Danger! [19th Century Crime Manual eBook]

[DIzzIE]

Shoplifting, slumming, prostitution, blackmail, gambling, and more...

A (long) while ago, I mentioned the existence of a particular 19th century crime guide which described New York City's underworld in the late 1800s. The ebook has now been OCRed/proofed and is available for downloading (links and mirrors at the bottom of the post).

Entitled Danger! A True History of a Great City's Wiles and Temptations. The Veil Lifted, and Light Thrown on Crime and its causes and Criminals and Their Haunts. Facts and Disclosures and first published in 1886 by two infamous New York City lawyers, Howe and Hummel, and reissued two years later under the similar title of In Danger; or, Life in New York. A True History of a Great City's Wiles and Temptations. True Facts and Disclosures (this OCRed copy is based on the former, though I have (unscanned) microfilm images of the latter as well, so if anyone is really interested in comparing the two editions, I could scan them in, though the quality of the microfilm print-outs is pissfuck poor, to put it mildly), here are a couple ways commentators have described it:

the two shysters coauthored a book entitled In Danger, or Life in New York: A True History of the Great City's Wiles and Temptations. They explained in the preface that it was published in the interest of justice and to protect the innocent from the guilty, but what they actually turned out was a primer on every type of crime?blackmail, house burglary, card sharping, safecracking, shoplifting, jewel thievery and, of course, murder. [emphasis added]

It became an immediate best-seller, with bookstore owners noticing a lot of traffic in their shops by persons who did not appear to be frequent book buyers. The book became required reading for every professional or would-be lawbreaker, from streetwalkers to killers. More and more when Howe and Hummel asked a new client, "Who sent you?" the stock reply was, "I read about you in the book."

(Frauds, Deceptions and Swindles, Carl Sifakis, 081604422 p. 89)

In 1888 [note that, as aforementioned, an edition of the same tome was actually first published two years prior], Howe and Hummel published In Danger; or Life in New York. A True History of a Great City's Wiles and Temptations, a purported expos? of the New York City underworld. Giving explicit and detailed information about how pickpockets, shoplifters, thieves, and even murderers conducted business [emphasis added], their "expos?" was essentially a how-to manual for would-be criminals. Their book attempted to drum up business by flaunting their success at thwarting the courts and returning their criminal clients to the streets, claims that many Americans believed.

(West from Appomattox, Heather Cox Richardson, 0300110524, p. 240)

Now, while it is certainly true that the tome covers shoplifting, blackmail, gambling, slumming, and much more, I would nonetheless stop short of calling it what it originally sounded like--a 19th century Steal This Book or Fuck the System. Indeed, one has to wonder if the above authors even bothered reading the tome in question, as murder is only mentioned in passing on rare occasions throughout the book (unless, of course, the aforementioned authors happen to be 'pro life' crazies, as there is indeed a section on abortion). Instead, the book disproportionately deals with cases of upper class infidelity and other bourgeois tripe. Yet, while I was thus initially disappointed with the tome after the false hopes instilled by the afore-quoted descriptions, the book is nonetheless quite a valuable asset, and definitely worth a read (though like, say, the bulk of Marquis de Sade's work, it is overwhelmingly dry in parts, necessitating that one persevere to get to the juicy center).

And lest folks start bitching about how a 19th century crime guide has zero relevancy to today's world, one only has to look at one example to shut them up:

Compare a decoy con described in Danger,

One of their very neat tricks is for a boy to place himself in view of the proprietor of a store, who, knowing the youth is after some of the goods outside, keeps a sharp eye on him. Suddenly, the boy makes a dash for some oranges and flies up the street, the proprietor in full chase. At the distance of, perhaps, half a block, the boy stops, allowing himself to be caught, when the irate shopkeeper roughly clutches him and, looking for the oranges stolen, is considerably chopfallen to find the boy has taken nothing. Upon being asked why he run away, the boy says he "thought he saw his brother and ran after him to speak to him." It seems plain enough, and the grocery man returns to find that, in his absence, twenty boys have plenteously helped themselves to everything within reach. It is now too late to re-catch the boy that he first ran after. It is a piece of strategic cleverness that rarely fails to succeed; and if any one underrates the finesse of the street Arabs of New York, he will stand a very good chance some day of being a sufferer from them.

to another shoplifting anecdote I overheard only a few years ago...

What'd we do is come into the store separately, walk around for and 'shop' for a bit, then we'd both get ready to leave at a predetermined time so that we're at the EAS towers at exactly the same moment. One of us would have the five-fingered gear, and the other one would be clean. As soon as the alarm would go off, the one of us who didn't have anything would sprint the fuck out of there, while the one who was holding would just look on in mock awe and disbelief and then just walk out of the store normally, while all attention was on the runner...

Thus the same basic technique employed in the 19th century, molded ever so slightly to fit the times, survives in the 21st .

And needless to say, plenty of other cons described in Danger are still flourishing today in the same form, as anyone who's gotten a Viagra spam ad will relate to one of the several miracle cure cons described therein:

MEN ONLY. A quick, Permanent Cure for Lost Manhood, Disability, Nervousness and Weakness. No Quackery.

And of course, the general advice contained in the tome is at times timeless...

Perhaps it would be a safe rule in life to avoid drinking beer if you have had anything to do with stolen goods.

Aside from being typical fodder for dusty historians and musty criminologists, this tome should be of interest to anyone with a curiosity in the historical workings of the underground. Enjoy!

With all that being said, here then are the download links:

Edit: Project Gutenberg and Internet Archive mirrors of the text are now available. Use these PG/IA mirrors instead of the ones first listed at the bottom of the post, as they're much more likely to stay up.

PG has mirrors to the HTML/PDF/TXT versions, as well as an automated Plucker converter for easy reading on portable devices (it outputs a PDB file).

Archive.org has the HTML/PDF/TXT versions, as well as the page scan zip on their FTP.

Old mirrors: (use the PG/IA ones listed above instead):
HTML (mirror) PDF (mirror) TXT (US-ASCII) (mirror) TXT (UTF-8) (mirror) HTML/PDF/TXT combo pack (zipped) (mirror) JPG (zipped) (mirror)

(The JPG zip contains the images of the copy-text used for the OCR, and is about 43 megs. The US-ASCII TXT is made entirely only of the characters found on a standard US keyboard. The UTF-8 TXT has a few special characters like ligatures, cedillas and the like, though there are only a handful of these in this text).

[Th0r]

Thanks DIzzIE I will definitely get round to reading it...

Looks fascinating.

[DIzzIE]

Just a note that Project Gutenberg and Internet Archive mirrors of the text are now available. Use these PG/IA mirrors instead of the ones first listed at the bottom of the post, as they're much more likely to stay up.

PG has mirrors to the HTML/PDF/TXT versions, as well as an automated Plucker converter for easy reading on portable devices (it outputs a PDB file).

Archive.org has the HTML/PDF/TXT versions, as well as the page scan zip on their FTP.