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Harlem in Disorder: A Spatial History of How Racial Violence Changed in 1935

"Eyewitness Put NY Mob at 20,000 Plus," Norfolk Journal and Guide, March 30, 1935, 20.

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Looting without arrest (37) No one was identified as being arrested for looting just over half of the businesses identified in the sources. There are eighteen individuals arrested for looting for who there is no information about their alleged targets; some of those men may have been charged with taking goods from stores for which there was no reported arrests. There are also twenty-one men charged with disorderly conduct in the Magistrates Court for which there is no information about their alleged actions, although only 6% (3 of 50) of those accused of looting were charged with that offense (the charges brought against ten of those arrested for looting are unknown).

That evidence supports the claim that police were unable to protect businesses made in multiple newspaper stories and by business-owners who sued the city for damages, as well as in the MCCH report. Once the crowd around Kress’ store broke into smaller groups sometime after 9.00 PM, police were unable to clear the streets or contain all those groups. Irving Stetkin told the City Comptroller that the two police officers who eventually responded to his call to protect his store "couldn't do anything. The mob was too big for them," according to a report in the New York World-Telegram. When police did disperse crowds, they simply reformed, according to the New York Herald Tribune, New York World-Telegram, Norfolk Journal and Guide and the MCCH Report. A more pointed image of that futility, in which police dispersed crowds only to see them gather again on the opposite side of the street, was described in the Afro-American and by business-owners who testified in the Municipal Court. An alternative account in the Daily News presented crowds not as elusive but as "too scattered" to be controlled. As a result, rather than being ineffective, police were absent from the scene of some attacks on businesses. Business-owners who sued the city for damages made that complaint. No police officers came to protect the stores of Harry Piskin, Estelle Cohen, and George Chronis despite Piskin approaching police officers on the street, and them all visiting or calling the local stationhouse.

The absence of police from some parts of Harlem resulted in part from a decision to concentrate them elsewhere. Reported police deployments focused on West 125th Street. Inspector McAuliffe used the reserves sent to Harlem after 9.00 PM to establish a perimeter around the main business blocks of the street, from 8th to Lenox Avenues, from 124th to 126th Streets, according to stories in the New York Times, Daily Mirror and Pittsburgh Courier, the only stories that described police deployments. Six emergency trucks were stationed at the intersection of West 125th Street and 7th Avenue in that strategy. Each truck had a “crew of 40 men and [was] equipped with tear gas and riot guns,” according to the Daily Mirror. Emergency trucks were more dispersed according to the New York Herald Tribune; two at West 125th and 7th Avenue, one at West 125th and Lenox Avenue, and one at West 127th and 7th Avenue. Armed patrolmen guarded Herbert’s Blue Diamond Jewelry store on the northeast corner of that intersection as well as other businesses with broken windows in this area. The Daily News noted that guarding “windowless stores” handicapped police without referring to which stores received that protection. This scale of police presence is likely why only one business on West 125th Street – Young’s hat store -- was among those reported looted despite at least twenty-three other stores having their windows broken. (The New York Evening Journal did report that "the rioting Negroes swarmed into stores. First the Woolworth "five and ten" then McCrory's and then the department store right and left in both sides of the street,” but as no other sources reported such looting that claim was apparently a product of the sensationalization and exaggeration that marked that publication's stories about the disorder).

Beyond West 125th Street, the police relied on radio cars patrolling the avenues and limited numbers of uniformed police and detectives in plainclothes moving through the streets. The New York Times reported that an emergency truck was stationed at West 130th Street and Lenox Avenue, in the heart of the blocks that saw the most reported looting. Police made eighteen arrests on Lenox Avenue between 125th and 135th, but clearly lacked the numbers to guard damaged stores or prevent crowds from forming that they did around West 125th Street. Similarly, police arrested three men for looting Jack Garmise's cigar store on 7th Avenue near West 116th Street, indicating the presence of uniformed officers and detectives, but their activity apparently did not extend to the blocks of West 116th Street to the east or the adjacent blocks of Lenox Avenue where Hispanic-owned businesses predominated. Two stores were reported looted in that area and at least another eleven had windows broken, a reporter from La Prensa found, without an arrest being made during the disorder. The police were not alone in their inattention to that area. Several newspapers drew the boundary of the disorder north of West 116th Street: crowds only went as far south as 120th Street according to the New York World-Telegram, New York Herald Tribune, New York Evening Journal and Daily Mirror; and as far south as 118th Street according to the Home News. (The Daily News and Afro-American did report crowds as far south as 110th Street).
Police response The police response to events inside Kress’ store slowly escalated, initially involving several patrolmen on post near the store, then reserves in radio cars, mounted officers, and an Emergency Truck, led by increasingly senior officers, Sergeant Bauer, then Inspector Di Martini (who commanded four precincts that made up the 6th Division). After Kress' store closed, a small group of officers remained to guard the front and rear entrances. Approximately fifteen officers were present on 125th Street in front of the store when Daniel Miller and then Harry Gordon attempted to speak. The arrests of those men followed police practice of singling out the leaders of a crowd, but came at the cost of reducing the number of officers guarding the store. When the crowd moved to the rear of the store, those officers called for help. Inspector Di Martini returned, and called for further reinforcements, likely in response to attacks on stores on 125th Street. Additional Emergency Trucks were sent, either three or four, as well as radio cars, uniformed officers and plainclothes detectives. Estimates of the total number of police ranged from 500 to 1000 men. Around 9.00 PM, Deputy Chief Inspector McAuliffe, commander of uniformed officers in Manhattan, took charge. The arriving police forces concentrated first on establishing a perimeter around 125th Street. Later, officers were dispersed throughout neighborhood, with radio cars patrolling the avenues, and Emergency trucks likely dispatched to outbreaks of violence. Stories in the New York World-Telegram, New York Herald Tribune, Home News, Norfolk Journal and Guide, Afro-American, and the MCCH report, described police as struggling to contain small groups that reformed soon after police scattered them. Nonetheless, police deployed in Harlem made at least 128 arrests. Officers also killed at least two Black men, Lloyd Hobbs and James Thompson. In the process, at least nine patrolmen and detectives suffered injuries.

