The Beatles in New York: Police logs detail band's first US visit

The log books show which officers were deployed to deal with the impact of The Beatles

Police log books for the officers who protected The Beatles from hordes of screaming fans on their first visit to the US have gone on display.

The records list the names of the officers who guarded the band in New York as they prepared to appear on The Ed Sullivan Show in February 1964.

The visit saw the Fab Four followed by huge crowds wherever they went.

NYPD officer Patrick Cassidy, who found the logs, has donated them to Liverpool's Magical Beatles Museum.

The band were met by screaming fans wherever they appeared in New York

Detailed as the "visit of Beatles singing group", the handwritten police blotter lists Sergeants O'Shea, Jones and McAuliffe, with officers Delgado, De Angelo, Lucarelli and Madden among the NYPD detachment looking after the band.

The records also mention The Beatles' show at Carnegie Hall on 12 February 1964 and an incident where an officer was "knocked off balance" and injured outside the Plaza Hotel while "attempting to restrain the surging crowd".

The records refer to the arrival of the "Beatles singing group"

Mr Cassidy, whose father Edward also served with the NYPD, said he found the logs while searching in police records.

"The Ed Sullivan Theatre is in the confines of my precinct, so one day in 2013, I went into the storage area that holds these books.

"After 50 years, they clean out and destroy them, so I looked up February '64 and found the book, which would have been destroyed the following year."

The US visit saw the band play their first gig at New York's Carnegie Hall

Mr Cassidy said his father had told him he found The Beatles to be "well dressed and well behaved", adding that the band had modestly assumed "the crowds outside the hotel were for someone else".

The Beatles had already hit number one in the US charts when they arrived on 7 February 1964 and the levels of anticipation surrounding their arrival had not been seen since the days of Elvis Presley in the 1950s.

The Beatles' debut TV appearance was seen by an estimated 73 million people in the US

Throngs of screaming fans and reporters shadowed the band's every move, with police on alert for anyone posing as hotel guests or other disguises trying to get close to them.

Their appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, which marked their US TV debut, was watched by a then record 73 million people, with 60% of televisions in the country tuned in to the show.