Line garrison

A force of 240 men in six detachments, contracted by the Sarrum council and assigned to the line under the Crown licence, with powers to stop, search, detain and remove within the cut and its fences. Most are recruited outside the county, many as formed mercenary companies.

The armed garrison of the line to London, holding the platform and six blockhouses with powers of arrest under the licence; it stops persons it has been given a name for but keeps no book of arrivals.

Named with it

• Captain Iver Dane (commander
• keeps the blockhouse book)

Ties

• answerable to the Crown
• associated with the Sarrum and London Line Company
• contracted by the Sarrum council
• paid chiefly through the line company's charge

At the table

Described as the only armed force in the High South answerable to the Crown rather than to a hall or house, and the one body that cannot be settled with locally; elsewhere the line's guard is said to be Grey Pike detachments under the council contract, maintained through the council under the Crown licence and paid by commercial interests. Nine attempts in eleven years, all near bridges, none successful. Dane will discuss powers and attempts but never a manifest or passenger. Twice Westminster has costed replacing it with Crown troops and let the matter die.