Mary Hare is probably best known as a pioneer of the education of deaf children, but a photograph sent recently to the Old Police Cells Museum at Brighton triggered some research which shows that she was also one of the early policewomen volunteers in World War 1. The photograph, annotated "Mary Hare: Policewoman" was taken by a Brighton photographer and initially caused some puzzlement because the photo was indistinct and, in any case, Brighton Borough didn’t recruit any women police until 1918 at the earliest. A higher definition photo has enabled the letters on the hat badge to be deciphered as 'WP' over 'V', more than probably "Women Police Volunteer".

Further research has shown that Mary Hare moved her Oral School for the Deaf from Upper Norwood to 17 St Michaels Place, Brighton in 1894. In 1901 it was relocated to 19 Goldsmid Road, Hove, and in 1909 it moved to larger premises at San Remo, 8 Kingsway, Hove (where it remained until it moved to become Dene Hollow Oral School for the Deaf in Burgess Hill in 1916). In 1907 she became an active member of the women’s suffrage movement and seems to have joined Damer Dawson’s Women’s Police Volunteers in London early in the war. Following a split within this organisation at least three members, apparently opposed to the militarisation of the organisation, and its renaming to the Women’s Police Service, moved to open a new branch in Brighton.

They kept the name Women Police Volunteers. One account of the history of the Great War in Hove suggests that in the spring of 1915 a Women Patrols Committee was formed for Brighton and Hove with the Countess of Chichester as president, the Mayoress of Brighton as chairman. Patrols were undertaken in both towns, though it is probably true to say that the Hove Chief Constable (William Cocks) was rather more supportive than was his colleague in Brighton. In May, 1917, a meeting to organise a distinct Hove section was held by the Mayoress at Hove Town Hall, and on this occasion the Chief Constable of Hove paid a "high tribute to the tactful and helpful work the patrols had done in the borough, not only in giving timely and wise advice to many young women and girls but by making reports on certain matters which had been most useful to the police".

It is difficult to say when Mary Hare left the WPV, but she was one of the main organisers of the WPV when it was established in Brighton, so may have stayed with the organisation even though the school she ran moved to Burgess Hill.