One wonders how such an insignificant alley could get such an absurdly large reputation, but, as a matter of fact, Minetta Lane, and Minetta street, which leads from it southward to Bleecker street, were, until a few years ago, two of the most enthusiastically murderous thoroughfares in New York. Bleecker street, MacDougal street and nearly all the streets thereabouts were most unmistakably bad, but when the Minettas started out the other streets went away and hid. To gain a reputation in Minetta Lane, in those days, a man was obliged to commit a number of furious crimes, and no celebrity was more important than the man who had a good honest killing to his credit. The inhabitants for the most part were negroes and they represented the very worst elements of their race. The razor habit clung to them with the tenacity of an epidemic, and every night the uneven cobbles felt blood. Minetta Lane was not a public thoroughfare at this period. It was a street set apart, a refuge for criminals. Thieves came here preferably with their gains, and almost any day peculiar sentences passed among the inhabitants. “Big Jim turned a thousand last night.” “No-Toe’s made another haul.” And the worshipful citizens would make haste to be present at the consequent revel.
As has been said, Minetta Lane was then no thoroughfare. A peaceable citizen chose to make a circuit rather than venture through this place, that swarmed with the most dangerous people in the city. Indeed, the thieves of the district used to say: “Once get in the Lane and you’re all right.” Even a policeman in chase of a criminal would probably shy away instead of pursuing him into the Lane. The odds were too great against a lone officer.
Sailors and any men who might appear to have money about them, were welcomed with all proper ceremony at the terrible dens of the Lane. At departure, they were fortunate if they still retained their teeth. It was the custom to leave very little else to them. There was every facility for the capture of coin, from trap-doors to plain ordinary knock-out drops.
And yet Minetta Lane is built on the grave of Minetta Brook, where, in olden times, lovers walked under the willows of the bank, and Minetta Lane, in later times, was the home of many of the best families of the town.
A negro named Bloodthirsty was perhaps the most luminous figure of Minetta Lane’s aggregation of desperadoes. Bloodthirsty, supposedly, is alive now, but he has vanished from the Lane. The police want him for murder. Bloodthirsty is a large negro and very hideous. He has a rolling eye that shows white at the wrong time and his neck, under the jaw, is dreadfully scarred and pitted.
Bloodthirsty was particularly eloquent when drunk, and in the wildness of a spree he would rave so graphically about gore that even the habituated wool of old timers would stand straight. Bloodthirsty meant most of it, too. That is why his orations were impressive. His remarks were usually followed by the wide lightning sweep of his razor. None cared to exchange epithets with Bloodthirsty. A man in a boiler iron suit would walk down to City Hall and look at the clock before he would ask the time of day from the single-minded and ingenuous Bloodthirsty.
After Bloodthirsty, in combative importance, came No-Toe Charley. Singularly enough, Charley was called No-Toe solely because he did not have a toe to his feet. Charley was a small negro and his manner of amusement was not Bloodthirsty’s simple way. As befitting a smaller man, Charley was more wise, more sly, more round-about than the other man. The path of his crimes was like a corkscrew, in architecture, and his method led him to make many tunnels. With all his cleverness, however, No-Toe was finally induced to pay a visit to the gentlemen in the grim gray building up the river.
Black-Cat was another famous bandit who made the Lane his home. Black-Cat is dead. It is within some months that Jube Tyler has been sent to prison, and after mentioning the recent disappearance of Old Man Spriggs, it may be said that the Lane is now destitute of the men who once crowned it with a glory of crime. It is hardly essential to mention Guinea Johnson. Guinea is not a great figure. Guinea is just an ordinary little crook. Sometimes Guinea pays a visit to his friends, the other little crooks who make homes in the Lane, but he himself does not live there, and with him out of it there is now no one whose industry in unlawfulness has yet earned him the dignity of a nickname. Indeed, it is difficult to find people now who remember the old gorgeous days, although it is but two years since the Lane shone with sin like a new head-light. But after a search the reporter found three.
