The Great Riots of New York, 1712 to 1873

by Joel Tyler Headley

There was, however, some excuse for him. He had been several times candidate for city register, and hence was more anxious to secure votes than flour—be a popular demagogue rather than a public benefactor.

But there were other speakers who kept more directly to the point. They launched at once into a bitter tirade against landlords for their high rents, and against monopolists for holding on to flour at the expense of the poor and suffering. Knowing the character of the audience before them, and their bitter hatred of the rich that had grown with their growth, and strengthened with their strength in the old country, it was not difficult to lash them into a tempest of passion. They depicted the aristocrats around them rolling in wealth, wrung from their necessities—laughing at their sufferings while rioting in luxury—nay, hoarding up the very bread without which they must starve, in order to realize a few dollars more on a barrel of flour. Loud oaths and deep muttered curses followed these appeals, and the excited multitude became agitated with passion. One of the speakers closed his bitter harangue with "Fellow-citizens, Mr. Eli Hart has now 53,000 barrels of flour in his store; let us go and offer him eight dollars a barrel for it, and if he will not take it—" It was not difficult to know how he meant to close the sentence; but just then, a friend shrewder than he, seeing the legal consequences to themselves of an open proposition to resort to violence, touched him on the shoulder, when in a lower tone of voice he concluded: "we shall depart in peace." In the excitement of the moment, he had evidently forgotten the guarded language he intended to use, and was about to utter that which would have consigned him to a prisoner's cell, but checked himself in time. He was willing others should suffer the consequence of violating the law, to which his appeals urged them; but his love for the poor did not prompt him to share their fate.

It was bitterly cold, and it was a wonder that the crowd had listened patiently so long. The proposition to go to Hart's store with a demand for flour, was instantly seized, and those around the speaker started off with a shout, and streaming down Broadway, poured in one dark living stream along Cortlandt Street into Washington Street. The clerks in the store heard the turmoil, and suspecting the object of the rioters, rushed to the doors and windows, and began to close and bolt them. There were three large iron doors opening on the sidewalk, and they had succeeded in bolting and barring all but one, when the mob arrived. Forcing their way through this middle door, the latter seized the barrels, and began to roll them out into the street. Mr. Hart, who, either from curiosity to hear what the meeting would propose to do, or from his suspicions being aroused from what he had previously heard, was on the spot, and as soon as he saw the crowd stream out of the Park, down Broadway, he hurried to the police, and obtaining a posse of officers, made all haste for his store. But as they were going down Dey Street, the mob, which blocked the farther end, rushed on them with such fury, that before they had time to defend themselves, their clubs, or staves as they were then called, were wrenched from their hands and broken into fragments. The crowd was not yet very great, and the disarmed officers forced their way into Washington Street and into the store. Their presence frightened the few inside, and they hastily decamped. The Mayor, who was in his room at the City Hall, had been speedily notified of the riot, and hurried to the spot. The crowd remaining in the Park had also been informed of what was going on, and dashing madly down Broadway, and through Cortlandt Street, joined with loud shouts their companions in front of the store. The Mayor mounted a flight of steps, and began to harangue the mob, urging them to desist, and warning them of the consequences of their unlawful action. He had not proceeded far, however, before brick-bats, and sticks, and pieces of ice came raining around him in such a dangerous shower, that he had to give it up, and make his way to a place of safety. The street was now black with the momentarily increasing throng, and emboldened by their numbers, they made a rush at the entrance of the store. Driving the police-officers before them, they wrenched by main force one of the heavy iron doors from its hinges. A half a score of men at once seized it, and using it as a battering-ram, hurled it with such force against the others, that after a few thundering blows, they one after another gave way, and the crowd poured in. The clerks fled, and the rioters went to work without hindrance. Mounting to the upper lofts, they first broke in all the doors and windows, and then began to roll and heave out the flour. The barrels on the ground-floor were rolled, swift as one could follow another, into the street, when they were at once seized by those waiting without, and their heads knocked in, and their contents strewn over the pavement. On the upper lofts, they were rolled to the broken windows, and lifted on to the sill, and tumbled below. Warned by their descent, the crowd backed to the farther side of the street. Part would be staved in by their fall; those that were not, were seized as they rolled off the sidewalk, and the heads knocked out. One fellow, as he stood by the window-sill and pitched the barrels below, shouted as each one went with a crash to the flagging: "Here goes flour at eight dollars a barrel!"

