Appointment in
Vanity Fair, 1886 In 1885, Warren was appointed commander at
Suakin in 1886. A few weeks after he arrived, however, he was appointed Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis following
Sir Edmund Henderson's resignation. The exact rationale for his selection is still unknown. Up to that time, and for some time into the 20th century, the heads of Scotland Yard were selected from the ranks of the military. In Warren's case, he may have been selected in part by his involvement in discovering the fate of Professor Palmer's expedition into the Sinai in 1883. If so there may have been a serious error regarding his "police work" in that case, as it was a military investigation and not a civil style police operation. The
Metropolitan Police was in a bad state when Warren took over, suffering from Henderson's inactivity over the past few years. Economic conditions in London were bad, leading to demonstrations. He was concerned for his men's welfare, but much of this went unheeded. His men found him rather aloof, although he generally had good relations with his superintendents. At
Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee in 1887, the police received considerable adverse publicity after Miss
Elizabeth Cass, an apparently respectable young seamstress, was (possibly) mistakenly arrested for
soliciting, and was vocally supported by her employer in the courts.
Friction To make matters worse, Colonel Warren, a
Liberal, did not get along with
Conservative Home Secretary Henry Matthews, appointed a few months after he became Commissioner. Matthews supported the desire of the
Assistant Commissioner (Crime),
James Monro, to remain effectively independent of the Commissioner and also supported the
Receiver, the force's chief financial officer, who continually clashed with Warren.
Home Office Permanent Secretary Godfrey Lushington did not get on with Warren either. Warren was pilloried in the press for his extravagant dress uniform, his concern for the quality of his men's boots (a sensible concern considering they walked up to 20 miles a day, but one which was derided as a military obsession with kit), and his reintroduction of
drill. The radical press completely turned against him after
Bloody Sunday on 13 November 1887, when a demonstration in
Trafalgar Square was broken up by 4,000 police officers on foot, 300
infantrymen and 600 mounted police and
Life Guards. , October 1888 Warren was appointed a
Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath (KCB) on 7 January 1888. Later that year he renamed the four District Superintendents (ranking between the
Superintendents and the Assistant Commissioners and each in charge of a group of
divisions)
Chief Constables, adding a Chief Constable at the head of the Met's
Criminal Investigation Department (CID) in 1889. Monro insisted that the first holder of the latter post should be a friend of his,
Melville Macnaghten, but Warren opposed his appointment on the grounds that during a riot in
Bengal Macnaghten had been "beaten by Hindoos", as he put it. This grew into a major row between Warren and Monro, with both men offering their resignation to the Home Secretary. Matthews accepted Monro's resignation, but simply moved him to the Home Office and allowed him to keep command of
Special Branch, which was his particular interest.
Robert Anderson was appointed Assistant Commissioner (Crime) and Superintendent
Adolphus Williamson was appointed Chief Constable (CID). Both men were encouraged to liaise with Monro behind Warren's back.
Jack the Ripper Colonel Warren's biggest difficulty was the
Jack the Ripper case. In his book,
Abberline: The Man Who Hunted Jack the Ripper, author Peter Thurgood indicates that Warren was criticised during the investigation. He was blamed for failing to track down the killer, accused of failing to offer a reward for information (although that plan was actually rejected by the
Home Office), accused of assigning an inadequate number of investigators (patently untrue) and favouring uniformed constables instead of detectives (probably untrue). In response, Warren wrote an article outlining his views and the facts for ''
Murray's Magazine''; the article also indicated that he favoured vigilante activity in finding the Ripper. He was censured by the Home Office for revealing the workings of the police department and for writing an article without permission. As recently as 2015, a book about the Ripper case by Bruce Robinson castigated Warren as a "lousy cop" and suggested that a "huge establishment cover-up" and a Masonic conspiracy had been involved. In its book review,
The Guardian stated that "most historians put the police's failure to catch the Ripper down to incompetence" but did not specifically name Warren in this context. Warren finally had enough of criticism and resigned – coincidentally right before the murder of
Mary Jane Kelly on 9 November 1888. But he agreed to stay on until his successor was in place and continued in post until 1 December. He then returned to his army career. Nearly every superintendent on the force visited him at home to express their regret over his resignation. One attendee praised Warren for his thoughtfulness and his caring for the men in his command. ==Later military career and Boer War==