Lights and Shadows of New York Life

J >> James D. McCabe >> Lights and Shadows of New York Life

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This wretched place Mr. Finn told us was one of the best of all the bed
houses. He proved his assertion by conducting us to one out of which we
beat a hasty retreat. The night air never seemed so pure to me as it did
as I came out of the vile den into the clear starlight. I could scarcely
breathe in the fearful hole we had just been in, and yet it was rapidly
filling up with people who were to pass the night there. There were men,
women and children, but they were all huddled together in one room.
There was no such thing as privacy. Some of the lodgers were simply
unfortunate, some were vagrants, and others were criminals.

I do not believe that all the sanitary measures in the world could ever
make these places clean or healthy. The atmosphere is always too foul
and dense to be breathed by any but lungs accustomed to it. When the
cellars are crowded with lodgers, and the heat of the stove adds to the
poison, it must be appalling. The poor wretches who seek shelter here
are more than half stupefied by it, and pass the night in this condition
instead of in a healthful sleep. They pay from ten to twenty-five cents
for their lodgings, and if they desire a supper or breakfast, are given a
cup of coffee and a piece of bread, or a bowl of soup for a similar sum.

As a matter of course only vagrants and those who have gone down into the
depths of poverty come here. They must choose between the cellars and
the streets, and the beds offered them here are warmer and softer than
the stones of the street.

"Have we seen the worst?" I asked Mr. Finn, as we came out of the last
place.

"No," he replied, "there are worse places yet. But I'll not take you
there."

The reader will readily credit this assertion, after reading the
following account of a visit of the Health Officers to one of a number of
similar cellars in Washington Street, on the west side of the city:

"The place next visited was No. 27 Washington street. This building is
also owned by 'Butcher Burke,' and is one of the most filthy and horrible
places in the city. We passed under an old tumble-down doorway that
seemed to have no earthly excuse for standing there, and into a dismal,
dark entry, with a zig-zag wall covered with a leprous slime, our
conductor crying out all the time: 'Steady, gentlemen, steady, keep to
your left; place is full of holes.'

"Presently we emerged into a yard with a detestable pavement of broken
bricks and mud, with high, towering houses surmounting it all around, and
a number of broken outhouses and privies covering a large portion of the
ground surface of the yard. Turning around, we could see the back of the
tenement house from whose entry we had just emerged, with its numberless
and wretched windows, shutting out the sky, or the fog, which was the
only thing visible above us, and a cloud of clothes-lines stretched
hither and thither, like a spider's web.

"There were eight privies in the yard, and we entered them. The night
soil was within a _foot and a half_ of the seats, and the odor was
terrible. From these privies a drain passed under the surface of the
muddy, sloppy yard, to the margin of the building, where a descent of
perhaps four feet was obtained, at the bottom of which the basement floor
was level with the windows, giving a sickly light, but no air or
ventilation whatever, to the inhabitants of the cellar. But the worst is
yet to be told. The drain from the privies connecting with the sewer in
the street had a _man-hole_, which was open, at the place where the yard
was broken for a descent into this infernal cellar. This man-hole was
about four feet wide and three feet deep, forming a small table for a
cataract of night soil and other fecal matter, which poured over this
artificial table in a miniature and loathsome Niagara and into a cesspool
at the bottom, and from thence was conducted under the rotten boards of
the cellar through a brick drain, a few inches below the board flooring,
to the main sewer in the street. The bottom of the windows in this house
are on a dead level with this horrid cesspool, so that a man sitting on a
chair at the window would not have only the odor, but also the view of
this loathsome matter circulating at his feet in the pool below. We
entered the back cellar after knocking at the door a few minutes, and a
man, poverty-stricken and wretched in appearance, of the laboring class,
came with a candle to let us in. The room was in a filthy condition, ten
by twenty-two and a half feet, with a ceiling of six feet three inches
elevation from the floor. A woman, wretched and woe-begone as the man,
rose suddenly from a dirty bed at the back of the room, and bade us
welcome civilly enough, in her night clothing, which was scanty.

"'And are yees the Boord of Helth, sure. Well it isn't much we have to
show thin, but yees can see it all without any charge at all, at all.'

"'How much rent do you pay here?' asked the writer of the man with the
candle.

