A police procedural following the investigations of the Kenya Police Force, filmed entirely on location.
Set in and around Nairobi, the series follows the work of Chief Inspector Paul Derek (John Bentley), a resourceful officer of the Kenya Police. He is assisted in his duties by his Kenyan colleague, Police Inspector Alan Tarlton. Each week, the pair investigate a range of criminal activities that disrupt the colony, including murder, diamond smuggling, robbery, and confidence tricks. Their cases bring them into contact with a cross-section of Kenyan society, from local tribesmen and safari guides to colonial administrators and wealthy settlers, with investigations taking them deep into the East African landscape.
African Patrol stands as a notable television artifact, one of the first British drama series to be filmed entirely on location in Africa. The production uses the structure of a standard police procedural as a vehicle to tour the landscapes, wildlife, and cultures of 1950s Kenya. This setting is not merely decorative; it is the series’ defining characteristic, with the location filming providing a scale and authenticity impossible to achieve in a studio. The central partnership between the assured British Chief Inspector and his local colleague presents a romanticised, paternalistic vision of colonial law enforcement. This perspective makes the programme a fascinating document of its era’s attitudes towards the waning British Empire, produced just a few years before Kenyan independence.
Broadcast: ABC – Gross-Krasne/Kenya Productions, 39 Episodes, 03 May 1958 – 22 March 1959
Writers include: John Kruse, Berkeley Mather, Basil Dawson, James Workman
Producer: Brian Robson
Director: George Breakston
Main Cast: John Bentley (Chief Inspector Paul Derek), Alan Tarlton (Himself)
