Nine-tenths of the emigration from Europe to the United States is through the port of New York. In order to accommodate the vast number of arrivals, the Commissioners of Emigration have established a depot for the especial accommodation of this class.
The emigrant ships, both sailing vessels and steamers, anchor in the river after entering the port. They generally lie off their own piers, and wait for the Custom House boat to board them. As soon as this is done, and the necessary forms are gone through with, preparations are made to land the emigrants, who, with their baggage, are placed on board a small steamer and conveyed to Castle Garden, a round building which juts out into the water at the upper end of the Battery.
In the year 1807, work was begun on this building by order of the General Government, the site having been ceded by the city. It was intended to erect a strong fortification, to be called Castle Clinton, but, in 1820, it was discovered that the foundations were not strong enough to bear heavy ordnance, and Congress reconveyed the site to the city. The building was then completed as an opera house, and was used for several years for operatic and theatrical performances, concerts, and public receptions. It was the largest and most elegant hall in the country, and was the favorite resort of pleasure-seekers. Jenny Lind sang there, during her visit to the United States. It was used for public amusements until 1825, when, the wealth and fashion of the city having removed too high up town to make it profitable, it was leased to the Commissioners of Emigration as a landing-place for emigrants.
THE BATTERY AND CASTLE GARDEN.
This commission has the exclusive charge of the Landing Depot and its inmates. It is composed of six Commissioners, appointed by the Governor of the State. The Mayors of New York and Brooklyn, and the Presidents of the Irish and German Emigrant Societies, are membersex-officio. They are responsible to the Legislature for their acts.
The Landing Depot is fitted up with quarters for the emigrants and their baggage, and with various stores at which they can procure articles of necessity at moderate prices. As most of them come provided with some money, there is an exchange office in the enclosure, at which they can procure American currency for their foreign money. Many of them come furnished with railroad tickets to their destinations in the West, which they have purchased in Europe, but the majority buy their tickets in this city. There is an office for this purpose in the building, at which the agents of the various lines leading from the city to the Great West are prepared to sell tickets. No one is compelled to transact his business in the building, but all are advised to do so, as they will then be fairly treated; while they are in danger of falling into the hands of swindlers outside. Attached to the establishment is an official, whose duty it is to furnish any information desired by the emigrants, and to advise them as to the boarding houses of the city which are worthy of their patronage. The keepers of these houses are held to a strict account of their treatment of their guests.
The majority of the emigrants go West in a few days after their arrival. Some have already decided on their place of future abode before leaving Europe, and others are influenced by the information they receive after reaching this country. Should they desire to remain in this city, they are frequently able to obtain employment, through the Labor Exchange connected with the Landing Depot, and by the same means many obtain work in other parts of the country—the Commissioners taking care that the contracts thus made are lawful and fair to both parties.
As we have said, the greater number of the emigrantsarriving here have money when they come. Others, who have been able to raise only enough to reach this, to them, “land of promise,” or who have been swindled out of their funds by sharpers in European ports, arrive here in the most destitute condition. These are a burden to the city and State at first, and are at once sent to the Emigrant Refuge and Hospital.
EMIGRANT HOSPITAL.
This establishment is located on Ward’s Island, in the Harlem River, and consists of several large buildings for hospitals, nurseries, and other purposes. It has a farm of one hundred and six acres attached to it. The destitute emigrants are sent to this establishment, as soon as their condition is ascertained, and cared for until they either obtain employment, or are provided for by their friends in this country, or are sent to their original destinations in the West at the expense of the Commissioners. Medical attendance is provided at the Landing Depot, and is free to all needing it. Serious cases are sent to the hospital on Ward’s Island, where good medical skill and attendance are furnished.
The number of emigrants at the Refuge sometimes amounts to several hundred of all nationalities. The Irish and Germanelements predominate, and these being bitterly hostile to each other, the authorities are frequently compelled to adopt severe measures to prevent an open collision between them. In the winter of 1867-68, the Irish and German residents on the island came to blows, and a bloody riot immediately began between them, which was only quelled by the prompt arrival of a strong force of the City Police.
The Commissioners adopt every means in their power to prevent the inmates of the Landing Depot from falling into the hands of sharpers. Each emigrant in passing out of the enclosure for any purpose is required to apply for a permit, without which he cannot return, and no one is allowed, by the policeman on duty at the gate, to enter without permission from the proper authorities. In this way sharpers and swindlers are kept out of the enclosure, inside of which the emigrant is perfectly safe; and when he ventures out he is warned of the dangers he will have to encounter the moment he passes the gateway.
The majority of the emigrants are unable to speak our language, and all are ignorant of the country, its laws, and customs. This makes them an easy prey to the villains who throng the Battery in wait for them.