"'Is it rint ye mane? Nyah, its $6 a munth, shure, and glad to get it,
and if we don't pay it, it's the little time we'll get from Burke, but
out on the street wid us, like pigs, and the divil resave the bit of
sattysfaction we'll get from him than ye would from the Lord
Palmershtown, Nyah!'

"'How do you live?'

"'Shure, I put in coal now and thin, whin I can get it to put, and that's
not often, God knows, alanna!'

"'How much do you earn?'

"'Is it earn d'ye say? Sometimes fifty cents a day, sometimes two
dollars a week; and thin it's good times wid me.'

"The Woman of the House.--'Don't mind him, man, what he's saying. Shure
he niver earns two dollars a week at all. That id be a good week faix
for me. Two dollars indade!'

"'Have you any children?'

"'We have one dauther, a girl--a fine, big girl.'

"'How old is she?'

"'Well, I suppose she's twenty-two next Mikilmas.'

"Woman.--'Indade she's not, shure. She's only a slip of a gerrul,
fifteen or sixteen years of age, goin' on.'

"While the parents were arguing the age of their daughter, who, it seems,
worked as a servant girl in some private residence, and only slept here
when out of employment, the Health Officer was testing the condition of
the walls by poking his umbrella at the base under the window and
directly over the cess-pool. The point of the umbrella, which was tipped
with a thin sheet of brass, made ready entrance into the walls, which
were so soft and damp that the point of the umbrella when drawn out left
each time a deep circular mark behind, as if it had been drawn from a
rotten or decomposed cheese in summer.

"'Take up a board from the floor,' said the Health Officer. The man, who
informed us that his name was William McNamara, 'from Innis, in the
County Clare, siventeen miles beyand Limerick,' readily complied, and
taking an axe dug up a board without much trouble, as the boards were
decayed, and right underneath we found the top of the brick drain, in a
bad state of repair, the fecal matter oozing up with a rank stench.
Every one stooped down to look at this proof of sanitary disregard, and
while this entire party were on their knees, looking at the broken drain,
two large rats ran across the floor, and nestling in a rather familiar
manner between the legs of Mr. McNamara for an instant, frisked out of
the dreary, dirty room into the luxurious cesspool.

"The physician asked, 'Are those rats?' of Mr. McNamara.

"'Rats is it? endade they were. It's nothing out of the way here to see
thim. Shure some of thim are as big as cats. And why wouldn't
they--they have no wurrok or nothing else to do.'"

III. THE MISSIONS.

There are now three thriving and much-needed Missions in the district, to
which I have applied the general name of the Five Points. These are the
_Five Points Mission_, the _Five Points House of Industry_, and the
_Howard Mission_, _or Home for Little Wanderers_.

The _Five Points Mission_ is the oldest. It is conducted by the "Ladies'
Home Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church," and as has
been stated, occupies the site of the "Old Brewery." I have already
described the "Old Brewery" as it existed twenty years ago. Few decent
people ever ventured near it at that time, and even the missionaries felt
that they were incurring a risk in venturing into it.

A number of Christian women of position and means, who knew the locality
only by reputation, determined, with a courage peculiar to their sex, to
break up this den, and make it a stronghold of religion and virtue.
Their plan was regarded by the public as chimerical, but they persevered
in its execution, trusting in the help of Him in whose cause they were
laboring. A school was opened in Park street, immediately facing the
"Old Brewery," and was placed in charge of the Rev. L. M. Pease, of the
Methodist Church. This school at once gathered in the ragged and dirty
children of the neighborhood, and at first it seemed impossible to do
anything with them. Patience and energy triumphed at last. The school
became a success, and the ladies who had projected it resolved to enlarge
it. In 1852 the "Old Brewery" building was purchased and pulled down,
and in June, 1853, the present commodious and handsome Mission building
was opened. Since then constant success has crowned the efforts of the
Ladies' Society. Their property is now valued at $100,000.

[Picture: THE LADIES' FIVE POINTS MISSION.]

The Mission is at present in charge of the Rev. James N. Shaffer. It
receives a small appropriation from the State for the support of its
day-school, but is mainly dependent upon voluntary contributions for its
support. Food, clothing, money, in short, everything that can be useful
in the establishment, are given it. Donations come to it from all parts
of the country, for the Mission is widely known, and thousands of
Christian people give it their assistance. The railroad and express
companies forward, without charge, all packages designed for it.

