Thursday 23 August 2012

New £5.5m RUC museum gets green light

A new museum telling the story of policing in Ireland is to be built in east Belfast.

Having secured funding from Westminster, the new two-storey building will be constructed in the grounds of the existing police headquarters in Knock, and will cost £5.5million.

There is already a museum on site, but it is so small that many of its artefacts have been held in storage for years.

The replacement building won't have a space problem and will display a variety of uniforms, weapons, medals etc dating back to the early 19th Century. In addition to the main exhibition, an oral history archive will be available. It will be free to visit.

More information about the museum's plans.

You may be interested to know that a genealogy search service is available from the existing Police Museum, which holds microfilm copies of the Royal Irish Constabulary service records 1822-1922 (the originals are held at The National Archives in Kew, London.)

A £25 charge is levied to search the records for an individual's service record, which may include:

Constabulary number
Name
Age on joining (or date of birth)
Height
Religion
Date of appointment
Native County
Name of person recommending for the Constabulary
Trade or calling on joining
Places served with dates
Promotions
Awards
Punishments
Injuries
Date of marriage (if married in service)
Native County of wife

Telephone 028 9070 0222 or Email for more information about this genealogy service.