Mammy Ross is one of the last relics of the days of slaughter still living there. Her weird history also reaches back to the blossoming of the first members of the Whyo gang in the old Sixth ward, and her mind is stored with bloody memories. She at one time kept a sailor’s boarding house near the Tombs prison, and accounts of all the festive crimes of that neighborhood in ancient years roll easily from her tongue. They killed a sailor man every day, and pedestrians went about the streets wearing stoves for fear of the handy knives. At the present day the route to Mammy’s home is up a flight of grimy stairs that is pasted on the outside of an old and tottering frame house. Then there is a hall blacker than a wolf’s throat and this hall leads to a little kitchen where Mammy usually sits groaning by the fire. She is, of course, very old and she is also very fat. She seems always to be in great pain. She says she is suffering from “de very las’ dregs of de yaller fever.”
During the first part of a reporter’s recent visit, old Mammy seemed most dolefully oppressed by her various diseases. Her great body shook and her teeth clicked spasmodically during her long and painful respirations. From time to time she reached her trembling hand and drew a shawl closer about her shoulders. She presented as true a picture of a person undergoing steady, unchangeable, chronic pain as a patent medicine firm could wish to discover for miraculous purposes. She breathed like a fish thrown out on the bank, and her old head continually quivered in the nervous tremors of the extremely aged and debilitated person. Meanwhile her daughter hung over the stove and placidly cooked sausages.
Appeals were made to the old woman’s memory. Various personages who had been sublime figures of crime in the long-gone days were mentioned to her, and presently her eyes began to brighten. Her head no longer quivered. She seemed to lose for a period her sense of pain in the gentle excitement caused by the invocation of the spirits of her memory.
It appears that she had had a historic quarrel with Apple Mag. She first recited the prowess of Apple Mag; how this emphatic lady used to argue with paving stones, carving knives and bricks. Then she told of the quarrel; what Mag said; what she said; what Mag said; what she said. It seems that they cited each other as spectacles of sin and corruption in more fully explanatory terms than are commonly known to be possible. But it was one of Mammy’s most gorgeous recollections, and, as she told it, a smile widened over her face.
Finally she explained her celebrated retort to one of the most illustrious thugs that had blessed the city in bygone days. “Ah says to ’im, Ah says: ‘You—you’ll die in yer boots like Gallopin’ Thompson—dat’s what you’ll do. You des min’ dat, honey! Ah got o’ny one chile an’ he ain’t nuthin’ but er cripple, but le’me tel’ you, man, dat boy’ll live t’ pick de feathers f’m de goose dat’ll eat de grass dat grows over your grave, man!’ Dat’s what I tol’ ’im. But—lan’ sake—how I know dat in less’n three day, dat man be lying in de gutter wif a knife stickin’ out’n his back. Lawd, no, I sholy never s’pected noting like dat.”
These reminiscences, at once maimed and reconstructed, have been treasured by old Mammy as carefully, as tenderly, as if they were the various little tokens of an early love. She applies the same back-handed sentiment to them, and, as she sits groaning by the fire, it is plainly to be seen that there is only one food for her ancient brain, and that is the recollection of the beautiful fights and murders of the past.
On the other side of the Lane, but near Mammy’s house, Pop Babcock keeps a restaurant. Pop says it is a restaurant and so it must be one, but you could pass there ninety times each day and never know that you were passing a restaurant. There is one obscure little window in the b
asement and if you went close and peered in, you might, after a time, be able to make out a small dusty sign, lying amid jars on a shelf. This sign reads: “Oysters in every style.” If you are of a gambling turn of mind, you will probably stand out in the street and bet yourself black in the face that there isn’t an oyster within a hundred yards. But Pop Babcock made that sign and Pop Babcock could not tell an untruth. Pop is a model of all the virtues which an inventive fate has made for us. He says so.
As far as goes the management of Pop’s restaurant, it differs from Sherry’s. In the first place, the door is always kept locked. The wardmen of the Fifteenth precinct have a way of prowling through the restaurant almost every night, and Pop keeps the door locked in order to keep out the objectionable people that cause the wardmen’s visits. He says so. The cooking stove is located in the main room of the restaurant, and it is placed in such a strategic manner that it occupies about all the space that is not already occupied by a table, a bench and two chairs. The table will, on a pinch, furnish room for the plates of two people if they are willing to crowd. Pop says he is the best cook in the world.
