The Roach Guards were an Irish street gang in New York City's Five Points neighborhood during the early 19th century. Originally formed to protect New York liquor merchants in Five Points, the gang soon began committing robbery and murder.
The Roach Guards began fighting with rivals the Bowery Boys and former Roach Guard members known as the Dead Rabbits. The feud between the Roach Guards and the Dead Rabbits was especially violent as they fought over the Five Points area. Despite constant fighting, they managed to hold their own in the "slugger battles" against the more organized and disciplined Bowery Boys. The Roach Guards, however, began to decline during the 1850s, disappearing entirely by the end of the American Civil War in 1865.
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Famous quotes containing the word guards:
“The intelligent have a right over the ignorant, namely, the right of instructing them. The right punishment of one out of tune, is to make him play in tune; the fine which the good, refusing to govern, ought to pay, is, to be governed by a worse man; that his guards shall not handle gold and silver, but shall be instructed that there is gold and silver in their souls, which will make men willing to give them every thing which they need.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)