Roach Guards

The Roach Guards ( English roach , cockroach ' , guard , watchman ' ) were an Irish street gang in the Five Points of New York City between about 1820 and 1865. It belonged to the The Chichester , Forty Thieves , Kerryonians , Plug Uglies , Shirt Tails , Dead Rabbits or Swamp Angels are the forerunners of the five classic gangs ( Big Five ) of the city.

The Roach Guards could be identified by the blue stripe on their pants; the Dead Rabbits , which later split off from them (but allied), used the color red. The stripes served as a distinguishing feature, since in the fights between the gangs in the Five Points, as a rule, fought in the undershirt .

Like all Irish gangs of the time, the Roach Guards supported politicians from Tammany Hall of the city's Democratic Party .

history

The gang was originally formed to protect the alcohol dealers, but the group has criminalized itself from robbery to murder . Like all Irish gangs of the time, it was recruited from Irish immigrants.

The gang soon became involved in conflicts with the Bowery Boys after venturing into the Bowery district in southern Manhattan . However, the Roach Guards were quickly busy defending their own status in these "slugger battles" as the Bowery Boys were far better organized.

Another competition arose from former members who had formed as Dead Rabbits , it drove the gang into insignificance. After its peak around 1850, it disappeared from the scene at the latest with the end of the American Civil War in 1865.

literature

• Herbert Asbury: The Gangs of New York. Alfred A. Knopf, New York 1928, ISBN 1-56025-275-8 .
• Carl Sifakis: The Encyclopedia of American Crime. Facts on File Inc., New York 2001, ISBN 0-8160-4040-0 .