The following story appears in Percy Ungate's book 'Luck was a Lady', a copy of which he kindly sent to us in 2020. Percy writes: "I was the Police Officer for the Ferrier Estate and surrounding area including Thomas Tallis. I advised re the building of the school i.e. security. I was the guest of honour at the inaugural prize giving in 1971, and did various talks. I was known as P.C. Percy or 'The Bobby on the bike'. We are very grateful to Percy for this great Tallis Tale. It was about 1977-8. As part of the school's programme I did a talk to a disruptive group from the Thomas Tallis Secondary School at Kidbrooke. It was a group of about 25-30 children. I was asked by the Teacher if I could arrange for a police dog to visit the school. This was a regular thing that we did where the handler would describe how they care for and train the dogs. We would usually arrange, apart from the talk, for the dog to find a bloodstained axe hidden somewhere and we usually saw a burglar jumping our of the school window and running away, luckily with his right arm heavily wrapped up!
I agreed and we fixed the date. "Not next Wednesday or the next, but the next." As soon as I returned to the Juvenile Bureau, I put it in my diary. It happened to be 1st April. My colleague Ricky Brock was licensed by the GLC to control vermin and a part of his kit was a lifelike pigeon, used as a decoy, made of rubber so that when he squeezed the tail, the head moved. And so to Thomas Tallis at 9am on the 1st April. I expected 20-30 children but to my amazement, we were shown into the main hall, which was packed with all the 1st, 2nd and I think 3rd years. About 250 -300 children, and the teachers. I began by introducing PC Gunn and his dog Brutus, who were attending from the police dog school at Keston. Then I introduced PC Brock who was attending from the Metropolitan Police communications Branch at Scotland Yard, who work closely with the dog school. We took the dog to the playing field where 'Ben' showed them how the dogs were trained and fed and cared for. He sent Brutus to find the axe, which had been hidden in the field. He found it; it resembled the same axe that he had found at the other school last week and the week before that!! It was then that we spotted a burglar jumping out of the Head Teacher's window. Brutus was sent after him and brought him down. He closely resembled another one of my colleagues. Then we had the children back in the playground where Ricky had parked his car where he was able to keep them 20 or 30 feet away. He then explained that we use pigeons in situations where we are searching open countryside where there are no telephones and where another police dog is urgently required. The pigeon takes the message back to Keston Dog School, who immediately send another dog to assist in the search. He then produced the pigeon from the boot of his car, held it under his tunic gently squeezing the tail so that the head moved, and made a pigeon like noise. He then returned the pigeon to the boot explaining to the children that unfortunately he could not fly the bird as it had been on night duty that night and of course, needed its proper sleep. We thought the visit had gone reasonably well and left. About two weeks lacer I was back at the school, arranging a visit and I happened to ask the Head Teacher, Beryl Husein, about our previous visit, how did it go? "Oh Percy, it went so well, the children are working on a project and they were going co ask you back when it was finished. But you might as well have a look now." She led me to a large area where, around the walls, the children had drawn and painted scenes of dogs searching the open countryside and woodlands, where there are no phones and of pigeons flying back to Keston with messages to send more dogs to search. They had gone to a lot of trouble and had obviously listened intently to the talks. I was completely bowled over by the effort they had put in and congratulated them on such a wonderful project. I then asked Beryl if we could have a word in her office. We entered and I closed the door. I said, "Beryl, they've been to all that trouble, the teachers were there too, it was the first of April". I think it was a look of horror that crossed her features. I continued, "We have radio communication these days, we don't use pigeons. I thought the teachers would have realised that it was 1st April. So what do we do now?" Mrs Husein replied, having seen the joke. "A whole generation of people from Kidbrooke will probably spend the rest of their lives believing that Police use homing pigeons to communicate". This is a true story and I would like to take this opportunity to apologise to that generation if they feel aggrieved or cheated. My only excuse being chat I realised the teachers were present, but I didn't know that they were as daft as the kids. Sorry. I'd had a long relationship with Beryl Husein and Thomas Tallis School as it had been on my 'Home Beat' before I joined the Juvenile Bureau. I had addressed the assemblies many times and had been the guest of honour with my wife at their inaugural prize giving. Just an after thought. One of the funniest things I can remember when bringing a dog to a school is to see the handler wrestling it while crying to get its paw on the inkpad then in the visitors' book especially when the paw is as big as the book. -- Percy Ungate, former police officer
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