Editing Jackson Gang (section)

==Leader and territory==
Thomas Jackson was born around 1879 and became known as “Humpty” because of a pronounced spinal deformity. Contemporary newspapers identified him as an East Side gang leader; later stories about his classical reading, personal philosophy and extreme violence should be distinguished from court and arrest records.

Herbert Asbury placed Jackson's independent group at a disused cemetery in the block bounded by First and Second Avenues and East 12th and 13th Streets.<ref name="Asbury">Herbert Asbury, [https://archive.org/details/the-gangs-of-new-york-herbert-asbury ''The Gangs of New York''] (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1928), chapters on East Side gangs.</ref> Alfred Henry Lewis separately described a broader Gas House gang operating along Third Avenue between East 11th and East 18th Streets.<ref name="Lewis">Alfred Henry Lewis, [https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/51909 ''The Apaches of New York''] (New York: G. W. Dillingham, 1912), “The Gas-House Gang” and related chapters.</ref>

These descriptions overlap geographically but do not prove that the Jackson Gang and the broader [[Gas House Gang]] were identical. The safest model is Jackson's independent cemetery-centered gang operating within the wider Gas House gang environment.