Gotham's First Crime Boss Defends  Himself     " The Captain," as Isaiah Rynders (1804-1885) was known, was a violent man and a violent racist.  He earned the captain's title for briefly captaining a sloop (one sail) packet boat along the Hudson River before becoming a gambler and knife fighter. Some time in the late 1830s he appeared in New York City and worked his way up in politics as the enforcing arm of the Tammy Hall Democrats.        Rynders owned a string of saloons in the city and gathered around him men who were young, violent, and looking for money.  He was head of the crime gang Dead Rabbits, a  thoroughly  criminal enterprise, and president of The Empire Club," which generally did the  rough  enforcement  for Tammy Hall.      "The Captain"  Rynders was a leader in what was called "The Astor Opera House Riot in May,1849.  (Worthy of its own future blog entry.)  In the 185...

  The Code Duello             Southern congressmen used the threat of dueling to bully Northern members into supporting—or, at least not opposing—pro slavery bills. It was one of several ways a wealthy minority could control the country’s governance against the clear sentiment of the majority. By the 1850s  a Southern congressman  refusing a duel   meant certain defeat at the next election. By contrast, a Northern member accepting a duel challenge could count of being defeated at the next election as the North’s repulsion against both slavery and duels grew. 25 Congressional Challenges New York Herald August 31, 1856             There have been 25 congressional challenges to fight duels since the organization of the First Congress, and the greater number of these originated in quarrels which, though political, had no reference to matters which occ...

        The Lincoln’s knew how to throw a party.  Abraham Lincoln’s second Inaugural Ball took place March 4, 1865, the evening after he had been sworn into office for a second term. (It was not until the 1930s that the inauguration of presidents was changed to January.) Counting the ticket sales and the formal invitations four thousand people attended the ball.  The event was a spectacular success and a spectacular mess.      The government patent office was the only building large enough for the event.  Now, you may wonder why the Patent Office had such a huge building.  Well, it’s because they had to store and display the thousands of models required of each patent filed. Don’t ask me what the Patent Office did with the models to make room for the ball.      Newspapers in the big cities, Washington, New York, and Philadelphia wrote similar reports of the event. I have chosen to reproduce the account from the Washin...

  The 5,000 Richest Girls in the US        I am occasionally asked, “how do you find  all the strange stuff in your blog?”      The answer is “I stumble onto it.”  Researching one thing leads to reading about something else just as fascinating or unknown as what I am originally looking for.      For example: I was looking for stories about the election of Nathaniel Banks, Jr. as Speaker of the US House of the 34 th  Congress February 2, 1856. Banks was elected after the House had voted 133 times! over a period stretching from December 1855 to February 2, 1856 Nathaniel Banks 1842      A short story in the Alexandria Virginia Gazette from February 4, 1856 briefly reports the election of a new Speaker of the House.  The paper has a longer article about deep disagreement between General Winfield Scott, head of the US Army, and then Secretary of War Jefferson Davis.       On t...

  WHAT IS A LIFE WORTH? Kidnapped! Part 2 The Slave Ship  1840 painted by JMW Turner depicts the drowning hands and limbs sinking into the waves as fish feast on them. If a slave ship captain thought a slave sick or a discipline problem, they were simply thrown overboard.  Many times, loss of slaves at sea was partly covered by insurance through Lloyds of London.  In the hold of a slave ship--choosing which ones  to throw overboard--  those who are too sick or those deemed troublemakers      What is an enslaved African worth to a white New York City banker?       Before the American Civil War, the single factor contributing the most to New York City's wealth was Wall Street's financing the trans-Atlantic slave trade even though s cholars believe only 5% of the millions of people captured and sent to the New World were taken to the United States  .        Wall Street banks arranged financing for m...