May 10:
On this day in 1849, the Astor Place Riot occurred, leaving 23 killed, over 100
injured, 10 sent to prison or fined, and New York's Astor Place Opera House in
ruins. In its simplest terms, the riot was a feud which got out of hand, those
in support of the touring English tragedian William Macready battling those who
preferred the American actor Edwin Forrest for artistic or market share
reasons. But, as told in the narrative style of The Shakespeare Riots, Nigel Cliff's recent study of the origins of
American theater, the Astor Riot tells a much larger tale of patriotism and
politics, from a time when the theater held a key place in New World cultural
life.
Among those pulling the
cultural-political strings attached to the Astor Riot was Isaiah Rynders, the
Tammany Hall strongman, and one of his lieutenants, Ned Buntline. At this point
in his eventful life, Buntline was a journalist, and decades away from his
Buffalo Bill and dime novel fame. But he was always up for a fight or a fast
buck, and Cliff sees his fingerprints all over the following poster, splashed
around town in an attempt to mobilize troops for the Astor Place showdown:
AMERICANS!! AROUSE! THE
GREAT CRISIS HAS COME!! Decide now whether English ARISTOCRATS!!! AND FOREIGN
RULE! shall triumph in this AMERICA'S METROPOLIS, or whether her own SONS,
whose fathers once compelled the base-born miscreants to succumb shall meanly
lick the hand that strikes, and allow themselves to be deprived of the liberty
of opinion so dear to every true American heart. AMERICANS!! come out! And dare
to owe yourselves sons of the iron hearts of '76!!
Cliff says that the Astor
was the ideal flash point of the larger turf war because it was situated at the
edge of the Bowery, where Buntline hoped to find or hire those itching for a
fight or a fun night out:
The Bowery was the
entertainment as well as the commercial artery of the down-at-the heels East
Side, and flames smelling of turpentine illuminated glass signs advertising
cockpits, rat-baiting arenas, boxing rings, dime museums, bowling alleys, and
gambling dens, together with scores of taverns and beer gardens, some of which
served firewater through a rubber tube straight from the barrel at three cents
a gulp. Above all, though, the Bowery was famed as the favorite stomping ground
of the b'hoys and their g'hals.
Daybook is contributed by Steve King, who teaches in the English Department of Memorial University in St. John's, Newfoundland. His literary daybook began as a radio series syndicated nationally in Canada. He can be found online at todayinliterature.com.
Subscribe
Email
Print
Share
Please sign in to add a comment on this article.