The scene which now presented itself was a most strange, extraordinary one. The night was clear and cold, and the wintry moon was sailing tranquilly through the blue and starlit heavens, flooding here and there the sea of upturned faces with its mellow light, or casting the deep shadow of intervening houses over the black mass, while the street looked as if a sudden snow-storm had carpeted it with white. The men in the windows and those below were white with flour that had sifted over their garments; while, to give a still wilder aspect to the scene, women, some bareheaded, some in rags, were roaming around like camp-followers after plunder. Here a group had seized empty boxes; there others pressed forward with baskets on their arms; and others still, empty-handed, pushed along, with their aprons gathered up like a sack. These all knelt amid the flour, and scooped it up with an eagerness that contrasted strangely with the equal eagerness of those who were scattering it like sand over the street. The heavy thud of the barrels as they struck almost momentarily on the sidewalk, could be distinctly heard above the shouts of the men. Some of the mob found their way into Mr. Hart's counting-room, and tore up his papers and scattered them over the floor. It was evident they were bent on utter destruction; but when about five hundred barrels of flour had been destroyed, together with a thousand bushels of wheat in sacks, a heavy force of police came marching along the street. These were soon after followed by detachments of the National Guards from Colonel Smith's and Hele's regiments. The flashing of the moonbeams on the burnished barrels and bayonets of their muskets, struck terror into the hearts of the rioters. The cry of "The soldiers are coming!" flew from lip to lip, causing a sudden cessation of the work of destruction, and each one thought only of self-preservation. Many, however, were arrested, and sent off to Bridewell under the charge of Officer Bowyer, with a squad of police. The latter were assailed, however, on the way, by a portion of the mob that pursued them, and a fierce fight followed. In the struggle, Bowyer and his assistants had their clothes torn from their backs, and some of the prisoners were rescued.

In the meantime, the military paraded the street, clearing it of the mob, and preventing their return. In front of the store, and far beyond it, the flour lay half-knee deep—a sad spectacle, in view of the daily increasing scarcity of grain.

Just before the military and police reached the ground, some one in the crowd shouted "Meeches." This was another flour store at Coenties Slip, on the other side of the city, nearly opposite. A portion of the mob on the outside, that could not get to the store, and aid in the work of destruction, at once hurried away to this new field of operations. On the way over, they passed Herrick & Co.'s flour store, and stopped to demolish it. They were loaded down with brick-bats, which they hurled at the windows, smashing them in. The doors followed, and the crowd, rushing through, began to roll out the barrels of flour. But when some twenty or thirty were tumbled into the street, and about half of them staved in, they, for some cause or other, stopped. Some said that they ceased because the owner promised, if they did, he would give it all away to the poor the next day. At all events, they would soon have been compelled to abandon the work of destruction, for the police hastened to the spot, accompanied by a large body of citizens, who had volunteered their help. Some were arrested, but most of the ringleaders escaped.

How many of those who attended the meeting in the Park anticipated a mob and its action, it is impossible to say; but that a great number of them did, there can be no doubt.

By nine o'clock the riot was over, and those who had engaged in it were either arrested or dispersed.

The next day, Mr. Hart issued a card, denying that the exorbitant price of flour was owing to his having purchased a large quantity for the sake of monopolizing it, but to its scarcity alone.

It was certainly a very original way to bring down the price, by attempting to destroy all there was in the city. Complaining of suffering from the want of provisions, they attempted to relieve themselves by putting its possession out of their power altogether. With little to eat, they attempted to make it impossible to eat at all. A better illustration of the insensate character of a mob could not be given.