by Bruno, Joe
Except for a 33-inch club, the Watchmen carried no arms. And they wore no uniforms, except for a fireman's leather hat, which they varnished twice a year, which made the hat as hard as a rock; hence they received the name - “Leatherheads.” They were also called "Old Charlies," which was also not a term of endearment.
Starting in 1829, Watchmen were required by New York City ordinance to call out fires. If they saw smoke, the Watchmen would scream out either the name of his post, or the street name of where the fire was located.
There was also a street curfew, which stated anyone seen outdoors after 9 p.m. was considered to be of “bad morals.” It was the Watchmen's duty to arrest anyone they caught wandering the streets at night, and then bring them to the local jail to be locked up until daylight.
The Watchmen's pay was a mere $1 a night. They were also paid an additional fifty cents to attend as witnesses at Special Court Sessions. There, they would testify to the particulars of any crime they may have seen while on duty, which, because of their lack of energy, hardly ever happened.
The criminals and gangs of New York City had very little respect for the Watchmen, who numbered only 30-40 in the entire city. The Watchmen were considered not to be very bright, nor very ambitious and were known to be frequently drunk on duty.
Each Watchmen had a post, or watch-box, which consisted of an unanchored wooden shack, where they would frequently fall asleep on duty, usually after consuming large amounts of whiskey. A favorite activity of the young ruffians throughout the city was to catch a Watchmen sleeping in his watch-box, lasso the watch-box with a rope, and then drag it through the streets, whooping and hollering like banshees. The soon-to-be-famous writer Washington Irving was known to be one of these pranksters.
Whereas Watchmen patrolled New York City at night, the crime solvers, or Roundsmen, were the daytime duty men. Roundsmen were considered the plainclothesmen, or detectives of the era, but solving crimes was certainly not their strong suit. Roundsmen were usually common laborers, or stevedores, who could not find work in their chosen fields of endeavor. As a result, Roundsmen were not especially adept at solving crimes, or catching criminals
Roundsmen were paid no salary, and they derived their income solely by serving legal papers, or collecting rewards from citizens for returning stolen property. This led to some very enterprising Roundsmen forming alliances with groups of criminals. The crooks would steal the goods, and the victims would post a reward for the return of their property. The Roundsmen would then “find” the stolen property, collect the reward, and then split it with the crooks.
Solving murders was very low on the list of the Roundsmen's priorities, since there was usually no reward for finding killers. The only way a Roundsmen could make a profit going after murderers was if the family of the victim posted a reward. And if the Roundsmen was lucky enough to catch the killer, which was very unusual, he would collect the reward and a further stipend from the city for serving a legal summons on the perpetrator.
Because of their outright incompetence, the Roundsmen and Watchmen were fast becoming an endangered species. It was the 1841 murder of Mary Rogers that put the final nail in their coffin. With plenty of clues as to who the murderer was, the Roundsmen dragged their heels, long enough that Rogers's killer was never found.
In 1845, the public was fed up with the archaic system of Watchmen and Roundsmen acting as an incompetent and un-industrious quasi-police force. Spurred on by the fury of the press, New York City reformers disbanded the Watchmen and Roundsmen system, and they replaced it with a functional police department, which was then copied by many cities throughout the United States of America.
Weyer, John (Johnny Spanish)
Johnny Spanish, whose real name was John Weyer, was one of the most feared gangsters in the early part of the 20th century. Weyer took the name Johnny Spanish because he was half-Jewish and half-Spanish. On his Spanish side, Weyer claimed to be a descendant of Butcher Weyer, the last Governor of Cuba. Weyer figured “Johnny Spanish” had much more cache to it rather than plain old John Weyer the Jew, so he claimed the name Johnny Spanish as his very own.
Spanish was born on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, and he quickly immersed himself in various street crimes. The short, frail, and morose Spanish was a loner, whose specialty was robbing saloons. When robbing a dive, Spanish liked to throw in the twist of sending a message to the saloon owners first, telling them of his imminent arrival. Spanish's legend grew immensely, when he performed that feat in a joint on Norfolk Street owned by Mersher the Strong Arm.
