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  It sometimes happens that as the river-thieves are seeking a haven of safety after a robbery, and as their boat glides quietly along in the dark, that another is seen, and shooting out from behind some wharf or from the shade of some vessel, she makes rapidly for the thieves. They see their enemy and know it for the police-boat. Now comes the race. The police-boat has more men and gaining rapidly on her prey, the latter is called on to surrender. The answer is a laugh of derision as the men lay aside their oars and drawing weapons, prepare to defend them selves to the last. One shot fired at the police-boat brings a dozen in return, and the fusilade is fast and furious for a minute. A cry. “My God, I’m shot,” comes from the boat of the thieves, and when the police pull alongside, they find all the men wounded and faint, but one, and he has passed over the river to the Thither Shore.

  The tales which these men, criminal as they are, could tell of life at the water-side, would form a page which might be read for the edification of those who seek to know the dark side of life. For as the river-thief, like Rogue Riderhood, pulls up and down in search of plunder, or, in the thieves’ vernacular, “swag,” he not infrequently hears the splash in the water that tells him of “Another Unfortunate” who has ended a world of trouble and sorrow in that one leap from life to death. He has seen them when they first stood gazing moodily into the water below, and knew from his own experience of life that they, contemplating in bitter agony the past of sorrow and wondering how in the future they may escape the judgment they have been taught to believe is in store for them; he has seen the last leap that told of the first embrace of death; he has noted the rising bubbles that tell of the spirit departed, and the prow of his boat has pushed aside from its course the floating body. And yet none of these things have moved him to reflection, or to such reflection as brings repentance and reformation. And when his trip is performed and he has come safely away with his plunder, he resorts to the vilest drinking saloons of the river-side, and there in the company of his “pals” he forgets the dangers he has passed and sinks deeper and deeper into crime in the exchange of ideas and experiences to be put into practice at the first opportunity.

  The Double Execution.—Howlett and Saul.

  Twenty years ago, river-thieves were more numerous, if not more daring, than they are to-day. The execution together of Howlett and Saul, which took place in the Tombs on the 28th of January, 1853, struck terror to the hearts of the entire fraternity, and for a brief period their depredations almost ceased.

  One murky night in the fall of 1852, a trio of river pirates quietly pulled alongside of the ship William Watson, then lying between James slip and Oliver street. They stealthily climbed over the ship’s side to her deck. Entering the cabin, they were detected in the act by private watchman Charles Baxter. But one shot was fired, and the watchman fell to the deck dead, the ball having passed through his neck, but the report of the pistol had been heard by a vigilant policeman, and the result was that the murderers were arrested. They proved to be Nicholas Howlett, William Saul, and one Johnson, well-known river-thieves. The three were tried and found guilty of murder in the first degree, and sentenced to be hanged January 28th, 1853. The night previous to the execution, the condemned men appeared in excellent spirits, and laughed and conversed as if their hours on earth were not numbered. They retired about midnight, and both dreamt of being hung. Early on the day of execution, they expressed a desire to see the gallows. When Howlett ascertained that there was a weight to be used, he remarked, “We will go up, instead of going down.” Saul answered, “If the spirit went up, it did not matter as to the body.” Howlett accompanied the priests to the chapel, where mass was celebrated, while Saul, who was a Protestant, was visited by several eminent clergymen. In the yard surrounding the gallows were about three hundred persons, many of whom had known the condemned men from boyhood. Johnson, whose sentence had been commuted, the day previous, to imprisonment for life, took an affectionate farewell of the men who were to soon suffer the extreme penalty. Sheriff Orser appeared and notified the doomed men that the hour had arrived for their execution, and with little ceremony they were prepared for the gallows. On reaching the foot of the scaffold, Saul expressed a desire to meet several persons, and a number came forward and shook hands with him; among whom were Tom Hyer and Bill Poole, the noted pugilists. Saul uttered a heartfelt prayer for Howlett and himself, and committed his soul to God. The Sheriff, who was much affected, kissed each of the men, and then gave the signal. The axe fell, the rope was severed, and they were jerked six feet from the ground and into eternity.

  A Backward Glimpse at the River Pirates.

