Five Points Gang
Members of the Five Points Gang of New York City.
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| Founder | Paul Kelly |
|---|---|
| Founding location | Five Points, Manhattan |
| Years active | 1890s–1920s |
| Territory | New York City, mainly active in Lower Manhattan, Harlem and Brooklyn |
| Ethnicity | Mainly Italians, but also Jews and Irish |
| Leader(s) | Paul Kelly |
| Criminal activities | Racketeering, extortion, pimping, illegal gambling, robbery, fraud |
| Allies | Tammany Hall |
| Rivals | Eastman and Gopher gangs |
| Notable members | |
Five Points Gang was a 19th-century and early 20th-century criminal organization, primarily of Irish-American origins, based in the Sixth Ward (The Five Points) of Manhattan, New York City. In the early 19th century, the area was first known for gangs of Irish immigrants. Their descendants gradually moved out, to be followed by the next immigrants.
Paul Kelly, born as Paolo Antonio Vaccarelli, was an Italian American who founded the Five Points Gang, one of the dominant street gangs in the first two decades of the twentieth century. Over the years, Kelly recruited youths who later became prominent criminals, such as Johnny Torrio, Al Capone and Lucky Luciano.
The area of Manhattan where four streets – Anthony (now Worth), Cross (now Mosco), Orange (now Baxter), and Little Water (now nonexistent) – converged was known as "The Five Points".Mulberry, notorious for slum tenements, was one street down from the Five Points. This area, now the location of Chinatown, lay between Broadway and the Bowery. By the 1820s, this district had been a center of settlement for poor immigrants and was considered a "slum" area.
Gambling dens and brothels were numerous in the Five Points area, and it was considered a dangerous destination, where many people had been mugged, particularly at night. In 1842, Charles Dickens visited the area and was appalled at the poor living conditions in substandard housing.
By the 1870s a wave of Italian and Eastern European Jewish immigrants were settling into the area. Criminal gangs competed for control of the revenue to be made from illicit activities. Irish gangs, such as the Whyos, replaced the Chichesters. Monk Eastman's Eastman Coin Collectors had many Irish members.
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