Water Police

In 1789 Governor Phillip formed a ‘Row Boat Guard’ to police the harbour and foreshores of Sydney Cove to detect smuggling, to control escaping convicts and prevent them from passing letters to ships anchored in the harbour. 

They quickly accrued wide responsibilities - for example, they built some of their own boats.  When the Express, a 40-ton schooner, capsized going around Millers Point in 1838, water police at Goat Island rowed out to rescue the crew, then towed the schooner to calmer waters and “for the space of three or four hours were unremitting in their endeavours to right her”. (Sydney Gazette, 24 November 1838)

They also looked out for “crimping”:

enticing seamen from their ships, and then keeping them until … shipping them on board other vessels. On Friday, Faris, the conductor of one of the water police boats, apprehended four seamen who had absconded from the Coromandel concealed in a loft in a waterman's house. … any person harbouring a deserter from his ship is liable to a penalty of £10 for every man harboured. (Sydney Herald, 17 December 1838)  

In 1840, the Water Police Force came under the supervision of a Water Police Magistrate. They moved from Garden Island, to premises overlooking Watsons Bay, the better to prevent convicts from escaping. By 1841 the Water Police, comprising 20 men, were located at Watsons Bay, Goat Island, and Cockatoo Island. 

During 1853 the water police were incorporated into the Metropolitan Police Force, until 1862, when the various police bodies came together under the new Inspector-General of the New South Wales Police Force.

 As marine technology evolved, the Water Police gained two steam launches, the ‘Biloela’ and the ‘Argus’, the fastest vessels on Sydney Harbour. In 1962 the Sydney fleet included seven speedy launches fitted with two-way frequency modulation radios. Each launch carried rescue appliances, rocket guns, portable stretchers, first aid kits, sparklet resuscitators for treatment of the apparently drowned, and line-firing apparatus. For practical rather than sentimental reasons the section still retained one rowing boat.

Sydney Harbour covers an area of over 22 sq. miles and has a depth of thirty feet or more over half its area. The foreshores extend for 200 miles, and there are 22 miles of wharves. Patrol duties of the Water Police up to 1962 retained the original objective of the ‘Row Boat Guard’, the prevention of smuggling, but also protecting wharf cargoes, bonded stores, and private craft, and effecting rescue operations, not only in Port Jackson, but along the entire coastline. The Water Police also co-operates with the Air-Sea Rescue. A new Police vessel, launched in 1962, was specially designed for this phase of search activity.

The Water Police moved to a demountable site on Pyrmont Point in 1987. In 2004 they were relocated to a purpose-built base on Camerons Cove, Balmain.