On the morning of the robbery, Spanish gave Mersher notice that he would arrive at a certain time. And that he did, armed with his usual four guns and an accomplice lurking behind him. Spanish threw a couple of shots through the mirror behind the bar, and then he emptied the till. To add insult to injury, Spanish lined 10 customers against the wall, and he relieved them of all their cash and jewelry. Spanish's notoriety grew, and soon he was accepted into Paul Kelly's Five Points Gang where he continued his shenanigans.
As an addition to his saloon crimes, Spanish found it quite profitable to steal the proceeds from the lucrative stuss gambling games located throughout New York City (stuss was a game which was a variation of the popular faro). Spanish had his eye on one such game, operated by Kid Jigger on Forsyth Street. One day, Spanish approached Jigger, who was known to be a fierce gunfighter, and he demanded half the take from Jigger's stuss game.
“And why should I give you half my stuss graft?” Jigger inquired.
“Because I'll knock you off if you don't,” Spanish said.
Jigger just laughed.
Spanish took offense and told him, “Alright then, I'll knock you off tomorrow night.”
Sure enough, being a man of his word, on the following night, as Jigger strode from his stuss game on Forsyth Street, Spanish opened fire with two guns. Jigger ran back into the building to safety, but the bullets struck an 8-year-old girl who was playing in the streets, killing her on the spot.
This necessitated Spanish leaving New York city for several months, until the heat died down. When Spanish returned, he was alarmed to find out that his girlfriend (who happened to be pregnant by who-knows -who), had been stolen by fellow thug Kid Dropper, real name Nathan Kaplan.
Spanish figured he'd settle with his ex-girlfriend first. He grabbed her off the streets, threw her in a taxicab, and then he headed out to the marshes of Maspeth, Long Island. There, Spanish tied her to a tree, and then he emptied five bullets into her pregnant belly. Spanish left the woman there to die, but miraculously, she survived. However, her baby was subsequently born with three missing fingers.
For this atrocity, Spanish was arrested, tried, convicted, and sentenced to seven years in Sing Sing Prison. Upon his release in 1917, Paul Kelly's Five Points Gang had dissolved, so Spanish figured he would take over Kelly's former rackets. The only problem was, Kid Dropper had the same idea.
The two old foes battled over the union protection racket for more than two years. One day in early 1919, the bulkier Dropper cornered Spanish on the street, and he carved him up badly with a knife. Spanish survived, but not for long.
On July 29, 1919, Spanish was entering a restaurant at 19 Second Avenue, when Dropper and two accomplices opened fire, hitting Spanish several times in the chest.
Bullets working better than blades, Spanish died a few days later in Bellevue Hospital.
Wexler, Irving (Waxey Gordon)
In the 1920's, Waxey Gordon was one of the richest, most powerful gangsters in New York City. However, after he was set up by his enemies for a fall, Gordon was reduced to selling junk on the streets like a common two-bit criminal.
Waxey Gordon was born Irving Wexler in 1889 on the Lower East Side of Manhattan to Polish/Jewish parents. Not having a great fondness for the New York City school system, Wexler took to the streets, and he became the best pickpocket on the Lower East Side. Wexler was so good at his trade, he got the nickname “Waxey,” becau
se he was so “light fingered,” he could pick someone's wallet, like his fingers and the wallet were coated with wax. Waxey Gordon sounded better than “Waxey Wexler,” so Waxey Gordon it was, from that point on.
Gordon did what most tough Jewish criminals did in those days. He got involved in the labor rackets (with the Dopey Fein gang), and soon Gordon was “schlammin’,” or breaking heads, with the best of them. To supplement his income, Gordon also did a little burglary and minor dope dealings on the side.
One of the men Gordon cracked heads for was the legendary gambler Arnold “The Brain” Rothstein, who was known to do a little investing in other people's illegal enterprises. It was the beginning of Prohibition, and Gordon hooked up with small-time hood, Max “Big Maxey” Greenberg, who had big ideas, but little cash. Greenberg had left his home in St. Louis for the bright lights of Manhattan, because he heard there were certain people who might bankroll his dream of owning his own bootlegging business. Greenberg needed $175,000 to get started, and through Gordon's connection to Rothstein, Maxey and Waxey approached “The Brain” (on a Central Park bench, no less), about loaning them the cash they needed in return for a piece of the action.
At first, Rothstein turned them down flat. Then, Rothstein had a change of heart, as well as a change of plans. Rothstein saw tremendous potential in the bootlegging business, but what Greenberg and Gordon were planning was strictly small-time. Rothstein said he would loan them the money, but with very specific conditions.
First, Rothstein would run the operation; no questions asked. Greenberg and Gordon would act as Rothstein’s main men, using their street contacts as secondary employees, who were needed for such a big operation.
And second, instead of smuggling cheap hooch in boats from Canada, Rothstein saw more monetary potential in shipping in top-notch booze from England. Rothstein purchased six speedboats, and when the cargo ship he hired, carrying 20,000 cases of Scotch, arrived in American waters from England, it would stop several miles off the coast of Montauk, Long Island. There it would be met by the six Rothstein speedboats, each of which would carry nearly 1,000 cases of booze back to shore. After the speedboats made three or four trips from ship to shore, trucks would take the booze to a warehouse in Manhattan, where it would be stored, and then distributed to thousands of speakeasies throughout the city.
This continuing operation brought Gordon much wealth. It was estimated, Gordon earned between $1 and $2 million a year, pure profit for himself. With this dough, Gordon bought several office buildings in Manhattan, a string of speakeasies, and illegal gambling houses.
After Rothstein was killed over a bad gambling debt, Gordon purchased his own fleet of motor boats, to keep the illegal flow of booze coming from across the pond. Gordon also bought a townhouse in Manhattan on Central Park West and a castle in New Jersey, complete with its very own moat.
Gordon soon formed bootlegging partnerships with the Italian gangs, headed by Lucky Luciano, who was himself was partnered with Jewish kingpin Meyer Lansky. By this time, Luciano was in the process of organizing Italian gangs throughout the country under one umbrella, and Lansky was doing the same thing with Jewish gangs.
The only problem was, Lansky and Gordon, both Jews, couldn't stand each other and wouldn't even sit at the same table together. Both accused the other of hijacking their bootlegging trucks, and both were right in their assumptions.
What transpired next, was what was known in the press as “The War of the Jews.” Lansky killed Gordon's men, and Gordon returned the favor. Luciano tried to step in to settle the dispute, but to no avail.
Gordon had now been declared “Public Enemy Number One” by the FBI, which put him right in the cross-hairs of Special Prosecutor Thomas E. Dewey. In 1930, it was Luciano's idea to feed Gordon to Dewey on an income tax rap, with Lansky's brother Jake leaking information to Dewey's investigators, about Gordon's financial operations. Gordon was arrested and indicted by Dewey.
At Gordon's trial, Dewey was able to show that Gordon lived high on the hog, raking in almost $2 million a year and only reporting an annual salary of $8,125. One hundred and fifty witnesses testified against Gordon, and they minutely explained to the jury Gordon’s illegal moneymaking activities. As a result, the jury took only 51 minutes to come back with a guilty verdict, which sent Gordon to the slammer on a 10-year sentence.
In 1940, when Gordon was released from Leavenworth, all his properties had been seized by the government and his millions had somehow disappeared. He told reporters, “Waxey Gordon is dead. From now on it's Irving Wexler, salesman.”
Gordon became a salesman alright, but not in the conventional manner. Gordon moved out to California, and he began peddling dope on the streets. In 1951, Gordon was arrested while delivering $6,300 of heroin to a federal narcotics informant. One of the cops who arrested Gordon was Sgt. John Cottone.
As Cottone was putting the cuffs on Gordon, Gordon started crying “Please Johnny, don't arrest me. Don't take me in for junk. Let me run, then shoot me.”
In December of 1951, Gordon, now 63, was convicted of narcotics trafficking and sentenced to 25 years in Alcatraz Prison. Gordon, broke and a broken man, died in prison six months later of a heart attack.
Whyos Street Gang
The Whyos were a vicious Irish street gang which ruled Lower Manhattan, starting right after the Civil War and running through the 1890's. The Whyos started out as an offshoot of a pre-Civil War gang called the Chichesters. Their headquarters was in the 6th Ward on Baxter Street, formerly Orange Street, and named after Mexican War hero Lt. Col. Charles Baxter.