When questioned concerning the present condition of the Lane, Pop said: “Quiet? Quiet? Lo’d save us, maybe it ain’t! Quiet? Quiet?” His emphasis was arranged crescendo, until the last word was really a vocal explosion. “Why, disher’ Lane ain’t nohow like what it uster be—no indeed, it ain’t. No, sir! ‘Deed it ain’t! Why, I kin remember when dey des was a-cuttin’ an’ a-slashin’ ’long yere all night. ’Deed dey was! My—my, dem times was diff’rent! Dat dar Kent, he kep’ de place at Green Gate Cou’t—down yer ol’ Mammy’s—an’ he was a hard baby—’deed, he was—an’ ol’ Black-Cat an’ ol’ Bloodthirsty, dey was a-roamin’ round yere a-cuttin’ an’ a-slashin’ an’ a-cuttin’ an’ a-slashin’. Didn’t dar’ say boo to a goose in dose days, dat you didn’t, less’n you lookin’ fer a scrap. No, sir!” Then he gave information concerning his own prowess at that time. Pop is about as tall as a picket on an undersized fence. “But dey didn’t have nothin’ ter say to me! No, sir! ’Deed, dey didn’t! I wouldn’t lay down fer none of ’em. No, sir! Dey knew my gait, ’deed, dey did! Man, man, many’s de time I buck up agin ’em. Yes, sir!”
At this time Pop had three customers in his place, one asleep on the bench, one asleep on the two chairs, and one asleep on the floor behind the stove.
But there is one man who lends dignity of the real bevel edged type to Minetta Lane and that man is Hank Anderson. Hank of course does not live in the Lane, but the shadow of his social perfections falls upon it as refreshingly as a morning dew. Hank gives a dance twice in each week, at a hall hard by in MacDougal street, and the dusky aristocracy of the neighborhood know their guiding beacon. Moreover, Hank holds an annual ball in Forty-fourth street. Also he gives a picnic each year to the Montezuma Club, when he again appears as a guiding beacon. This picnic is usually held on a barge and the occasion is a very joyous one. Some years ago it required the entire reserve squad of an up-town police precinct to properly control the enthusiasm of the gay picnickers, but that was an exceptional exuberance and no measure of Hank’s ability for management.
He is really a great manager. He was Boss Tweed’s body servant in the days when Tweed was a political prince, and anyone who saw Bill Tweed through a spy-glass learned the science of leading, pulling, driving and hauling men in a way to keep the men ignorant of it. Hank imbibed from this fount of knowledge and he applied his information in Thompson street. Thompson street salaamed. Presently he bore a proud title: “The Mayor of Thompson street.” Dignities from the principal political organization of the city adorned his brow and he speedily became illustrious.
Hank knew the Lane well in its direful days. As for the inhabitants, he kept clear of them and yet in touch with them according to a method that he might have learned in the Sixth ward. The Sixth ward was a good place in which to learn that trick. Anderson can tell many strange tales and good of the Lane and he tells them in the graphic way of his class. “Why, they could steal your shirt without moving a wrinkle on it.”
The killing of Joe Carey was the last murder that happened in the Minettas. Carey had what might be called a mixed-ale difference with a man named Kenny. They went out to the middle of Minetta street to affably fight it out and determine the justice of the question. In the scrimmage Kenny drew a knife, thrust quickly and Carey fell. Kenny had not gone a hundred feet before he ran into the arms of a policeman.
There is probably no street in New York where the police keep closer watch than they do in Minetta Lane. There was a time when the inhabitants had a profound and reasonable contempt for the public guardians, but they have it no longer, apparently. Any citizen can walk through there at any time in perfect safety unless, perhaps, he should happen to get too frivolous. To be strictly accurate, the change began under the reign of Police Captain Chapman. Under Captain Groo, the present commander of the Fifteenth precinct, the Lane has donned a complete new garb. Its denizens brag now of its peace, precisely as they once bragged of its war. It is no more a bloody lane. The song of the razor is seldom heard. There are still toughs and semi-toughs galore in it, but they can’t get a chance with the copper looking the other way. Groo has got the poor old Lane by the throat. If a man should insist on becoming a victim of the badger game, he could probably succeed upon search in Minetta Lane, as indeed, he could on any of the great avenues, but then Minetta Lane is not supposed to be a pearly street in Paradise.