Approaching these poor creatures, as they are gazing about them with the timidity and loneliness of strangers in a strange land, the scoundrels will accost them in their own language. Glad to hear the mother-tongue once more, the emigrant readily enters into conversation with the fellow, and reveals to him his destination, his plans, and the amount of money he has with him. The sharper after some pleasantries meant to lull the suspicions of his victim, offers to show him where he can purchase his railroad tickets at a lower rate than at the office in the Landing Depot, and if the emigrant is willing, conducts him to a house in Washington, Greenwich, West, or some neighboring street, where a confederate sells him the so-called railroad tickets and receives his money. He is then conducted back to the Battery by a different route, and the sharper leaves him. Upon inquiring at the office, he learnsthat his cheap tickets are so much worthless paper, and that he has been swindled out of his money, which may be his all. Of course he is unable to find the place where he was robbed, and has no redress for his loss.
Others again are led off, by persons who pretend to be friends, to take a friendly drink in a neighboring saloon. Their liquor is drugged, and they are soon rendered unconscious, when they are robbed of their money, valuables, and even their clothes, and turned out into the street in this condition, to be picked up by the police.
All sorts of worthless wares are palmed off upon them by unscrupulous wretches. They are drawn into gaming and are fleeced out of their money. Dozens of sharpers are on the watch for them, and woe to them if they fall into the hands of these wretches.
Women are prominent amongst the enemies of the emigrants. The proprietors of the dance-houses and brothels of the city send their agents to the Battery, to watch their opportunity to entice the fresh, healthy emigrant girls to their hells. They draw them away by promises of profitable employment, and other shams, and carry them off to the houses of their heartless masters and mistresses. There they are drugged and ruined, or in other ways literally forced into lives of shame.
It is said that there are more than forty thousand women and girls in New York dependent upon their own exertions for their support. This estimate includes the sewing women, factory girls, shop girls, female clerks, teachers, and governesses. They all labor under two common disadvantages. They are paid less for the same amount of work than men, and being more helpless than men are more at the mercy of unscrupulous employers. The female clerks and shop girls receive small wages, it is true, but they are generally paid regularly and honestly. The sewing women and factory hands are usually the most unfortunate, and these constitute the great bulk of the working women of New York. Many of these are married, or are widows with children dependent upon them for support.
The life of the New York working woman is very hard. She rises about daybreak, for she must have breakfast and be at her post by seven o’clock, if employed in a factory or workshop. At noon she has a brief intermission for dinner, and then resumes her work, which lasts until 6 o’clock in the evening. You may see them in the morning, thinly clad, weary and anxious, going in crowds to their work. They have few holidays except on Sunday, and but few pleasures at any time. Life with them is a constant struggle, and one in which they are always at a disadvantage. The sewing girls are in the majority, and there are two classes of these—those who work in the rooms of their employers and those who work at home. The former we have included in the general term of factory hands. The factory girls earn from two to four dollars a week, as a rule, a sum scarcely sufficient to keep body and soul together, but theyget their wages promptly and consider themselves fortunate. Men doing the same work would receive about twice as much.
THE SEWING-GIRL’S HOME.
The sewing women who work at home are worse off. They live in the poorer class of tenement houses, and are surrounded with discomfort of every kind. They work as hard as, if not harder than their sisters in the factories, and are even worse paid. They have not the advantage of being compelled to undertake the exercise of walking to and from the factories which the latter enjoy. They sit in their wretched rooms all day, and often late into the night, sewing for a miserable pittance, and for some scoundrel who will perhaps swindle them out of their hard earnings. For making blue cotton shirts, or “hickories” as they are called, a woman receives six cents apiece, and must furnish her own thread; for making linen coats she receives from fifteen to twenty cents apiece; for men’s heavy overalls she gets sixty-two cents a dozen; for flannel shirts one dollar a dozen. These prices are not paid by the Jews alone, but by reputable Broadway dealers, men who style themselves “leading merchants.” No wonder they pile up such large fortunes.
Now, in order to pay the rent of her bare and cheerless room, the sewing woman must make two whole shirts a day. Then she must do work enough to provide for her other expenses. She has to buy fuel in the winter, and kindling wood costs her three cents a bundle and coal fifteen cents a pail. Perhaps she has children, or a sick and helpless, or, worse still, a drunken husband to provide for. All out of her beggarly wages. Her food consists almost entirely of bread and potatoes, and sometimes she treats herself to the luxury of a cup of tea without milk or sugar. If she owns a sewing machine, and very few do, she can earn more than one who sews by hand, but constant work at the machine means a speedy breaking down of her health and a lingering death, or a transfer to the charity hospital.
Small as are her wages, the working woman is not always sure of receiving them. Some rascally employers—and one of the institutions to be mentioned further on, could give a long list of them—will, upon receiving the work, find fault with the sewing, and either deduct a part of the poor creature’s wages for thealleged fault, or refuse point blank to pay her a cent. Others again will demand a deposit equal to the value of the materials taken home by the sewing women. Upon the return of the completed work, they will not only refuse the promised payment, alleging that the work is badly done, but will also refuse to return the money advanced by the woman. The wretch well knows that the woman is weak and helpless, and that she is ignorant of the mode of protecting herself. More than this, she has not the money to go to law.
These are simple facts, and not “sensational items.” The records of the “Working Women’s Protective Union” will corroborate them, and will furnish many others.
