Advances in Fingerprint Technology.pdf

in charge he undoubtedly supported and encouraged his staff and should
therefore be responsible for the innovation they suggested. In a letter dated
May 10, 1926, Henry wrote to a correspondent concerning Haque:
I wish to make it clear that, in my opinion, he contributed more than any
other member of my staff and contributed in a conspicuous degree to
bringing about the perfecting of a system of classification that has stood the
test of time and has been accepted in most countries.
The Belper Commission, aware that Henry’s book was due to be published,
recommended the use of the Henry Classification System, which was
introduced at Scotland Yard in 1901. Police forces from all over the world
duly sent their officers to learn this new fingerprint system.
The maintenance of a fingerprint collection serves the primary function
of causing a file to be associated with each person whose finger impressions
appear in the collection. When fingerprint sets are received at police headquarters,
the person is allocated a number; in Great Britain this is known as
the Criminal Record Office Number (CRO No.). This number always remains
the same for the individual, and as the individual ages and collects convictions,
the file accordingly gets thicker, all convictions in the file being confirmed
by fingerprints taken at the time of arrest. It does happen that a person
gives a fictitious name when fingerprinted, and if dealt with expeditiously at
court, previous convictions will not be cited and punishment will be dealt
out as if for a first-time offender. In the meantime, the routine is inexorably
taking place: the fictitious name with the associated fingerprint classification
is not found after a name search, and so the fingerprint form is then searched
through the fingerprint collection. The true name will certainly be discovered,
the alias and conviction will be added to the file, and the next time that
person appears in court on another charge, they will discover, to their chagrin,
that they did not beat the system.
The secondary use of a fingerprint collection is to provide a catchment
area for identifying offenders who leave their fingerprints at crime scenes,
and this has been my special province for the last 37 years. For the initial
suggestion associating the identification of finger imprints found at crime
scenes with finger impressions in the collections, we owe a quite considerable
debt of gratitude to Dr. Henry Faulds.
Dr. Henry Faulds (1843–1930)
Henry Faulds (Figure 1.13), the son of Scottish parents, was born in Beith,
Ayrshire, Scotland, on June 1, 1843. He became a medical missionary for the
Church of Scotland and spent a year in India; however, because of a clash of
personalities with the clergy in charge, he returned to Scotland the following