In the meantime, the Italians have begun to dispute possession of the Lane with the negroes. Green Gate Court is filled with them now, and a row of houses near the MacDougal street corner is occupied entirely by Italian families. None of them seems to be overfond of the old Mulberry Bend fashions of life, and there are no cutting affrays among them worth mentioning. It is the original negro element that makes the trouble when there is trouble.
But they are happy in this condition, are these people. The most extraordinary quality of the negro is his enormous capacity for happiness under most adverse circumstances. Minetta Lane is a place of poverty and sin, but these influences cannot destroy the broad smile of the negro, a vain and simple child but happy. They all smile here, the most evil as well as the poorest. Knowing the negro, one always expects laughter from him, be he ever so poor, but it was a new experience to see a broad grin on the face of the devil. Even old Pop Babcock had a laugh as fine and mellow as would be the sound of falling glass, broken saints from high windows, in the silence of some great cathedral’s hollow.
ADVENTURES of A NOVELIST
[The headline above Crane’s report in
the September 20, 1896, edition of the New York Journal read:
ADVENTURES OF A NOVELIST
BY STEPHEN CRANE
THE DISTINGUISHED AUTHOR’S NARRATIVE OF HOW HE SOUGHT “MATERIAL” IN REAL LIFE IN THE “TENDERLOIN” AND
FOUND MORE THAN HE BARGAINED FOR.]
This is a plain tale of two chorus girls, a woman of the streets and a reluctant laggard witness. The tale properly begins in a resort on Broadway, where the two chorus girls and the reluctant witness sat the entire evening. They were on the verge of departing their several ways when a young woman approached one of the chorus girls, with outstretched hand.
“Why, how do you do?” she said. “I haven’t seen you for a long time.”
The chorus girl recognized some acquaintance of the past, and the young woman then took a seat and joined the party. Finally they left the table in this resort, and the quartet walked down Broadway together. At the corner of Thirty-first street one of the chorus girls said that she wished to take a car immediately for home, and so the reluctant witness left one of the chorus girls and the young woman on the corner of Thirty-first street while he placed the other chorus girl aboard an uptown cable car. The two girls who waited on the corner were deep in conversation.
The reluctant witness was returning leisurely to them. In the semi-conscious manner in which people note details
which do not appear at the time important, he saw two men passing along Broadway. They passed swiftly, like men who are going home. They paid attention to none, and none at the corner of Thirty-first street and Broadway paid attention to them.
The two girls were still deep in conversation. They were standing at the curb facing the street. The two men passed unseen—in all human probability—by the two girls. The reluctant witness continued his leisurely way. He was within four feet of these two girls when suddenly and silently a man appeared from nowhere in particular and grabbed them both.
The astonishment of the reluctant witness was so great for the ensuing seconds that he was hardly aware of what transpired during that time, save that both girls screamed. Then he heard this man, who was now evidently an officer, say to them: “Come to the station house. You are under arrest for soliciting two men.”
With one voice the unknown woman, the chorus girl and the reluctant witness cried out: “What two men?”
The officer said: “Those two men who have just passed.”
And here began the wildest and most hysterical sobbing of the two girls, accompanied by spasmodic attempts to pull their arms away from the grip of the policeman. The chorus girl seemed nearly insane with fright and fury. Finally she screamed:
“Well, he’s my husband.” And with her finger she indicated the reluctant witness. The witness at once replied to the swift, questioning glance of the officer, “Yes; I am.”
If it was necessary to avow a marriage to save a girl who is not a prostitute from being arrested as a prostitute, it must be done, though the man suffer eternally. And then the officer forgot immediately—without a second’s hesitation, he forgot that a moment previously he had arrested this girl for soliciting, and so, dropping her arm, released her.