  Not having the inclination, nor the opportunity, in the preparation of this work, to delve into the “flash” memoirs of the river-thieves of New York and Brooklyn, for the purpose of producing a panoramic history of their personnel and operations, we gladly avail ourselves of the subjoined article from the Brooklyn Eagle. It has evidently been collected by a careful hand, and is a miniature painting of the daring exploits, for years back, of these reckless men. It scarcely needs any comment, as it adorns its own tale and points its own moral.

  “Ever since the days of Saul and Howlett, organized bands of pirates and river-thieves have infested both shores of the East River. This fact has been long and well known to the police of New York and Brooklyn, who have not alone become familiar with the members of the different gangs, but have learned their resorts, their ‘molls,’ their ‘pals’ and their ‘fences,’ and yet have failed to make any organized attempt to break up river piracy. The Harbor Police of New York freely admit their inability to suppress stealing on the river, and claim that too much duty is required of too few men, while the Brooklyn Police urge as an excuse the fact that they have no Harbor Police. That there is some truth in these explanations none can deny, for with the many miles of water front possessed by both cities and the inducements held out by the junkmen, the wonder is that more depredations are not committed.

  “River-thieves as a class are more reckless of human life than either burglars or highwaymen. They believe in the doctrine that ‘dead men tell no tales,’ they always go well armed, and never hesitate to sacrifice life rather than jeopardize their own liberty. They are like wharf-rats, as much at home in the water as on shore, and when once they have committed a robbery or a murder, if too closely chased, they are prepared to jump overboard, dive under a pier, and thus escape arrest or even detection, as has often been done. Probably within a day or two afterward the vessel they have robbed and the friends of the man they have murdered will have gone to sea. Thus the circumstances will soon die out of the recollection of the detectives, who, not stimulated by the hope of a reward, will, of course, fail to make any efforts to discover the perpetrators of what the newspapers will style, ‘Another River Outrage.’

  “The river- thieves of New York and Brooklyn are divided into two classes, namely, those who steal from the docks in the day-time, and those who board and rob vessels by night. In this city the former class abound. Though troublesome, they are not considered dangerous. New York is the haven of the more desperate class; men born on the river who have graduated in crime, and who, after serving several terms in reformatories, jails, and penitentiaries, come forth full-fledged pirates, ready to scuttle a ship, rob a cabin, cut a throat, or throw a watchman overboard. This class belongs to the peculiar institutions of New York city, while our own dock thieves, less known, cruise from Hudson avenue to the Atlantic Dock, paying occasional visits to the Wallabout, back of the Navy Yard Dock, and sometimes inside the Cob Dock of the Navy Yard, thence to that still sparsely settled region between the built-up portion of Williamsburgh and Brooklyn proper. If closely pressed they leave their boats and their ‘swag,’ and soon find refuge in the classic regions of Irishtown.

  “Twenty years ago river pirates were more numerous, if not more daring, than they are to-day. There were ‘Sow’ Madden, ‘Slobbery Jim,’ ‘Bill Lowrie,’ and ‘One-armed Charle
y,’ the pals of Saul and Howlett. As they met their fate, younger men took their places. ‘Old Tom Flaherty,’ ‘Tommy Shay,’ ‘Bum’ Mahoney, ‘Cow-legged Sam,’ ‘Socco,’ ‘Denny’ Brady, and others then became the chief of the river-thieves, and more recently there has been ‘Scotchy Lavelle,’ ‘Tom the Mick,’ ‘Larry Nevins,’ Martin Broderick, Dongan, Carroll, Preslin, Coffee, Merricks, the Commodore, and the gangs so well known about the Hook, the Navy Yard, and the shores of Brooklyn, New York, Jersey City, Hoboken, and Staten Island.

  “The exploits of these river-thieves make a perfect romance of crime. Devoid of sensationalism, it is a chapter in the criminal history of New York and Brooklyn as thrilling and interesting as it is true.