Police officers already present on West 125th Street were the first to respond to events inside Kress’ store. Patrolman Donohue and his partner Patrolmen Keel saw three men struggling with Lino Rivera. At least one other officer, a Black officer named Miller, joined those two men. Keel and Miller must have remained outside the store, perhaps trying to move on the crowds that Donohue reporting seeing in line with police practice at the time, as neither are mentioned as having been involved inside Kress’ store. While Donohue left at 3:30 PM via the front entrance after he released Rivera, the store manager only found only Miller on West 125th Street when he sought help sometime before 4:00 PM. Looking for police on post was how New Yorkers had traditionally sought their assistance. Miller must have left for the 4:00 PM shift change, as he was not mentioned again. Patrolman Timothy Shannon likely replaced Miller on West 125th Street, as he was in the store at 4:00 PM.

After twenty minutes in the store, Patrolman Shannon called for help, in the form of radio cars. In 1935, the Radio Motor Patrol, which worked sectors of 15-20 blocks served as police reserves. Each car carried two officers. They were not yet equipped with two-way radios, so three cars were typically dispatched to each call to ensure that at least one responded. Shannon did not specify how many officers responded to his call. They clearly had little impact in dispersing the customers, as within minutes of their arrival Smith, the store manager, was telephoning the police for more help. A call to Police Headquarters was the means of seeking police assistance being promoted in the 1930s. (Thale, 826-7) Police responded by sending a sergeant to take control of the scene. According to the store manager, Sergeant Bauer soon told him that he did not know what to do. The manager then telephoned again, asking for enough officers to clear the store so he could close it. Additional officers were sent; the New York American reported that "About 40 radio patrolmen and detectives —the first major force to arrive—stamped into the store and cleared it" (although the story mistakenly claimed those officers cleared the store later, after it had been stormed by crowds from the street). The New York Herald Tribune reported three radio cars and an Emergency Truck arrived to help clear the store, which would have amounted to fourteen additional police. The Emergency Services Division had succeeded the Police department’s Riot Battalion in 1925, with twenty-two trucks distributed around the city in 1935. Each truck had a crew of eight officers, equipped with a Thompson machine gun, three Winchester rifles and a Remington shotgun, as well as a tear gas gun, for use against "disorderly crowds." Such incidents represented a very small part of the work of those squads, only 1.49% (100 of 6725) of the cases in which the squads were involved in 1935 according to the department's Annual Report. One arrest was made as the store was cleared, of Margaret Mitchell by Detective Johnson, confirming the presence of officers in plainclothes. Detectives in radio cars also served as reserves at this time.

Kress' store had been cleared and closed by the time Inspector Di Martini arrived at 5:40 PM. Although he told a MCCH hearing that he saw no “indications of further trouble" and left at 6:00 PM, the inspector did station "Sergeant Bauer, two foot policeman, one mounted policeman in the rear to prevent a riot.” Additional officers remained in front of the store, likely the "15 patrolmen, six mounted police and uniformed men of five radio cars" that the New York Evening Journal reported were present when Di Martini returned around 7:15 PM. Those officers focused on preventing a crowd from forming in in front of the store, moving along any who stopped, likely using their nightsticks. Although outnumbered by the crowds, the police followed their practice of arresting those they perceived to be leaders in an attempt to disperse the crowd. In this case, they arrested two white men who tried to speak to the crowds gathered on 125th Street and then two white men and a Black man who picketed in front of the store. Those arrests also brought police reinforcements. By the time Inspector Di Martini returned, some of the people police had pushed off 125th Street onto 8th Avenue had moved to 124th Street and attacked the rear of Kress' store. Two officers were injured as police dispersed that crowd. As police worked to keep 125th Street clear, mounted patrolmen played a prominent role, riding on sidewalks to clear crowds. While their efforts and those of officers patrolling the street swinging nightsticks kept the crowds moving, they did not prevent windows being broken in stores the length of the block between 8th and 7th Avenues. Only when reinforcements from other precincts began arriving around 8:00 PM were police able to start establishing a perimeter around 125th Street.