Children are the chief care of the Mission. Those in charge of it
believe that first impressions are the strongest and most lasting. They
take young children away from the haunts of vice and crime, and clothe
and care for them. They are regularly and carefully instructed in the
rudiments of an English education, and are trained to serve the Lord. At
a proper age they are provided with homes, or with respectable
employment, and are placed in a way to become useful Christian men and
women. Year after year the work goes on. Children are taken in every
day, if there is room for them, and are trained in virtue and
intelligence, and every year the "Home," as its inmates love to call it,
sends out a band of brave, bright, useful young people into the world.
But for its blessed aid they would have been so many more vagrants and
criminals.

The school averages about 450 pupils. In the twenty years of the career
of the Mission thousands have been educated by it. As I passed through
the various class-rooms I found children of all ages. In the
infant-class were little ones who were simply kept warm and amused. The
amusement was instructive, as well, as they were taught to recognize
various objects by the young lady in charge of them. They all bore
evidences of the greatest poverty, but they were unquestionably happy and
contented.

"Do you find harshness necessary?" I asked of the lady principal, who was
my guide.

"No," was the reply. "We rely upon kindness. If they do not wish to
stay with us, we let them go away in peace. They are mostly good
children," she added, "and they really love the school."

A little curly-headed girl came up to her as she was speaking:

"What does Louisa want, now?" she asked, encouraging the child with a
kind smile.

"Please, Mrs. Van Aiken," said the child, "Nelly Jackson wants another
cake."

Nelly Jackson was one of the tiniest and plumpest of the infant class I
had just inspected, and I had found her with a cake in hand at the time
of my visit. Mrs. Van Aiken hesitated a moment, and then gave the
desired permission.

"Cakes," she added, turning to me, "constitute one of our rewards of
merit for the little ones. When they are very good we give them
doll-babies at Christmas."

Says the Secretary in her last Report of the work of the Mission: "These
children have quick perceptions and warm hearts, and they are not
unworthy of the confidence placed in them by their teachers. All their
happy moments come to them through the Mission School, and kind hearts
and willing hands occasionally prepare for them a little festival or
excursion, enjoyed with a zest unknown to more prosperous children. . . .
An excursion to Central Park was arranged for them one summer
afternoon. The sight of the animals, the run over the soft green grass,
so grateful to eye and touch, the sail on the lake, their sweet songs
keeping time with the stroke of the oar--all this was a bit of fairy land
to a childhood of so few pleasures. Then the evening of the Fourth of
July spent on the roof of the Mission House, enjoying the display of
fireworks, and singing patriotic songs. One kind friend makes a winter
evening marvellous to childish eyes by the varied scenes, historic,
scriptural, poetic, of the magic lantern."

If the Mission did no more than give these little ones a warm shelter
during the day, and provide for them such pleasures as cakes,
doll-babies, excursions, and magic lanterns, it would still be doing a
noble work, for these children are dwellers in the Five Points, a
locality where pleasure is almost unknown. The Mission does more,
however, it educates the children; it provides them with the clothes they
wear, and gives each child a lunch at midday. It also gives clothing,
bedding and food to the parents of the children where they need it. It
is provided with a tasteful chapel, in which religious services are held
on Sunday and during the week. The Sunday-school is large, and provides
religious instruction for the attendants. A "Free Library and
Reading-room" has been opened in the basement, for the use of all who
will avail themselves of it. It is open every night, and it is well
patronized by the adult population of the vicinity. The homeless and
friendless, who are simply unfortunate, are sheltered, as far as the
accommodations will permit, and are provided with homes and employment.
The work of the Mission, apart from its schools, for the year ending May
1st, 1871, is thus summed up by the Secretary: "The following statistics
do not include coal nor medicine, which are very considerable items: 5197
pieces of clothing, including pairs of shoes and bed-quilts, have been
distributed from the wardrobes, and 1293 through the office, making a
total of 6490; 122,113 rations of food have been given to the needy; 4
infants have been adopted; 66 children have been provided with homes; and
119 adults have been sent to places of employment."

The Treasurer states that during the same period $3004 were given away in
"direct charities."