  “Many old citizens will recollect the excitement caused by the murder of a watchman on board the ship William Watson, lying between James slip and Oliver street, nearly twenty-one years ago. Three river-thieves boarded the vessel at night for the purpose of committing a robbery. They were discovered by the watchman while in the act of rifling the cabin, and thinking to escape detection by murder a shot was fired. The watchman fell dead, shot through the neck, but the pistol-shot had been heard by a vigilant policeman, and the result was that the murderers were arrested. They proved to be Saul, Howlett, and one Johnson, all well-known river-thieves. Justice was then more swift than it is now. Johnson turned State’s evidence, and Saul and Howlett expiated their crime on the gallows. What became of Johnson is a mystery to the present day, but it has been hinted that he was killed by ‘Bill’ Lowrie and others of the Saul and Howlett gang for having ‘given them away.’ At any rate, Lowrie and ‘Slobbery Jim’ became the leaders of the gang, with their headquarters at Slaughter-House Point, a low gin-mill at the corner of Water street and James slip, kept by Pete Williams, formerly of New Orleans. After seven murders had been committed there, the place was closed by Captain (now Inspector) Thorne, of the Fourth Ward Police. Then ‘Bill’ Lowrie and his reputed wife, ‘Moll’ Maher, opened a grogshop in Water street, near Oliver, next door to ‘Bilker’s Hall.’ It was called ‘The Rising States,’ and for many years was the headquarters of the river-thieves. About this time Charley Monnell, alias ‘One-armed Charley,’ became a recognized power among the thieves and murderers in the Fourth Ward. He opened a place in Dover street, which he called the ‘Hole in the Wall,’ and with Kate Flannery and ‘Gallus Mag’ as Lieutenants, soon made his den attractive to his kindred spirits. It was there that ‘Slobbery Jim’ stabbed and killed ‘Patsey the Barber;’ it was there that thieves and junkmen would meet to ‘put up jobs;’ it was there that men were drugged and robbed and women beaten under ‘One-armed Charley’s’ directions; it was there that young thieves became graduates in crime.

  “In 1858 the pirates were stronger, more numerous and better organized than they had been since Saul and Howlett were hanged. The police of the Fourth Ward had nightly encounters with the river-thieves, and Roundsman Blair and Officers Spratt and Gilbert were making themselves notorious by shooting a round dozen of the pirates within a year. ‘Slobbery Jim’ had meanwhile made his escape, and never more was heard of until he turned up as captain of a company of rebels during the late war; Bill Lowrie had been sent to State Prison for fifteen years; Sam McCarthy, alias ‘Cow-legged Sam,’ had given up the river and become a burglar, and the rest of the mob had moved up town toward the Hook, or to the neighborhood of the Brooklyn Navy Yard. And thus the old Saul and Howlett gang dropped out of existence, and to a great extent out of the recollection of almost everybody. About this time business began to increase in the Seventh Ward, New York. Junkmen, who, as a class, are not inquisitive and buy anything from anybody without asking any questions about where it came from, began moving from the Fourth to the Seventh Ward. They seemed to do a thriving business, thanks to such thieves as Bill Murray, George Williams, John Watson, Socco, Jim Coffee, Valentine, Billy Woods, Tom the Mick, Larry Nevins, Scotchy Lavelle, Martin Broderick, Abe Cokeley, Denny Brady, George alias Pat alias Sow Madden, Piggy, Beeny, Nigger and a score of others. This mob did their work very quietly for several years, and were really being forgotten except by the junkmen, when Perry, the junkman, shot and killed ex-Police Officer Thomas Hayes at the Harbeck Stores, Furman street. Perry, the junkman, was one of the New York mob, and Hayes was employed as a private detective at Harbeck Stores. It was found necessary to kill Hayes in order to commit a particular robbery, and his life was sacrificed. With a bullet in his breast, his life’s blood flowing out in torrents, poor Hayes jumped on a passing horse-car, and as he fell into a seat, he said to the astonished passengers, ‘My name is Thomas Hayes. I am a private watchman at Harbeck Stores. Ned Perry shot me’—and died. The murderer escaped hanging and is now serving out a life sentence in State Prison.