“Among the employés of a certain Israelitish manufacturer of straw goods in New York was a poor French woman, who, with her three small children, occupied apartments in a rear tenement house in Mulberry street. What renders this case of more than ordinary interest, is the fact that the lady had once been in affluent circumstances, and at one period of her life moved in the wealthiest circles of Paris. Misfortune befel her in the death of her husband, who was accidentally killed upon a railroad train. The bulk of the property of her deceased husband was seized upon by her creditors. The widow, however, succeeded in saving from the general wreck a few hundred dollars, and with this she emigrated to America, arriving here in the spring, and bringing with her three little children. Here she anticipated she would be enabled, with the aid of her superior education, to provide for herself and family. For several weeks her efforts at securing employment proved unavailing; but just before her last dollar was expended, she succeeded in forming a class in French, which she instructed for two months, at the expiration of which time she was deprived of this her only support—her pupils leaving her for the purpose of a summer’s holiday at the fashionable watering-places. Other efforts were made to secure the position of teacher of languages (with several of which she is conversant), but all to no effect. Finally, reduced to absolute want, the lady was obliged to resort to manual labor in order to provide herself and little ones with bread.Unused as she was to toil, her efforts to obtain employment were attended with little or no success. Day by day her case grew more desperate, until, at last, unable to pay the rent of her miserable attic apartment, she and her little ones were thrust into the street. Homeless and friendless, with not sufficient money wherewith to purchase a supper for herself and famishing little ones, the lady was forced to beg; which course, up to this time in her unfortunate career, she had looked upon as barely preferable to death itself. She had a few acquaintances among the parents of her former pupils, and to these she resolved to apply for aid. Her efforts in this direction were but a repetition of the old, old story. Her friends, who, during her prosperity, were lavishing their attentions on her, now that misfortune had overtaken her, refused to recognize her, and thrust her from their doors without a penny. Fortune relented one day, and rewarded her efforts with a situation in a manufactory of straw goods. To be sure, the compensation was small; still, as bread enough might be secured in this manner to keep the wolf from the door until something better might present itself, she resolved to accept the terms of the straw manufacturer, and entered upon her duties. For a week or two the sum earned by the unfortunate lady was faithfully paid her, but on the third week the pusillanimous nature of the Jew cropped out. She had bargained to manufacture straw hats at eighty cents a dozen, or six and two-third cents each. At this rate, she managed to earn two dollars and fifty cents per week. Upon applying for her wages at the close of the third week, the employer informed her that he had discovered that six and two-thirds cents apiece was too large a compensation, and that from eighty cents he had resolved to reduce her pay to seventy cents per dozen, and accordingly presented her with her weekly payment, first deducting one dollar and forty cents from her wages. Pressed as she was for money, the lady refused to accept these terms, and at once set about seeking legal redress. Learning that at the ‘Working Women’s Union’ of Bleecker street legal advice was furnished free of charge to such as herself, she laid her grievances before the officers of the institution, who at once placed the affair in thehands of their legal adviser, who soon brought the rapacious Israelite to terms. At the time of her application to the institution the lady stated that she had been without fire, and, with the exception of a small loaf or two of bread and what few potatoes her children were enabled to gather from about the stalls in several of the markets, without food for several days.”
The wrongs inflicted upon the working women are many. “There are hoop-skirt manufactories where, in the incessant din of machinery, girls stand upon weary feet all day long for fifty cents. There are photograph galleries—you pass them in Broadway admiringly—where girls ‘mount’ photographs in dark rooms, which are hot in summer and cold in winter, for the same money. There are girls who make fans, who work in feathers, who pick over and assort rags for paper warehouses, who act as ‘strippers’ in tobacco shops, who make caps, and paper boxes, and toys, and almost all imaginable things. There are milliners’ girls, and bindery girls, and printers’ girls—press-feeders, book-folders, hat-trimmers. It is not to be supposed that all these places are objectionable; it is not to be supposed that all the places where sewing-girls work are objectionable; but among each class there are very many—far too many—where evils of the gravest character exist, where the poor girls are wronged, the innocents suffer. There are places where there are not sufficient fires kept, in cold weather, and where the poor girl, coming in wet and shivering from the storm, must go immediately to work, wet as she is, and so continue all day. There are places where the ‘silent system’ of prisons is rigidly enforced, where there are severe penalties for whispering to one’s neighbor, and where the windows are closely curtained, so that no girl can look out upon the street; thus, in advance, inuring the girls to the hardships of prison discipline, in view of the possibility that they may, some day become criminals! There are places where the employer treats his girls like slaves, in every sense of the word. Pause a moment, and reflect on all that signifies. As in the South ‘as it was,’ some of these girls are given curses, and even blows, and evenkicks; while others are special favorites either of ‘the boss,’ or of some of his malesubordinates, and dress well, pay four dollars a week for board, and fare well generally—on a salary of three dollars a week.”
Is it a wonder that so many of the working women and girls of New York glide into sin, with the hope of bettering their hard lot? And, when thrown out of work, with no food or shelter, save what can be obtained by begging or at the Station House, is it a wonder that they seek the concert saloons, in sheer desperation, or join the street walkers on Broadway?
But if the working woman has her persecutors, she has also her friends in the great city. One of the best institutions which have been organized for the protection and assistance of this class is the “Working Women’s Protective Union,” the head-quarters of which are in Bleecker street, a short distance east of Broadway. It is organized for the common benefit of all those women who obtain a livelihood by other employments than household services. It aids them:
“First. By securing legal protection from frauds and impositions free of expense.Second. By appeals, respectfully but urgently made, to employers for wages proportioned to the cost of living, and for such shortening of the hours of labor as is due to health and the requirements of household affairs.Third. By seeking new and appropriate spheres of labor in departments not now occupied by them.Fourth. By sustaining a registry system, through which those out of work may be assisted in finding employment.Fifth. By appeals to the community at large for that sympathy and support which is due to working women.”
The members each contribute the sum of ten dollars annually to the support of the institution. Outside aid is also liberally given. The Union has done much good since its organization. It has compelled dishonest employers to fulfil their contracts with their operatives, and in one single week compelled the payment of the sum of three hundred and twenty-five dollars, which had been withheld by these scoundrels. Out of two hundred complaints against employers in a single year, it secured a fair settlement of nearly two-thirds. In 1869 it procured work for 3379 women and girls. It also looks after friendless and homeless women who seek its assistance, and helps them to secure employment.
STEWART’S HOME FOR WORKING WOMEN.
The “Home for Working Women,” No. 45 Elizabeth street, is a massive brick building, six stories high, and will accommodate about five hundred boarders. It is supplied with a reading-room, a reception-room, a parlor, a restaurant, and a laundry. The upper floors are used as dormitories. The beds are neat and tidy, and are arranged in rows and separated from each other by white screens. The rooms are large and well ventilated, and the whole establishment is kept scrupulously clean and in perfect order. One dollar and twenty-five cents is the charge for a week’s lodging and washing. The restaurant supplies meals of an excellent quality at an average cost of twenty-five cents. Lodgers are admitted until eleven o’clock at night at the price named. If they enter after that hour, they are charged twenty-five cents extra.
The Children’s Aid Society conducts several lodging-houses for girls, one of which is located in Bleecker street, and the other at 27 St. Mark’s Place. They furnish beds and meals to girls of all ages, at five cents each, while they have money, and give them for nothing where the applicant is found to be destitute. They have been tolerably successful thus far, and give promise of future usefulness.
There are several other associations, with similar objects, in operation in the city.
Mr. A. T. Stewart is now erecting, on Fourth avenue, a magnificent iron building, which is to be used as a “Home for Working Women.” The building extends along the avenue, from Thirty-second to Thirty-third street, a distance of 192 feet, and has a depth of 205 feet. Including the central Mansard roofs, the building is eight stories in height. It is one of the finest edifices in the city, and will be provided with every convenience for the work to which it is destined. It will be capable of accommodating fifteen hundred boarders, and will be conducted on a plan similar to that of the “Home for Working Women” in Elizabeth street. It is not to be conducted as a charity. Each occupant is to pay a fixed sum per week; and it is believed that here this sum will not exceed two dollars a week for board, lodging, and washing.
It is not known how many stores, or places in which trade is conducted beneath the shelter of a roof, the city contains. They are numerous, but they are not sufficient for the wants of trade. The sellers overflow them and spread out into the streets and by-ways, with no roof above them but the blue sky. Some of these sellers are men, some women, and some mere children. Some have large stationary stands, others roam about with their wares in boxes, bags, or baskets in their hands. They sell all manner of wares. Watches, jewelry, newspapers, fruits, tobacco, cigars, candies, cakes, ice cream, lemonade, flowers, dogs, birds,—in short everything that can be carried in the hand—are sold by the Street Venders. The rich and the poor buy of them. The strolling vagrant picks up his scanty breakfast at one of these stands, and the millionaire buys an apple at another.
The eating and apple stands are mainly kept by women. The most of them are Irishwomen, and the big cap and dirty frill under the quilted bonnet are among the most common signs of such a stand. Some of these stands sell soups, some oysters, some coffee and hot cakes, some ice cream, and some merely fruits and apples. In Wall street they are kept by men, and pies and cakes form the staple articles of trade. Candies and nuts are sold exclusively by many. Such candies as are not to be had of any confectioner in town. Women never sell cigars or tobacco, though many of them never take their pipes from their mouths during business hours. Some of them offer ladies’ hose and gentlemen’s socks, and suspenders, yarns, worsted hoods, and gloves. A few women sell newspapers, but these are rapidly giving way to men.
STREET VENDERS.
The newspaper stands are located principally on Broadway, in Wall street, and around the Post Office and the ferries. At some of them only the morning or evening journals are kept, but others offer all the weeklies and the illustrated papers as well.
The venders of cheap neckties and pocket book straps are mostly boys or very young men. They frequent the lower part of Broadway, which is also the favorite haunt of the venders of cheap jewelry. Pocket books of every description are sold at marvellously cheap prices, and photographs are displayed in such lavish quantities that you feel sure that every dealer in them has bankrupted himself in order to afford a free art exhibition to the crowd of little ragamuffins gathered around him. Toys of every contrivance adorn the stands above Canal street. The dealers in these articles are strong, able-bodied men, who prefer to stand on the side walks pulling the strings of a jumping jack, or making contortions with a toy contrived for that purpose, to a more manly way of earning their bread.
The balloon men, the penny whistle and pop gun dealers frequent the upper streets, where they are apt to be seen by children. The lame soldier sets up his stand anywhere, and deals principally in shoe strings, neckties, or in books and papers that no one ever reads. Towards Christmas large booths for the sale of toys are erected on some of the east and west side streets, at which a thriving business in toys and fire-works is carried on.
The Chinese candy and cigar sellers are to be found between the Astor House and the South Ferry. No one ever seems to buy from them, but they continue in the business, and thus afford proof positive that they have their customers.
The dog and bird men haunt the neighborhood of the Astor House and St. Nicholas hotels. They get high prices for their pets. Dogs sell readily. It is the fashion in New York to discourage the increase of families, and to attempt to satisfy the half-smothered maternal instinct by petting these dumb creatures.
Little girls are numerous among the street venders. They sell matches, tooth-picks, cigars, newspapers, songs and flowers.The flower-girls are hideous little creatures, but their wares are beautiful and command a ready sale. These are made into hand bouquets, and buttonhole bouquets, and command from ten cents to several dollars each. When the day is wet and gloomy, and the slush and the mud of Broadway are thick over everything animate and inanimate, and the sensitive soul shrinks within itself at the sight of so much discomfort, the flower-girls do a good business. The flower-stands then constitute the most attractive objects on the street, and men are irresistibly drawn to them by the sight of their exquisite adornments. It is very pleasant at such times to have a bright, fragrant nosegay in one’s buttonhole, or to carry a bouquet to one’s home. On such days you may see hundreds of splashed and muddy men on the great thoroughfare, utterly hopeless of preserving any outward semblance of neatness, but each with his nosegay in his buttonhole; and as he glances down at it, from time to time, you may see his weary face soften and brighten, and an expression of cheerfulness steal over it, which renders him proof against even the depressing influences of the mud and the rain.
No visitor to New York should omit visiting the wharves of the North and East rivers. A day may be profitably spent on the shore of each stream. The docks do not compare favorably with the massive structures of Liverpool, or London, or the other great seaports of the world. They are wretched, half decayed and dirty; but ere long they are to be replaced with a system of magnificent stone and iron piers, which will afford all the desired facilities, and render New York in this respect one of the best provided ports on the globe.
Beginning at the Battery on the North River side, we find first the pier of the famous Camden and Amboy Railway Company, from which passengers and freights are conveyed to the railway by steamer. Above this are the piers of the great European steamship lines, the coast steamers, and the steamboats plying between the city and the neighboring towns. The Boston boats, all of which run to points in Connecticut and Rhode Island, where they make connections with the railways to Boston, are fine steamers. Those of the Narragansett Steamship Company, the Bristol and Providence by name, are the most magnificent steamers in the world. They cost $1,250,000 apiece. They are simply floating palaces, as are also the Albany night boats. The foreign steamers are huge iron vessels, carrying thousands of tons of freight and hundreds of passengers. The sailing of one of these ships always draws a crowd to her pier, and though from five to eight of them leave the port every week, the attraction still continues.
The ferries to Jersey City and Hoboken are all located on this river, and are full of interest to the stranger. The Bethel,or floating chapel for seamen, is also worth visiting. The ice trade of the city is carried on on this front, the principal supply of that article being obtained along the river, about one hundred miles above the city.
BOAT STORES.
The oyster boats, or boat stores, are peculiar to New York. They lie chiefly in the vicinity of Christopher street, and are sources of considerable profit to their owners. The Hay Scales are also curious objects. At the foot of Fifty-fourth street the numerous telegraph lines which connect New York with the States south of it, cross the Hudson. They gain the Jersey shore in the vicinity of the Elysian Fields at Hoboken, and thence continue their way to every part of the States mentioned.
The East River front is the terminus of the ferry lines to Brooklyn, Long Island City, and Hunter’s Point. The shipping here consists almost entirely of sailing vessels. The craft plying between New York and the New England towns have their stations here, and here also are the California clippers. Thehuge Indiamen lie here receiving or discharging cargo. The whole river front is covered with merchandise representing the products of every land under the sun.
The Floating Docks are among the principal sights of the East River, as are also the vast coal and ship yards. This stream will soon he spanned by an immense suspension bridge which is to connect the City Hall in New York with the City Hall in Brooklyn. The total length of the bridge and its approaches is to be 5878 feet. The bridge is to rest on cables, supported by massive stone towers at the water’s edge on each side. The span between these towers is to be 1616 feet. From each tower the flooring is to be carried a further distance of 940 feet to the land approaches. The New York approach is to be 1441 feet, and the Brooklyn approach 941 feet in length. The approaches will, in some instances, be on a level with the tops of the houses in the cities through which they pass. The total height of the bridge above the tide is to be 268 feet. The work is now progressing rapidly, and will be completed in about three years.
Accidents are very common in every large port, but the peculiar construction of the New York ferry houses renders the number of cases of drowning doubly great. In order to guard against this, and to afford timely assistance to persons in danger of drowning, “rescue stations” have been established along the water front of the city. There is one at each ferry house, and the others are located at the points where accidents are most likely to occur. These stations are each provided with a ladder of sufficient length to reach from the pier to the water at low tide, with hooks at one end, by means of which it is attached firmly to the pier; a boat hook fastened to a long pole; a life preserver or float, and a coil of rope. These are merely deposited in a conspicuous place. In case of accident, any one may use them for the purpose of rescuing a person in danger of drowning, but at other times it is punishable by law to interfere with them, or to remove them. The station is in charge of the policeman attached to the “beat” in which it is located, and he has the exclusive right in the absence of one of his superior officers to direct all proceedings. At the same time, he is required to comply strictlywith the law regulating such service on his part, and to render every assistance in his power. The law for the government of persons using the “rescue apparatus” is posted conspicuously by the side of the implements, as are also concise and simple directions as to the best method of attempting to resuscitate drowned persons. These stations have been of the greatest use since their establishment, and reflect the highest credit upon those who originated and introduced them.
There stands on the shore of the East River, at the foot of Twenty-sixth street, a massive gray-stone building, known as Bellevue Hospital. Over the lowest door of the front, on the upper side of Twenty-sixth street, is a single word in gilt letters—MORGUE. This door marks the entrance to the Dead House of New York, one of the most repulsive, but most terribly fascinating places in the city. The place is named after the famous dead house of Paris, and the interior is arranged in exact imitation of it, except that it is smaller. It is a gloomy-looking place, this Morgue, and it is always crowded. Bodies found in the streets or in the harbor are brought here for identification. They are kept a certain length of time, usually from twenty-four to forty-eight hours, and if not claimed by relatives or friends, are buried at the expense of the city. Every article of clothing, every trinket, or other means of identification, found with a body, is carefully preserved, in the hope that it may lead to a discovery of the cause of the death.
The room is gloomy and cell-like in appearance. It is about twenty feet square. The floor is of brick tiles, and the walls are rough and heavy. The apartment is divided into two unequal portions by a partition of glass and iron. The smaller portion is used by the public. The remainder is devoted to the purposes of the establishment. Back of the glass screen are four stone tables on iron frames, each with its foot towards the glass. Stretched on these are lifeless naked forms, each covered with a sheet. A stream of cold water, from a movable jet, falls over the lifeless face of each and trickles over the senseless forms, warding off decay until the last moment, in the hope thatsome one to whom the dead man or woman was dear in life will come and claim the body. A vain hope, generally, for but few bodies are claimed. Nearly all go to the potter’s field.
THE MORGUE.
A fearful company, truly, as they lie there, cold and rigid, their ghastly features lighted by the chilly gleams which fall from the windows above. Here is the body of an infant, its little life of suffering over. It was found in an ash barrel in an alley. On the next slab is the form of a man who was evidently well to do in the world. He is a stranger to the city, the Superintendent tells you, and dropped in the streets from apoplexy. His friends will no doubt claim him before the day is over, as the articles found on his person have established his identity. The next table contains the body of a woman. She was young and must have been fair. She was found in the river, and as there are no marks of violence on her person, the presumption is that she sought her own destruction. “Such cases are becoming common,” says the Superintendent in his matter of fact way. “They are very sad, but we see too many of them to think them romantic.” A shudder comes over you as you gaze at the ghastly occupant of the last table. The dead man was evidently a gentleman, for he bears every mark of a person of good position in life. His purple, swollen features tell you plainly that he was taken from the river. There is a deep wound in his side, and marks of violence are numerous about his head and neck. You gaze at the Superintendent inquiringly, and even that cool, clear-headed official turns a shade paler as he answers, almost under his breath, “Murdered. For his money, doubtless.”
On the walls back of the tables are suspended the clothing of the unfortunates, and of others who have preceded them. Maybe some friend will come along and recognize them, and the one who has been missing will be traced to this sad place. They form a strange collection, but they speak chiefly of poverty and suffering.
The dark waters of the rivers and bay send many an inmate to this gloomy room. The harbor police, making their early morning rounds, find some dark object floating in the waters.It is scarcely light enough to distinguish it, but the men know well what it is. They are accustomed to such things. They grapple it and tow it in silent horror past the long lines of shipping, and pause only when the Morgue looms up coldly before them in the uncertain light of the breaking day. The still form is lifted out of the water, and carried swiftly into the gloomy building. It is laid on the marble slab, stripped, covered with a sheet, the water is turned on, and the room is deserted and silent again.
So many come here on their way to their long homes. The average number is about two hundred per year. You can scarcely take up a city newspaper without finding one or more advertisements of persons “lost.” Many of them come here. Many are never heard of again. The waters which encompass the city keep well the secrets confided to them, and neither the Morgue nor the Police books can tell the fate of all the missing. Strangers visiting the city often venture into the chosen haunts of crime “to see the sights,” and in so doing place themselves in the power of the most desperate and reckless villains. Human life is held so cheap here, and murder has become such a profession, that no respectable person is safe who ventures into these localities. You may often see at the Morgue, where the majority of the bodies show marks of violence, the lifeless forms of those who but a few days before left their pleasant homes in other portions of the country to see the metropolis. A visit to a concert saloon or a dance house, merely from what they consider the most innocent curiosity, has sealed their doom. A glass of drugged liquor has destroyed their power of self-protection, and even without this they have been assaulted. They are helpless, and they have paid with their lives the price of their “innocent curiosity.” Then the River and the Morgue complete the story; or perhaps the River keeps its secret, and the dead man’s name goes down on the long list of the missing.
Strangers, and all others who would see New York, should content themselves with its innocent sights and amusements. Those who seek to pass beneath the shadow willfully take their lives in their hands.
The Custom House is one of the most prominent and interesting places in New York. It is one of the largest in the country, and is provided with every facility for the prompt despatch of the vast business transacted in it. Five-sixths of all the duties on imports collected in the United States are received here.
The Custom House building was formerly the Merchants’ Exchange. It is one of the handsomest structures in the city, and its purchase cost the General Government one million of dollars in gold. The building is constructed of solid granite, with a fine portico and colonnade in front. If is fire-proof throughout. It occupies the entire block bounded by Wall street, Exchange Place, William street, and Hanover street. Its dimensions are a depth of two hundred feet, a frontage of one hundred and forty-four feet, and a rear breadth of one hundred and seventy-one feet. The top of the central dome is one hundred and twenty-four feet from the ground. The main entrance is on Wall street, but there are entrances on every side. The Rotunda occupies the space beneath the central dome, and is one of the finest interiors in the country.
Within the Rotunda are arranged rows of desks, running parallel with the walls. These are occupied by four “deputy collectors,” three “chief clerks,” five “entry clerks,” two “bond clerks,” the “foreign clearance clerk” and his assistant, and by those whose duties bring them most commonly in contact with the merchants, shippers, commanders of vessels, etc., in the ordinary routine of the business of the port. The Collector and the higher officials have handsome offices in other parts of the building.
THE CUSTOM HOUSE.
There are about 1100 clerks attached to the Custom House, whose total wages amount to about $3,000,000 per annum. The legal salary of the Collector is $6000 per annum, but his fees and perquisites make up an actual income of five or six times that amount. The Collectorship of this port is the best paying office within the gift of the Government. ColonelThorpe thus sums up the duties of the various officers of the port:
“The Collector shall receive all reports, manifests, and documents to be made or exhibited on the entry of any ship or vessel; shall record, on books to be kept for that purpose, all manifests; shall receive the entries of all ships or vessels, and of the goods, wares, and merchandise imported in them; shall estimate the amount of the duties payable thereupon, indorsing said amount on the respective entries; shall receive all moneys paid for duties, and take all bonds for securing the payment thereof; shall, with the approbation of the Secretary of the Treasury, employ proper personages—weighers, gaugers, measurers, and inspectors—at the port within his district.
“The Naval Officer shall receivecopiesof all manifests and entries; shall estimate the duties on all goods, wares, and merchandise subject to duty (and no duties shall be received without such estimate), and shall keep a separate record thereof; and shallcountersignall permits, clearances, certificates, debentures, and other documents granted by the Collector. He shall also examine the Collector’s abstract of duties, his accounts, receipts, bonds, and expenditures, and, if found correct, shall certify the same.
“The Surveyor shall superintend and direct all inspectors, weighers, measurers, and gaugers; shall visit and inspect the ships and vessels; shall return in writing every morning to the Collector the name and nationality of all vessels which shall have arrived from foreign ports; shall examine all goods, wares, and merchandise imported, to see that they agree with the inspector’s return; and shall see that all goods intended for exportation correspond with the entries, and permits granted therefor; and the said Surveyor shall, in all cases, be subject to the Collector.
“The Appraisers’ department is simply for the purpose of deciding the market values and dutiable character of all goods imported, so that the imposts can be laid with correctness. Other than this, it has no connection with the Custom House.”