The _Five Points House of Industry_ is situated on Worth street,
diagonally opposite the _Home Mission_. It consists of two large brick
edifices, covering an area about 100 feet square. This Mission was begun
by the Rev. L. M. Pease, the same gentleman who was in charge of the Home
Mission at the time of the purchase of the "Old Brewery." He conceived a
different plan for the management of the Home Mission from that
determined upon by the ladies, and finding cooperation impossible,
resigned his position, and began his labors afresh, according to his own
plan, and trusting entirely to the generosity of the public for his
support. He was ably assisted by his good wife in carrying out his plan.
He began with one room, and in 1853 was able to hire five houses, which
he filled with the occupants of the wretched hovels in the vicinity. He
procured work for them, such as needle-work, basket-making, baking,
straw-work, shoe-making, etc. He made himself personally responsible to
the persons giving the work for its safe return. The expenses of the
Mission were then, as now, paid from the profits of this work, and the
donations of persons interested in the scheme. Five hundred persons were
thus supported. Schools were opened, children were taught, clothed and
fed, and religious services were regularly conducted.

In 1854, the health of Mr. Pease began to fail under his herculean
labors. He had carried his enterprise to a successful issue, however.
He had done good to thousands, and had won friends for the institution,
who were resolved, and possessed of the means, to carry it on. A Society
was incorporated for the conduct of the Mission, and, in 1856, the larger
of the present buildings was erected. In 1869, the edifice was increased
to its present size. Heavy donations were made to the institution by Mr.
Sickles, who gave $20,000, and Mr. Chauncy Rose, who gave $10,000, and it
was constantly in receipt of smaller sums, which made up an aggregate
sufficient to provide for its wants. Its progress has been onward and
upward, and it is a noble monument to the energy and Christian charity of
Mr. Pease, its founder.

The main work of the Mission is with the children, but it also looks
after the adults of the wretched quarter in which it is located. There
are about two hundred children residing in the building. These have been
taken from the cellars and garrets of the Five Points. Two hundred more,
children of the very poor, are in attendance upon the schools. All are
clothed and fed here. Besides being educated, they are taught useful
trades. The House is supported partly by voluntary contributions and
partly by the labor of its inmates.

Besides the children, there are always about forty destitute women, who
would otherwise be homeless, residing in the building. The annual number
thus sheltered is about six hundred. They are provided with situations
as servants as rapidly as possible. Since its opening, sixteen years
ago, the House has sheltered and provided for 20,000 persons. The number
of lodgings furnished yearly is about 90,000, and the daily number of
meals averages 1000. Since 1856, 4,135,218 meals have been given to the
poor. No one is ever turned away hungry, and sometimes as many as 150
persons, men and women, driven to the doors of the House by hunger, may
be seen seated at its table at the dinner hour.

_The Howard Mission and Home for Little Wanderers_ is situated in the
heart of the Fourth Ward, in one of the most wretched quarters of the
city. Here the inhabitants are packed into their dirty dwellings at the
rate of 290,000 persons to the square mile. The dirt and the
wretchedness of this part of the city are terrible to behold, the
sufferings of the people are very great, and the mortality is heavy.
Sailors' lodging houses of the lowest character, dance houses, rum shops,
and thieves' cribs are numerous, and the moral condition of the Ward is
worse than the sanitary.

In May, 1861, the Rev. W. C. Van Meter organized a Mission in the very
heart of this locality, to which he gave the name of the _Howard Mission
and Home for Little Wanderers_. For three years it was maintained by his
individual exertions, but, in 1864, Mr. Van Meter having secured for it
wealthy and powerful friends, it was regularly incorporated, and placed
under the control of a Board of Managers, Mr. Van Meter still continuing
to act as Superintendent. Since then, comfortable and tasteful brick
buildings have been erected for the Mission, and it is succeeding now
beyond the first hopes of its founder. Our engraving shows the New
Bowery front as it will appear when completed.

The Mission is located in the New Bowery, just below its junction with
Chatham Square. It extends back to Roosevelt street, upon which
thoroughfare there is an entrance. The erection of the buildings on the
New Bowery will about double the size of the Mission, and proportionately
increase its capacity for doing good. It is entirely dependent upon
voluntary contributions for its support.

