The initial class composition of the troops was 50% Sikhs and 50% Dogras, Rajputs and Mussulmans (Muslims) from the Punjab and the North-West Frontier.

[1] Whatever the case, the regiment was raised and trained and developed as an elite corps, which soon saw action in Bihar (then part of Eastern Bengal) in the Sonthal 'parganas'.

The battle honour Defence of Arrah was awarded to the Bengal Military Police Battalion for their conduct during the Siege of Arrah, when a party of 68 men (including 50 from this unit) held out for 7 days against an estimated 2000–3000 mutinying sepoys and rebellious citizens, suffering only one casualty.

[6] On 27 September 1858 a party of Cavalry commanded by Lieutenant Charles George Baker (Commandant of Cavalry for the Bengal Military Police Battalion), consisting of 69 men from the Bengal Military Police Battalion and 56 men from the 3rd Sikh Irregular Cavalry defeated a force of around 1000 mutinying Bengal Native Infantry soldiers.

[7] During the 1857–59 Indian Mutiny the Bengal Military Police Battalion appears in official paperwork with the following names: