Bowery Boys (gang)

, a Bowery grocer, was the inspiration for Mose the Fireboy, the quintessential Bowery B'hoy folk hero In the Antebellum Period, the population of single working men living in lower Manhattan increased significantly. These young men were drawn to the city by rising wages for laborers, brought about by growing technology and industrialization that followed the War of 1812. Typically firemen or mechanics, b'hoys spent their free time in the theaters and bars that surrounded their living wards around the Bowery. Writer James Dabney McCabe observed of the Bowery B'hoy in 1872: “You might see him ‘strutting along like a king’ with his breeches stuck in his boots, his coat on his arm, his flaming red shirt tied at the collar with a cravat such as could be seen nowhere else...None so ready as he for a fight, none so quick to resent the intrusion of a respectable man into his haunts.” The term B'hoy was also widely used to describe a young man of the working-class who enjoyed drinking, seeking out adventure, and finding fun. While various gangs were called the "Bowery Boys" throughout the antebellum years, Mike Walsh is often considered to have founded the gang's first incarnation. Walsh, an Irish-born Protestant, shaped the Bowery Boys into an anti-Catholic Irish gang. He acted as a political leader to the Bowery Boys and was elected to the United States House of Representatives. When he died in 1859, his obituary, published in The Subterranean and thought to have been written by Walt Whitman, read that the leader of the Bowery Boys was an "original talent, rough, full of passionate impulses...but he lacked balance, caution-the ship often seemed devoid of both ballast and rudder". During the New York Draft Riots of 1863, the Bowery Boys reached the height of their power, taking part in the looting of much of New York City while fighting with rival gangs, the New York Police, and the Union Army. By the end of the decade, the gang had split into various factions and the Bowery Boys gradually disappeared. == Appearance ==

Appearance was of great importance to Bowery B'hoys, who dressed for both flair and convenience. A typical Bowery B'hoy wore: “[a] black silk hat, smoothly brushed, sitting precisely upon the top of his head, hair well oiled, and lying closely to the skin, long in front, short behind, cravat a-la sailor, with the shirt collar turned over it, vest of fancy silk, large flowers, black frock coat, no jewelry, except in a few instances, where the insignia of the engine company to which the wearer belongs, as a breastpin, black pants, one or two years behind the fashion, heavy boots, and a cigar about half smoked, in the left corner of his mouth, as nearly perpendicular as it is possible to be got. He has a peculiar swing, not exactly a swagger, to his walk, but a swing, which nobody but a Bowery boy can imitate.”George Foster, a travel writer, wrote in 1850: “Who are the b’hoys and g’hals of New York?...sometimes a stout clerk in a jobbing-house, oftener a junior partner at a wholesale grocery, and still more frequently a respectable young butcher with big arms and broad shoulders, in a blue coat with a silk hat and a crape wound about its base, and who is known familiarly as a ‘Bowery Boy!'” ==The Bowery Theatre==

The Bowery Boys were known to frequent theaters in New York City. Richard Butsch in The Making Of American Audiences notes, "they brought the street into the theater, rather than shaping the theater into an arena of the public sphere". The Bowery Theatre, in particular, was a favorite among the Bowery Boys. The Bowery Theatre was built in 1826 and soon became a theater for the working man. Walt Whitman described the theater as "packed from ceiling to pit with its audience, mainly of alert, well-dressed, full-blooded young and middle aged men, the best average of American-born mechanics". Higher wages brought higher standards of living for working-class citizens, which provided them both social mobility and the ability to indulge in entertainment. File:Bowery Theatre, Manhattan.jpg|Bowery Theatre, the Bowery, Manhattan, New York City File:Bowery-Theatre-Leslie-1856.jpeg|The interior of the Bowery Theatre Rowdiness Rowdy Bowery B'hoy audiences mostly sat in the theater's pit, and often requested that songs, dances, and scenes be repeated multiple times or added impromptu to the performance, Some found this behavior more tolerable: “Walt Whitman warmly recalled the Bowery Theatre around the year 1840, where he could look up to the first tier of boxes and see ‘the faces of the leading authors, poets, editors, of those times,’ while he sat in the pit surrounded by the ‘slang, wit, occasional shirt sleeves, and a picturesque freedom of looks and manners, with a rude, good-nature and restless movement’ of cartmen, butchers, firemen, and mechanics.” Rioting The Bowery B'hoys, among other groups, participated in the Astor Place Riots of 1849, which were fueled by class tensions in New York City as well as a drawn-out feud between actors Edwin Forrest and William Macready. ==Theatrical representation==

Benjamin Baker's play A Glance at New York, written in 1848, created popular depictions of a Bowery B'hoy and G'hal. Their sayings and the names of the characters, Mose and Liza, were picked up and used popularly to refer to b'hoys and g'hals outside of the production. Even travel writers used these characterizations to describe Bowery B'hoys and G'hals to tourists and readers abroad. Written phonetically in the b'hoys' typical accent, Mose's dialogue includes sayings that were picked up by audience members and used in daily life. As described by the New York Herald, "the lithographers are multiplying his likeness throughout the city. The boys in the street have caught his sayings.." Throughout the play, Mose is ready to fight anyone who might oppose him or his companions. The play ends with an act of bravery on his part, as he leaves to help a fellow fireman, Sykesy, in a fight. Lize The Bowery G'hal was depicted in this play as Eliza Stebbins, or "Lize". George G. Foster writes on the character of Lize: "The g'hal is as independent in her tastes and habits as Mose himself. Her very walk has a swing of mischief and defiance in it, and the tones of her voice are loud, hearty, and free." In a bonnet and mismatching styles, her outfit fits the g’hal sensibility to go against the current fashions of respectable society. Reception The characters of Mose and Lize were revisited by other playwrights and writers, including Ned Buntline in his story, The Mysteries and Miseries of New York. Travel writer George G. Foster wrote of the play: "With the exception of the single drama which Mr. Chanfrau, slight as is its plot and meager and commonplace as are its incidents, has been able by the force of his genius to confer a new character upon the stage, nothing has been adequately done to begin imparting to our literature the original and rich wealth lying latent in the life and history of Mose and Lize." ==In popular culture==

• The main character of Patricia Beatty's 1987 historical children's fiction novel Charley Skedaddle is a Bowery Boy before enlisting as a drummer in the Union army. • The 2002 Martin Scorsese film Gangs of New York features a semi-fictionalized version of "Bill the Butcher" as a central character belonging to a gang of nativists. The Bowery Boys themselves are also briefly depicted including their feud with the Dead Rabbits and their firefighting tradition. • The 2025 Netflix TV show House of Guinness features the Bowery Boys in Episode 4. ==Gallery==

File:Bowery Boys Soap Locks 1840-1844.jpg|Bowery Boys with soap-locks hairstyle, smoking cigars and wearing working class fashionable clothing, circa 1840–1847. File:Bowery Boys Street Corner.jpg|Bowery Boys on a street corner in the Bowery. File:Dead Rabbit.jpg|Member of Dead Rabbits street gang, the Bowery Boys' arch rivals. File:Dead rabbits barricade new york.jpg|A fight between the Dead Rabbits and the Bowery Boys during the 1857 Dead Rabbits Riot. File:New York Draft Riots - fighting.jpg|Bowery gangs clashing with police and Union Army troops in the 1863 New York City draft riots. ==Notable Bowery Boys==

• Mike Walsh, gang leader • William "Bill the Butcher" Poole, gang leader ==See also==