derek the dartboard'.
A Nick trip to 'a Spanish resort' wearing T shirts (sponsored by the local pub), with the person's nickname on the back. TIC, Sex Pest, Teflon, Mutant, Boing!... in no particular order... because he was; Irish; mental health problems X2 (both dead now); complaints - gripped the rail - no convictions.
I think there's a whole conversation to be had about the positive, cathartic benefits of black humour, in jobs (not just the Police), where you experience the worst of people and life.
Sometimes a nickname can have an unintended collateral effect within the team as well.
Being well over 6ft my nickname of Big Russ was a given from the moment I walked through the door. Luckily bypassing, Lurch and Beanpole
All well and good until I moved to a new office, with a scottish officer , also called Russell but a good foot lower than me.
From then on whenever anyone called me Big Russ, I'd swear you could hear his teeth grinding in repressed west coast rage, because he new damn well the rest of the office now called him 'Little Russ', that he'd done nothing to deserve the Monika , apart from having his arse too close to the floor
There are some really funny ones. (I obviously couldn’t possibly laugh at this at work. ) A lot of people used to find it a badge of honour that they had been accepted by the group and felt safe to give them a nickname. I knew some Sgts in my early days from a distance ie not my Sgt, and didn’t find out their real names for years because everyone referred to them by nickname. I just called them Sergeant to their face because I didn’t feel I knew them enough to use their nickname. Great post.
Catching up. Great thread as ever. So many nicknames, so little time. I’m sure we we were given one or several that we never found out about...
There were some fantastic ones out there that just cannot be repeated... but also :-
FLUID - fat lazy useless idle dickhead
Microwave - 15 years service in 2 minutes. Applied to probationers, or gobby officers just out of it.
15 watt - light is in but they’re f***ing dull.
DialUp - slow on the uptake.
The Chuckle Brothers - applied to two particularly cunty Borough seniors who had absolutely no sense of humour.
And a mate who recounted to me his moniker being changed by his fellow specialists colleagues before his attendance on a course. They’d managed to get OBE after his name on the course list. The skills based course lasted several weeks and towards the conclusion of it, one of the lead instructors asked what he was awarded the OBE for. Perplexed my mate responded ‘OBE? One Big Ear’
Like so so many now reminiscing about our past lives, we are probably all glad that ‘it is not my circus & not my clowns’; yet we miss the clowns we worked with day in, night out & of whom the majority of them made the shitshow bearable.
I am now reminded of a DC at DPS whose name is Roger Moore. He told me that when he was at BH, he often used to patrol with his friend Ian Ogilvie. Those who remember the Saint (RM) and Return of the Saint (IO) will not be surprised to hear that their combined calls ignored was "The two Saints"!
Great observations, as usual, mate. Remember most of those. Here's a few more. A generally unpopular South London DS was known as TCP - That C**t Price (not his real name, but same initial), an unfortunate PC who had a motorbike accident and fractured his skill vertically, which healed offset,. This earned him the sobriquet 'Isiah', because one eye's ''igher' than the other. My favourite, that one. Then there was the Uniformed Inspector who was a famous panicked, and who was known as Commercial Union, after a TV ad of the time, where in contrast to the titular insurance company, he WOULD make a drama out of a crisis. There was another , very nice but very boring Inspector, who was known as Mogadon Ron, after a common sleeping pill of the time. Finally, there was young WPC on F who was very free with her favours, as was, of course, her right. She was known as Martini, after the 80s ad campaign 'Any time, any place, anywhere..
At Training School I was nicknamed Moses by two of the PT Instructors, both of whom were Jewish, because I had a beard and because I was the only class member who knew that Wingate FC was named after the Jewish leader of the chindits in Burma, Orde Wingate. As a PC at GA I was christened Guido Fawkes, or Gweed for short. My favourite nickname was told to me by one of my DCs, who was the son of Polish immigrants. He once worked in an office in West London where all the staff were of Polish descent except the Inspector in charge, who was very unpopular. It was a running joke among the staff to punctiliously greet the Inspector as "Guvnor", because "Govno", pronounced much the same, means "turd" in Polish.
I once knew a Superintendent known as 'Sinex'. A little squirt who got up everybody's nose.
The term 'Tom' for prostitute I believe comes from Cockney rhyming slang, Sir Thomas More = whore.
"Tom" was also jewellry - in Cockney rhyming slang "Tom foolery"
Also Ratner, as in ‘a nice bit of Ratner on that DC’ 🤣
*cough* SO13 *cough* I started a rumour they were installing Elizabeth Duke vending machines on the 17th floor in the run-up to the harmonious CTC amalgamation to keep them happy.