  “Four years of comparative quiet again elapsed and the scenes of these midnight murders and robberies had again been transferred, this time to the neighborhood of the Battery. Vigilance on the part of the police soon drove them away, however, and the old ground was visited again. The old river-thieves had all been ‘settled,’ and the young ones were ambitious. This was the condition of affairs when on the night of May 29, 1873, Joseph Gayles, alias ‘Socco the Bracer,’ ‘Bum’ Mahoney, a first-class river-thief, and ‘Billy’ Woods, formerly a stone-cutter but now a murderer and expert river-thief, stole a boat from the foot of Jackson street, and with muffled oars pulled down stream to Pier 27, East River. They boarded the Brig Margaret, of New Orleans, and while ransacking the captain’s trunk awakened the captain and mate. A scuffle ensued which resulted in the thieves leaving the brig and taking to their boat. An alarm brought officers Musgrave and Kelly to the scene of the attempted robbery. It was three o’clock in the morning, the sky was over cast, and not a star was to be seen. As Musgrave flashed his dark lantern under the pier, he saw a boat starting out. Throwing the rays of his lantern full upon it, three men stood up, revolvers in hand, and the firing began. Musgrave’s first shot gave ‘Socco’ his death wound.

  “The officers continued firing until they had emptied their pistols, but the thieves escaped in the darkness, and pulled over toward the Long Island shore. ‘Socco the Bracer’ fainted from loss of blood, and his companions, thinking he was dead, threw him overboard to lighten the boat. The water revived him and he begged piteously to be taken in the boat again. This was done, after much trouble, but as soon as he touched the thwart he gasped and died. The boat was again stopped mid-stream and the lifeless body of ‘Socco the Bracer,’ with the tell-tale bullet hole through the breast, was thrown to the waters, but four days afterward it came to the surface at the foot of Stanton street, within sight from the residence of the dead river-thief. Secrecy was no longer possible, and now the thieves themselves admit that their pal was killed by Officer Musgrave, of the Fourth Precinct Police.

  “Socco’s just fate did not prevent the commission of other robberies.

  “Less than three months ago the brig Mattano, Captain Connington, was boarded off the Battery by a gang of masked and armed men. The captain and his wife were subjected to many indignities and then robbed of everything of value they had on board the vessel. For this crime two well-known river-thieves, Dougan and Carroll, were arrested, tried, convicted, and sentenced to twenty years’ imprisonment in State Prison. They confessed they had been river-thieves all their lives, but denied all knowledge of the crime with which they were charged. Despite their prayers, protestations and oaths, they were convicted, but it has recently been made known to the authorities that the robbery was committed by ‘Denny’ Brady, ‘Larry’ Griffin and ‘Patsy’ Conroy. These three men belong to the gang of masked burglars who have lately been committing such terrible depredations in the suburban villages. Brady is now confined in jail at Catskill, charged with the robbery of Mr. Post’s house, and Griffin and Conroy are in the White Plains jail, awaiting trial for the robbery of Mr. Emmett’s residence. Brady is a man well known to sports who travel down the Coney Island road; a medi
um-sized man, with broad shoulders and powerful build. A sentence of, at least, twenty years in State Prison awaits each of them, and the probabilities are that Dougan and Carroll will be pardoned—and arrested again at some not distant day, for a crime they will actually commit. In quick succession several other daring robberies were perpetrated, during the month of December. First came the robbery of the bark ‘Zonma,’ at Pier 22, East River. Louis Engleman, a Fourth Ward river-thief, who lived at No. 57 Rose street, New York, is the convicted thief. He was captured by Sergeant Blair, of the Second Precinct, after a chase of three hours, during which he jumped overboard and while hanging on to the rudder of a three-masted schooner, at Pier 27, was thrown a rope by a policeman. ‘Go to h—l with your rope,’ he exclaimed, rejecting it. ‘You shan’t take me alive.’

  “He dove under vessels and docks, and for a long time defied half a dozen officers in boats, but he was at length captured, and is now doing the State some service. The following night an attempt was made to steal some bales of cotton-duck from Pier 8, North River. The watchman gave the alarm, which brought Officer Mulrooney and Captain Lowrie to the scene. The thieves, as they pulled away in their boat, opened fire upon the officers, which the latter returned, apparently with good effect, as one man was heard to exclaim: ‘Oh, I’m shot,’ but no trace of a dead or wounded river-thief has since been found.