Great Riots of New York 1712 to 1873 | Page 3

J.T. Headley
Troops.--General Brown assumes Command.--Attack of Mob on the Tribune Building.--Its severe Punishment.--Government Buildings garrisoned.--Difficulty between Generals Brown and Wool.--Head-quarters.--Police Commissioners' Office Military Head-quarters.

CHAPTER XV.
Telegraph Bureau.--Its Work.--Skill and Daring and Success of its Force.-- Interesting Incidents.--Hairbreadth Escapes.--Detective Force.--Its arduous Labors.--Its Disguises.--Shrewdness, Tact, and Courage.--Narrow Escapes.--Hawley, the Chief Clerk.--His exhausting Labors.

CHAPTER XVI.
DRAFT RIOT--SECOND DAY.
Appearance of the City.--Assembling of the Mob.--Fight between Rioters and the Police and Soldiers.--Storming of Houses.--Rioters hurled from the Roofs.--Soldiers fire on the People.--Awful Death of Colonel O'Brien.-- Fight in Pitt Street.--Deadly Conflict for a Wire Factory.--Horrible Impaling of a Man on an Iron Picket.--Mystery attached to him.--Second Attack on Mayor Opdyke's House.--Second Fight for the Wire Factory.-- Telegraphic Dispatches.--Citizens Volunteering.--Raid on the Negroes.-- They are hunted to Death.--Savage Spectacle.--Negroes seek Head-quarters of Police.--Appearance and State of the City.--Colonel Nugent's House sacked.--Fight with the Mob in Third Avenue.--Battle at Gibbon's House.-- Policeman Shot.--Night Attack on Brooks and Brothers' Clothing Store.-- Value of the Telegraph System.--Captain Petty.--Seymour's Speech to the Mob.--Cars and Stages seized.--Barricades.--Other Fights.--Acton and his Labors.

CHAPTER XVII.
DRAFT RIOT--THIRD DAY.
Scenes in the City and at Head-quarters.--Fight in Eighth Avenue.--Cannon sweep the Streets.--Narrow Escape of Captain Howell and Colonel Mott.-- Battle for Jackson's Foundry.--Howitzers clear the Street.--State of Things shown by Telegraph Dispatches.--General Sandford sends out a Force against a Mob, at Corner of Twenty-ninth Street and Seventh Avenue.-- Colonel Gardin's Fight with the Mob.--Is Wounded.--Mob Victorious.--Dead and Wounded Soldiers left in the Street.--Captain Putnam sent to bring them away.--Disperses the Mob.--Terrific Night.

CHAPTER XVIII.
DRAFT RIOT--FOURTH DAY.
Proclamations by the Governor and Mayor.--City districted.--Appearance of the East Side of the City.--A small Squad of Soldiers chased into a Foundry by the Mob.--Fierce Fight between the Mob and Military in Twenty- ninth Street.--Soldiers driven from the Ground, leaving a dead Sergeant behind.--Captain Putnam sent to bring the Body away.--Mows down the Rioters with Canister.--Storms the Houses.--Utter Rout of the Mob.-- Colored Orphans and Negroes taken by Police to Blackwell's Island.-- Touching Scene.--Coming on of Night and a Thunder-storm.--Returning Regiments.--Increased Force in the City to put down Violence.--Archbishop Hughes offers to address the Irish.--Curious Account of an Interview of a Lady with him and Governor Seymour.--Strange Conduct of the Prelate.

CHAPTER XIX.
CLOSING SCENES.
Tranquil Morning.--Proclamation of the Mayor.--Mob cowed.--Plunderers afraid of Detection.--Dirty Cellars crowded with rich Apparel, Furniture, and Works of Art.--Archbishop Hughes' Address.--Useless Efforts.--Acton's Forty-eight Hours without Sleep over.--Change in Military Commanders in the City.--General Brown relinquishes his Command.--True Words.--Noble Character and Behavior of the Troops and Police.--General Brown's invaluable Services.

CHAPTER XX.
Continued Tranquillity.--Strange Assortment of Plunder gathered in the Cellars and Shanties of the Rioters.--Search for it exasperates the Irish.--Noble Conduct of the Sanitary Police.--Sergeant Copeland.-- Prisoners tried.--Damages claimed from the City.--Number of Police killed.--Twelve hundred Rioters killed.--The Riot Relief Fund.--List of Colored People killed.--Generals Wool and Sandford's Reports.--Their Truthfulness denied.--General Brown vindicated.

CHAPTER XXI.
ORANGE RIOTS OF 1870 AND 1871.
Religious Toleration.--Irish Feuds.--Battle of Boyne Water.--Orangemen.-- Origin and Object of the Society.--A Picnic at Elm Park.--Attacked by the Ribbonmen.--The Fight. After Scenes.--Riot of 1871.--Conspiracy of the Irish Catholics to prevent a Parade of Orangemen.--Forbidden by the City Authorities.--Indignation of the People.--Meeting in the Produce Exchange.--Governor Hoffman's Proclamation.--Morning of the 12th.--The Orangemen at Lamartine Hall.--Attack on the Armories.--The Harpers threatened.--Exciting Scenes around Lamartine Hall and at Police Head- quarters.--Hibernia Hall cleared.--Attack on an Armory.--Formation of the Procession.--Its March.--Attacked.--Firing of the Military without Orders.--Terrific Scene.--The Hospitals and Morgue.--Night Scenes.--Number of killed and wounded.--The Lesson.
THE GREAT RIOTS OF NEW YORK CITY.

CHAPTER I.
Character of a City illustrated by Riots.--New Material for History of Draft Riots.--History of the Rebellion incomplete without History of them.--The Fate of the Nation resting on the Issues of the Struggle in New York City.--The best Plan to adopt for Protection against Mobs.
The history of the riots that have taken place in a great city from its foundation, is a curious and unique one, and illustrates the peculiar changes in tone and temper that have come over it in the course of its development and growth. They exhibit also one phase of its moral character--furnish a sort of moral history of that vast, ignorant, turbulent class which is one of the distinguishing features of a great city, and at the same time the chief cause of its solicitude and anxiety, and often of dread.
The immediate cause, however, of my taking up the subject, was a request from some of the chief actors in putting down the Draft Riots of 1863, to write a history of them. It was argued that it had never been written, except in a detached and fragmentary way in the daily press, which, from the hurried manner in which it was done, was necessarily incomplete, and more or less erroneous.
It was also said, and truly, that those who, by their courage and energy, saved the city, and who now would aid me not only officially, but by their personal recollections and private memoranda, would
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