Daily AncestorConstable
In America a constable was a local peace officer, elected or appointed in a town or township, who kept order and served writs and court orders.
The word comes from Latin for count of the stable: first an officer in charge of a lord's horses, later a high military rank in medieval Europe, and in Britain a police officer.
In the United States it came to mean a local public officer, usually at town or township level, responsible for keeping order and serving writs and court orders.
As seen in a recordOccupation column of the 1850 to 1940 census
Amos Kidd, 50, Constable
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Daily Ancestor. "Constable." Dictionary of Old Record Words. https://dailyancestor.com/dictionary/occupations/constable. Last checked 2026-10-10.