A colleague became very flustered under cross at a VAT tribunal and ended up agreeing with the opposition brief and torpedoing his own case in around 10 minutes. He became known as Jigsaw...'cos he comes apart in the box.
Also Bungy, for the challenged of thought, ' cos there's not much upstairs.
Great piece. Your take on reality is so true and so easy to understand that you ought to send it to Rishi and Suella and her team - it might just spark their interest. Sadly, I think it would be wasted on many of The Met's senior management because, frankly, I'm not sure they have the confidence to think for themselves unless the views have been approved by Mr Khan't. Thanks again 👍
When prosecutors started in the nick we had one nicknamed ‘Flat battery’ - no charge.
The extreme politically correct brigade have practically taken over policing, inappropriate humour is one of their main targets. This is sad news, humour that is not cruel or offensive creates a team spirit and makes often dull work enjoyable. I know someone who is in the job, he has ginger hair, no, you can’t call him ginge or swan vesta, he and his team have happily agreed his nickname will be rusty! Senior officers and the station cleaner refer to him as Rusty.... Maybe there is a small chance that humour and high morale are fighting back?
We had a few, one was 'Plank' (Thick as a short plank), Mounted were 'Donkey Wallopers'
The nearby Rural Force were 'County Wa**ers' or 'Carrot Crunchers'
The 'Station Cat' always hanging around the nick.
'Sarbut' was the reference for an informant, or CHIS as they were later known.
Spot on Dom. I miss nicknames, two memories spring to mind.
N District in the eighties, PC was unfortunate enough to have been stabbed on three separate occasions (one serious, two technical). Whether that was bad luck or his magnetic personality we'll leave to another day. After the third, he was awarded the moniker 'Del' as in 'Derek' as in 'Derek the dartboard'.
A Nick trip to 'a Spanish resort' wearing T shirts (sponsored by the local pub), with the person's nickname on the back. TIC, Sex Pest, Teflon, Mutant, Boing!... in no particular order... because he was; Irish; mental health problems X2 (both dead now); complaints - gripped the rail - no convictions.
I think there's a whole conversation to be had about the positive, cathartic benefits of black humour, in jobs (not just the Police), where you experience the worst of people and life.
Sometimes a nickname can have an unintended collateral effect within the team as well.
Being well over 6ft my nickname of Big Russ was a given from the moment I walked through the door. Luckily bypassing, Lurch and Beanpole
All well and good until I moved to a new office, with a scottish officer , also called Russell but a good foot lower than me.
From then on whenever anyone called me Big Russ, I'd swear you could hear his teeth grinding in repressed west coast rage, because he new damn well the rest of the office now called him 'Little Russ', that he'd done nothing to deserve the Monika , apart from having his arse too close to the floor
There are some really funny ones. (I obviously couldn’t possibly laugh at this at work. ) A lot of people used to find it a badge of honour that they had been accepted by the group and felt safe to give them a nickname. I knew some Sgts in my early days from a distance ie not my Sgt, and didn’t find out their real names for years because everyone referred to them by nickname. I just called them Sergeant to their face because I didn’t feel I knew them enough to use their nickname. Great post.
Catching up. Great thread as ever. So many nicknames, so little time. I’m sure we we were given one or several that we never found out about...
There were some fantastic ones out there that just cannot be repeated... but also :-
FLUID - fat lazy useless idle dickhead
Microwave - 15 years service in 2 minutes. Applied to probationers, or gobby officers just out of it.
15 watt - light is in but they’re f***ing dull.
DialUp - slow on the uptake.
The Chuckle Brothers - applied to two particularly cunty Borough seniors who had absolutely no sense of humour.
And a mate who recounted to me his moniker being changed by his fellow specialists colleagues before his attendance on a course. They’d managed to get OBE after his name on the course list. The skills based course lasted several weeks and towards the conclusion of it, one of the lead instructors asked what he was awarded the OBE for. Perplexed my mate responded ‘OBE? One Big Ear’
Like so so many now reminiscing about our past lives, we are probably all glad that ‘it is not my circus & not my clowns’; yet we miss the clowns we worked with day in, night out & of whom the majority of them made the shitshow bearable.
We’ve had a ‘New York’ - because they’re 5 hours behind. The Shard - Tall and Handsome, nothing up top and Stokey - Governor’s Nark - GN
I am now reminded of a DC at DPS whose name is Roger Moore. He told me that when he was at BH, he often used to patrol with his friend Ian Ogilvie. Those who remember the Saint (RM) and Return of the Saint (IO) will not be surprised to hear that their combined calls ignored was "The two Saints"!