National Academy of DesignAn 1858 painting by George Henry Hall entitled A Dead Rabbit or Study of an Irishman.The 2002 film Gangs of New York focuses on two gangs in 19th-century New York: the Natives and the Dead Rabbits. In real life, the Natives were called the Bowery Boys. But Dead Rabbits truly existed and, just as the movie suggests, the group was composed of Irish immigrants.In the mid-19th century, they controlled a large swath of Lower Manhattan, including in the notorious Five Points neighborhood. The Dead Rabbits frequently clashed with the Bowery Boys, who embraced anti-immigration, anti-Irish, and anti-Catholic ideas making them the Dead Rabbits natural enemy. Their most infamous clash came on July 4, 1857, in a raucous street brawl that left dozens if not hundreds injured. This is the wild true story of the Dead Rabbits, the real New York City gang from Gangs of New York.Irish Immigration To New York City In The 19th CenturyThe story of the Dead Rabbits begins with Irish immigration to New York City, which soared during the mid-19th century. Then, many Irish fled Ireland during the Irish Potato Famine and some 900,000 arrived in New York between 1845 and 1855. According to RTE, Irish-born New Yorkers were a third of the citys population by 1855.Many of the immigrants had come to the United States with nothing, having spent what little money they had on their passage across the Atlantic. As such, many settled into poorly maintained tenement housing, which was largely concentrated in the Lower East Side. Library of CongressA New York City tenement building. A few residents can be seen sitting on the fire escape.Tenements were dark, densely crowded, and ridden with disease, and Irish immigrants relied on each other to survive. They developed social networks, opened businesses, and, as a growing voting bloc, changed the citys politics.In the rough-and-tumble world of 19th-century Manhattan, they also formed gangs including the Dead Rabbits. And this gang of Irish immigrants soon clashed with another group, the nativist Bowery Boys. The Dead Rabbits And The Bowery BoysThe Dead Rabbits, who controlled territory in Lower Manhattan and the Five Points neighborhood, were a gang composed of Irish Catholic immigrants. Theres some debate about where their name came from. One story states that a dead rabbit was thrown into the middle of the room during a meeting, and was taken as a lucky omen.Another, suggested by the Observer, postulates that it came from the Gaelic ribad (a big, hulking person). With dead meaning very, perhaps Dead Rabbits was born. Public DomainA depiction of a Dead Rabbit gang member.Then again, its also possible that the Dead Rabbits were actually part of a different gang, the Roach Guards, or that the term dead rabbit was a pejorative used by both their enemies and the New York City press. In any case, the gang was said to be led by John Old Smoke Morrissey, an Irish-born boxer who later became a U.S. Congressman. Most of the other members were men, but the Dead Rabbits purportedly included women in their ranks as well, including the fearsome Hell-Cat Maggie who allegedly wore brass fingernails and filed her teeth to points. And the Dead Rabbits had an enemy: the Bowery Boys. This gang represented the anti-Irish feeling of the era. As the Library of Congress reports, many Americans looked down on the Irish because of their poverty, their living conditions, their willingness to work for low wages, and their Catholicism. The Bowery Boys were thus anti-Catholic and and anti-Irish.Wikimedia CommonsJohn Old Smoke Morrissey, the leader of the Dead Rabbits.They were led by William Poole, also known as Bill the Butcher, until 1855. Then, Poole was shot and killed by Morrissey and his compatriots. According to The History of the City of New York Project, Pooles last words were purportedly: I think I am a goner. If I die, I die a true American; and what grieves me most is, thinking that Ive been murdered by a set of Irish by Morrissey in particular.But the most violent clash between the Dead Rabbits and the Bowery Boys occurred two years later, in July 1857.The Dead Rabbits Riot Of July 1857 And Their Legacy TodayOn July 4, 1857, tensions between the Dead Rabbits and the Bowery Boys escalated into open warfare. As the city celebrated Independence Day, the two gangs came head-to-head in a violent clash that left dozens wounded. As The New York Times breathlessly reported on July 6, the so-called Dead Rabbits riot or Great Gang Fight began when the Dead Rabbits attacked a Bowery Boys clubhouse. The attack was not anticipated, the paper wrote, [but] still a vigorous resistance was made by the assailed fire arms, clubs, brick-bats, and stones were freely used.Though the Bowery Boys were forced to retreat, the Great Gang Fight ratcheted up that evening and bled into the next day. Hundreds of gang members perhaps as many as 1,000 bitterly fought on the streets of Manhattan. While residents locked their windows and doors, and police tried to contain the violence, the gang warfare went on.Public DomainA depiction of the Great Gang Fight of 1857, which left dozens injured and at least eight men dead.Brickbats, stones and clubs were flying thickly around, and from the windows in all directions, and the men ran wildly about brandishing firearms, The New York Times wrote. Wounded men lay on the sidewalks and were trampled upon. Now the Rabbits would make a combined rush and force their antagonists up Bayard street to the Bowery. Then the fugitives, being reinforced, would turn on their pursuers and compel a retreat to Mulberry, Elizabeth and Baxter streets.The gang fight didnt end until the night of July 5, when the New York state militia arrived. By then, eight men had reportedly been killed and between 30 and 100 had been injured. But the true tally may never be known.Though the Dead Rabbits remained active in New York City, little is known about their activities after this point, and they more or less disappeared from newspaper coverage by the 1860s. But their story which is also a story of immigration and belonging was memorably revived in Gangs of New York.After reading about the Dead Rabbits, the notorious Irish gang of 19th-century New York City, discover the story of Lucky Luciano, the man who created the American mafia. Or, look through these stunning photos of New York City from when it was mostly farmland, not skyscrapers.The post The Dead Rabbits: The Story Behind One Of 19th-Century New Yorks Most Notorious Gangs appeared first on All That's Interesting.