[Picture: THE HOWARD MISSION (AS IT WILL APPEAR WHEN COMPLETED).]

"Our object," says Mr. Van Meter, "is to do all the good we can to the
souls and bodies of all whom we can reach." It may be added, that the
prime object of the Mission is to care for neglected and abused children,
whether orphans or not, and also for the children of honest and
struggling poverty. It further undertakes to aid and comfort the sick,
to furnish food, shelter, and clothing to the destitute, to procure work
for the unemployed, and to impart intellectual, moral, and religious
instruction to all who are willing to receive it.

"Our field," says Mr. Van Meter, "is the very concentration of all evil
and the headquarters of the most desperate and degraded representatives
of many nations. It swarms with poor little helpless victims, who are
born in sin and shame, nursed in misery, want, and woe, and carefully
trained to all manner of degradation, vice, and crime. The _packing_ of
these poor creatures is incredible. In this ward there are less than two
dwelling houses for each low rum hole, gambling house, and den of infamy.
Near us, on a small lot, but 150 by 240 feet, are twenty tenant houses,
111 families, 5 stables, a soap and candle factory, and a tan yard. On
four blocks, close to the Mission, are 517 children, 318 Roman Catholic
and 10 Protestant families, 35 rum holes, and 18 brothels. In No. 14
Baxter street, but three or four blocks from us, are 92 families,
consisting of 92 men, 81 women, 54 boys and 53 girls. Of these, 151 are
Italians, 92 Irish, 28 Chinese, 3 English, 2 Africans, 2 Jews, 1 German,
and but 7 Americans.

"Our work," he says, "is chiefly with the children. These are divided
into three classes, consisting of, I. Those placed under our care to be
sent to homes and situations. II. Those whom we are not authorized to
send to homes, but who need a temporary shelter until their friends can
provide for them or surrender them to us. These two classes remain day
and night in the Mission. III. Those who have homes or places in which
to sleep. These enjoy the benefits of the wardrobe, dining and school
rooms, but do not sleep in the Mission.

"Food, fuel and clothing are given to the poor, after a careful
inspection of their condition. Mothers leave their small children in the
day nursery during the day while they go out to work. The sick are
visited, assisted, and comforted. Work is sought for the unemployed. We
help the poor to help themselves.

"The children over whom we can get legal control are placed in carefully
selected Christian families, chiefly in the country, either for adoption
or as members of the families. . . They receive a good common school
education, or are trained to some useful business, trade, or profession,
and are thus fitted for the great duties of mature life. We know that
our work prevents crime; keeps hundreds of children out of the streets,
keeps boys out of bar-rooms, gambling houses, and prisons, and girls out
of concert saloons, dance houses, and other avenues that lead down to
death; and that it makes hundreds of cellar and attic homes more cleanly,
more healthy, and more happy, and less wretched, wicked, and hopeless.
We never turn a homeless child from our door. From past experience we
are warranted in saying that one dollar a week will keep a well filled
plate on our table for any little wanderer, and secure to it all the
benefits of the Mission. Ten dollars will pay the average cost of
placing a child in a good home."

During the ten years of its existence, the Mission has received more than
10,000 children into its day and Sunday schools. Hundreds of these have
been provided with good homes. Thousands of poor women have left their
little ones here while they were at their daily work, knowing that their
babies are cared for with kindness and intelligence. The famous
nurseries of Paris exact a fee of four cents, American money, per head
for taking care of the children during the day, but at the Little
Wanderers' Home, this service is rendered to the mother and child without
charge.

Yet in spite of the great work which the Missions are carrying on, the
wretchedness, the suffering, the vice and the crime of the Five Points
are appalling. All these establishments need all the assistance and
encouragement that can possibly be given them. More workers are needed,
and more means to sustain them. "The harvest indeed is plenteous, but
the laborers are few."

XXVIII. THE MILITARY.

The city is very proud of its military organization, and both the
Municipal and State Governments contribute liberally to its support.
This organization consists of the First Division of the National Guard of
the State of New York. The law creating this division was passed in
1862, when the old volunteer system was entirely reorganized. Previous
to this, the volunteers had borne their entire expenses, and had
controlled their affairs in their own way. By the new law important
changes were introduced.