The Whyos got their name from the bird calls they made to each other to identify themselves as members of the gang. When they first appeared on the streets of Lower Manhattan, the Whyos cruised the area called Mulberry Bend, robbing, beating, and killing with ungodly gusto. Soon, they extended their domain to the Lower West Side, into Greenwich Village, and then further north.
Author Herbert Asbury said about the Whyos “The Whyos were the most ferocious criminals who ever stalked the streets of an American city.”
The Whyos favorite hangout was a dive on the corner of Mulberry and Worth called “The Morgue”; an apt name, since it was estimated that over 100 murders took place on the premises. The bar owner boasted his booze was powerful and quite tasty, but could also be used an excellent embalming fluid if necessary.
Myth had it, that in order to become a member of the Whyos, an aspiring member had to kill, or at least make an attempt to kill someone. One of the Whyos early leaders was Mike McCoin, who was hanged in the Tombs on March, 8, 1883, for the slingshot murder of a saloon owner on West 26th Street named Louis Hanier. The day after he killed Hanier, McCoin announced to his gang, “A guy ain't tough until he's knocked his man out (killed).”
Some hard men took McCoin's remark to heart and a string of murders followed, precipitating new members being inducted into the gang.
In the 1880's, the Whyos reached the height of their power, when such miscreants as Big Jim Hines terrorized the city. Hines was the first person to hold up stuss games, which were then run by the Italian and Jewish gangs and a great source of revenue. The stuss games were played nightly at numerous locations, from east of the Bowery, up to 14th Street, and then west to Broadway. Almost every night, Hines bounced from one stuss game to another, a huge gun in each hand. Using impending force, Hines extracted a fat percentage of each game, but he always left a substantial cut for the house.
Once, after he was arrested, Hines told a detective, “Them guys must be nuts. Don't I always leave 'em somethin'? All I want is me share.”
In 1884, Whyos member Piker Ryan was arrested for one of his numerous crimes. The police found a book on him, containing prices for a laundry list of crimes the Whyos performed for monetary profit. The list read:
Punching -- $2,
Both eyes blacked -- $4
Nose and jaw broke -- $10
Jacked out - - $15
Ear chewed off -- $
15
Leg or arm broke -- $19
Shot in the leg -- $25
Stab -- $25
Doing the big job (murder) -- $100 and up
Another prominent Whyos member was Dandy Johnny Dolan, who was fastidious in dress, with oiled and plastered hair, and a penchant for wearing only the finest shoe apparel available.
Dolan was also the inventor of two gruesome weapons. The first was sections of an ax blade, embedded in the sole of his “Fighting Shoes,” which he used to stomp and stab a fallen foe. The other was an “eye gouger,” made of brass and worn on Dolan’s thumb.
On August 22, 1875, Dolan decided to rob a brush manufacturer at 275 Greenwich Street. On the premises, he confronted James H. Noe, and Dolan bashed Noe over the head with an iron crowbar. Then Dolan proceeded to rob Noe of money, a gold watch and chain, and Mr. Noe's walking stick, which had a metal handle formed into the shape of a monkey. However, before Dolan left, he gouged out both of Mr. Noe's eyes with his “eye gouger,” and then he proudly showed Noe’s eyeballs to his pals.
Mr. Noe died a few days later, and when Dolan was soon arrested, he was walking with Mr. Noe's distinctive cane and carrying Mr. Noe's eyeballs in his pocket. As a result, Dolan was tried and convicted of murder. He was hung in the courtyard of the Tombs Prison, on April 21, 1876.
The most famous of the Whyos leaders were a couple of Dannys; Messrs. Driscoll and Lyons, who co-ran the Whyos in the 1880's. In 1888, Driscoll became involved in a gunfight with Five Points gang member John McCarthy, over the affections of a prostitute named Beezy Garrity. Not being the greatest of gunslingers, Driscoll accidentally shot and killed Ms. Garrity instead.
At his trial, Driscoll swore it was a case of mistaken identity, and that John McCarty had fired the fatal shots at Ms. Garrity. However, Garrity's mother, Margaret Sullivan, said on the witness stand that as her daughter lay dying at St. Vincent Hospital, she whispered into her mother's ear, “Danny Driscoll shot me, mother.”
