Paul Kelly Association
 Paul Kelly in a photograph published by McClure's Magazine in 1909 | |
| Also Known As | Paul Kelly Club Paul Kelly gang |
|---|---|
| Origins | |
| Founder | Francesco Paolo “Paul Kelly” Vaccarelli |
| Founding Location | Lower East Side, Manhattan, New York City |
| Territory | Lower East Side north of the historic Five Points intersection |
| Headquarters | Mulberry Street north of Broome Street (early) 57–59 Great Jones Street (by 1905) 338 Bowery (athletic-club address) |
| Profile | |
| Structure | Social and athletic association linked to cooperating neighborhood crews |
| Ethnicity | Primarily Italian-American |
| Activities | Election fraud Hired violence and assault Gang fighting Protection of criminal businesses Dances, picnics and ticket sales |
| Politics | |
| Leader | Francesco Paolo “Paul Kelly” Vaccarelli |
| Notable Members | John “Kid Griffo” Cucco Thomas “Eat-'em-up Jack” McManus |
| Allies | Five Points Gang crews James Street Gang (affiliated under Johnny Torrio) |
| Rivals | Eastman Gang |
| Activity | |
| Years Active | c. 1901–late 1905 |
| Dissolved Date | Late 1905 |
| Dissolution Cause | Little Naples shooting Police closure pressure Kelly's withdrawal to East Harlem |
The Paul Kelly Association was an Italian-American gang and social or athletic association active on Manhattan's Lower East Side from approximately 1901 until late 1905. It was led by Italian-born former boxer Francesco Paolo Vaccarelli, who used the name Paul Kelly. Contemporary newspapers called it the Paul Kelly Association, Paul Kelly Club or Paul Kelly gang; later writers frequently identified it with the Five Points Gang.[1]
Organization and territory
[edit]Kelly was involved in prizefighting and gang activity by 1901. Newspapers in 1902–03 reported his association separately from the Five Points Italian gang, although the organizations cooperated against Monk Eastman's network.[2][3] A modern reconstruction in Informer places Kelly's territory primarily north of the historic Five Points intersection rather than inside the old neighborhood itself.[1]
The association first operated above a Mulberry Street saloon north of Broome Street. By 1905 its center was Kelly's Brighton or New Brighton establishment—also called Little Naples—at 57–59 Great Jones Street, with an official athletic-club address at 338 Bowery.[1] Kelly's organization combined a social-club structure with cooperating neighborhood crews. Contemporary reports linked it to election repeating, paid violence, gang fighting and fundraising through dances, picnics and ticket sales.[4][5]
Composition and alliances
[edit]The association was primarily Italian-American. The evidence reviewed does not support the familiar formula that Kelly founded a predominantly Irish gang or that his core organization had a settled Italian-Irish-Jewish membership balance. Jewish and Eastern European gangsters were especially prominent in the rival Eastman network, while individual crews and alliances crossed ethnic lines.[1] John “Kid Griffo” Cucco was a well-supported lieutenant, and the association paid for Thomas “Eat-'em-up Jack” McManus's funeral in 1905. Jack Sirocco and Johnny Torrio commanded allied or separately organized crews and should not automatically be treated as Kelly subordinates.[1]
Biographers describe Torrio's James Street Gang as allied or affiliated with the Five Points network. Robert J. Schoenberg says Torrio “allied his James Streeters with the Five Points gang,” and John Kobler calls Torrio's organization an “affiliated gang.”[6][7]
Eastman conflict
[edit]Contemporary newspapers document repeated fighting in 1902–03 between Kelly's association, cooperating Five Points crews and Monk Eastman's predominantly Jewish-American network. Reports connected the conflict to territory, political work and hired violence. These accounts support a coalition of crews more strongly than Herbert Asbury's later depiction of a single centralized army.[2][3][8]
Decline
[edit]In November 1905, gunmen attacked Little Naples. William Harrington was killed and Kelly was wounded. Police moved to close the Great Jones Street businesses, and Kelly abruptly left the association and Lower East Side gang life for East Harlem.[9][10][1] This supports an organizational endpoint in late 1905, although former associates and the Five Pointers label persisted.
Later Five Points narrative
[edit]Herbert Asbury's 1928 account called Kelly “chieftain of the Five Pointers,” attributed approximately 1,500 members to him and described a large centralized territory and hierarchy.[11] Those details appeared more than two decades after Kelly's Lower East Side career and are not consistently corroborated by the contemporary reports. They are therefore treated as Asbury's later narrative rather than settled organizational facts.
See also
[edit]- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 Informer: The History of American Crime and Law Enforcement, October 2023, pp. 35–50, 77–84.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 “Gangsters Battle in City Streets”, The Evening World, September 30, 1902, p. 6.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 “Gang Men to Fight Eastman”, The Evening World, April 18, 1903, p. 8.
- ↑ “Price List for Crime”, The Evening World, October 23, 1903, p. 10.
- ↑ “Thus Does a Gang Grow Up”, The Sun, October 11, 1903, p. 20.
- ↑ Robert J. Schoenberg, Mr. Capone (William Morrow, 1992), chapter 2.
- ↑ John Kobler, Capone: The Life and World of Al Capone (Da Capo Press edition), p. 26.
- ↑ “An East Side Vendetta”, The New York Times, September 17, 1903.
- ↑ “One Dead in Gang Battle”, The Sun, November 24, 1905, p. 2.
- ↑ “Gangsters Shoot Up Kelly's Place”, New-York Tribune, November 23, 1905, p. 1.
- ↑ Herbert Asbury, The Gangs of New York (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1928), pp. 272–296.