There is located at the Battery, an old white building, surmounted by a light tower. This is the Barge office, and is the headquarters of the Inspectors attached to the Surveyor’s office, who are under the orders of Mr. John L. Van Buskirk, now nearly 89 years of age, and who has been “Assistant to the surveyor” for many years. The arrivals of all ships are reported from the telegraph station at Sandy Hook, and as soon as it is announced at the barge office that a steamer or ship “from foreign ports” is off soundings, two Inspectors are placed on a revenue cutter, and sent down to take charge of the arriving vessel. From the moment they set foot on the vessel’s deck, they are in supreme control of the cargo and passengers. One would think from the manner in which many of them conduct themselves toward passengers, that an American citizen coming home from abroad has no rights but such as the Inspector chooses to accord him. Certainly the joy which an American feels in returning to his own home is very effectually dampened by the contrast which he is compelled to draw between the courtesy and fairness of the customs officials of European lands, and the insolence and brutality of those into whose clutches he falls upon entering the port of New York. The Inspectors examine the baggage of the cabin passengers, collect the imposts on dutiable articles, and send them ashore. They then send the steerage passengers to Castle Garden where they are examined. After this, the ship is allowed to go alongside of her pier, where her cargo is discharged under their inspection, and carted to the Bonded Warehouses of the United States, for appraisement and collection of duties.
Passing goods through the Custom House is a troublesome and intricate undertaking, and most merchants employ a Broker to perform that duty for them. A novice might spend hours in wandering about the labyrinths of the huge building, trying to find the proper officials. The broker knows every nook and corner in the establishment, and where to find the proper men, and moreover manages to secure the good will of the officials so that he is never kept waiting, but is given every facility for the despatch of his business. The fee for “passingan entry” is five dollars. Sometimes a broker will pass fifty different entries in a single day, thus earning $250. Some brokers make handsome fortunes in their business. When there is a dispute between the government and the importer as to the value of the goods or the amount of the duty, the broker’s work is tedious and slow. The large importing houses have their regular brokers at stated salaries.
It is a common and almost meaningless remark, that one has to be careful to avoid being lost in New York, but the words “Lost in New York” have a deeper meaning than the thoughtless speakers imagine. If the curious would know the full force of these words, let them go to the Police Headquarters, in Mulberry street, and ask for the “Bureau for the Recovery of Lost Persons.” The records of this bureau abound in stories of mystery, of sorrow, and of crime.
As many as seven hundred people have been reported as “lost,” to this bureau, in a single year, and it is believed that this does not include all the disappearances. Many of those so reported are found, as in the cases of old persons and children, but many disappear forever. Others who are recovered by their friends are never reported as found to the bureau, and consequently remain on its books as missing.
When a person is reported “Missing” to this bureau, a description of the age, height, figure, whiskers, if any, color of eyes, dress, hair, the place where last seen, the habits and disposition of the person, is given to the official in charge, who enters it in the register. When the returns of the Morgue, which are sent to the Police authorities every twenty-four hours, are received, they are compared with the descriptions in the register, and in this way bodies are often identified. Five or six hundred cards with the description of the missing person are printed, and sent to the various police precincts, with orders to the commanding officers to make a vigilant search for the person so described. Advertisements are also inserted in the newspapers describing the missing ones. Many of the estrays are children, and these are usually recovered within twenty-four hours. These little ones usually fall directly into the hands of the police, and are taken at once to the station house.If not claimed there, they are sent at nightfall to Police Headquarters, where they are cared for until their friends come for them.
THE FATE OF HUNDREDS OF YOUNG MEN.
Many of the missing are men—strangers to the city. They have come here on business or for pleasure, and have undertaken to see the sights of New York. They have drowned their senses in liquor, and have fallen into the hands of the thieves and murderers, who are ever on the watch for such as they. They have been robbed and murdered, thrown into the river, from which they sometimes find their way to the Morgue. Or perhaps they have followed some street walker to her den, there to fall victims to the knife or club of her accomplice. The river is close at hand, and it hides its secrets well. Year after year the same thing goes on, and men pay with their lives the price of their impure curiosity. The street walker still finds her victim ready to follow her to her den, for “he knoweth not that the dead are there: and that her guests are in the depths of hell. He goeth after her straightway, as an ox goeth to the slaughter, or as a fool to the correction of the stocks. Till a dart strike through his liver, and knoweth not that it is for his life. She hath cast down many wounded; yea, many strong men have been slain by her. Her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death.”
Year after year the waters cast up their dead, and the Morgue is filled with those who are known to the police as “missing.” Men and women, the victims of the assassin, and those who are tired of life, find their way to the ghastly tables of the dead house; but they are not all. There are long rows of names in the dreary register of the police against which the entry “found” is never written. What has become of them, whether they are living or dead, no one knows. They were “lost in New York,” and they are practically dead to those interested in knowing their fate. Year after year the sad list lengthens.
In many a far off home there is mourning for some loved one. Years have passed away since the sorrow came upon these mourners, but the cloud still hangs over them. Their loved one was “lost in New York.” That is all they know—all they will ever know.
[78]Samuel J. Tilden’s speech.
[86]The Committee of citizens consisted of the leading merchants of New York—such men as Royal Phelps, Robert Lenox, P. Bissinger, Paul N. Spofford, Samuel Willets, H. B. Claflin, Seth B. Hunt, T. F. Jeremiah, R. L. Cutting, W. A. Booth, Jas. Brown, B. L. Solomon, Courtlandt Palmer, J. K. Porter, W. E. Dodge, T. W. Pearsall.
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