Several hundred police officers from surrounding precincts arrived on 125th Street around Kress' store, with Deputy Chief Inspector McAuliffe, who commanded uniformed police in the borough of Manhattan, taking charge around 9:00 PM. The six Emergency trucks were given the most attention in newspaper accounts. They were stationed at several intersections to anchor the police cordon, with members of their crews, identifiable by the rifles - "riot guns" - they carried photographed guarding damaged stores around the intersection of 125th Street and 7th Avenue. The need to guard businesses continued to limit how many police could be deployed to control crowds, as police continued to focus on preventing large groups from forming or moving onto the block of 125th Street containing Kress' store, with mounted patrolmen and nightsticks again prominent. They did let individuals and small groups walk along the sidewalk. Further damage to store windows in this area was limited by the increased numbers of police, with additional windows broken seemingly only on two occasions when crowds broke through the police cordon, around 9:00 PM and again around 10:30 PM. Police made at least four arrests on that second occasion, but none are recorded around the time of the earlier incident. It could be that there were still insufficient police to make arrests at 9:00 PM, or that those arrested are among those for which there is no information on timing. Sometime between those two clashes, groups began to move away from 125th Street and direct their attacks at businesses and white individuals they encountered on 8th, 7th, and later Lenox Avenues. In response, police began to be deployed beyond 125th Street.

Rather than concentrating on a specific location, the crowds beyond 125th Street came together in smaller groups, scattering when police appeared and reforming when they departed. They ranged over an area too large for police to guard with any sort of cordon. Instead, police responded to calls, patrolled the streets in radio cars, and took up positions at some locations. Unlike earlier in the disorder, they encountered looting, which officers regarded as a serious enough offense to warrant shooting at alleged offenders. Police fatally shot two Black men allegedly caught looting, and likely shot and wounded several others. They also made more arrests during this period of the disorder than earlier, with almost half of the arrests with information on timing occurring between 11:00 PM and 2:00 AM. However, the gunfire and arrests did not prevent widespread damage and looting. More than one hundred businessowners cited a lack of police protection when they sued the city for failing to protect their property from the disorder. By 4:00 AM, Deputy Chief Inspector McAuliffe claimed the streets were quiet. There were three incidents an hour later involving radio cars patrolling 8th and Lenox Avenues, including the fatal shooting of James Thompson.

While police reserves from outside Harlem were sent home, a large force of police was on Harlem's streets on March 20, and additional police were present in the neighborhood for several more weeks, including numbers of detectives in plainclothes.
Windows broken without arrest (54) No one was identified as being arrested for breaking 75% (54 of 72) of the businesses identified in the sources (as no one was arrested for the first broken window in Kress' store, the store appears among those cases in which no arrests were made even though an arrest was made for allegedly breaking a window after another attack over four hours later). There are four individuals arrested for breaking windows for who there is no information about their alleged targets; some of those three men and one woman may have been charged with breaking windows in stores for which there was no reported arrests. So could the twenty-one men charged with disorderly conduct in the Magistrates Court for which there is no information about their alleged actions, although only just over one in four of those accused of breaking windows were charged with that offense.

There are significantly more businesses with broken windows for which no one was charged than businesses that were looted, 75% (54 of 72) compared with 55% (37 of 67). Most of those stores were on and around West 125th Street, the area where the disorder began, and likely suffered damage during the time when small numbers of police struggled to control crowds that had gathered in front of Kress' store. Three arrests on West 125th Street, of Frank Wells, Claude Jones and William Ford, came after police reinforcements arrived. The reported arrests on Lenox Avenue around West 125th Street for which there is information on timing, of John Kennedy Jones, Bernard Smith, and Leon Mauraine and David Smith, came after midnight, when businesses in that area began to be looted. Another cluster of businesses with broken windows for which no one was arrested was on West 116th Street and the blocks of Lenox Avenue around it. That lack of arrests could indicate the absence of police in that area, which also was ignored in the English-language press. Those damaged businesses were only reported in La Prensa, with the arrest of Jackie Ford two days after the disorder for allegedly breaking a window in a store at 142 Lenox Avenue also mentioned in the New York Post and New York World-Telegram. Several newspapers drew the boundary of the disorder north of West 116th Street: crowds only went as far south as 120th Street according to the New York World-Telegram, New York Herald Tribune, New York Evening Journal and Daily Mirror; and as far south as 118th Street according to the Home News. (The Daily News and Afro-American did report crowds as far south as 110th Street).

The low proportion of arrests supports the claim that police were unable to protect businesses made in multiple newspaper stories and by business-owners who sued the city for damages, as well as in the MCCH report. Once the crowd around Kress’ store broke into smaller groups sometime after 9.00 PM, police were unable to clear the streets or contain all those groups. When police did disperse crowds, they simply reformed, according to the New York Herald Tribune, New York World-Telegram, Norfolk Journal and Guide and the MCCH Report. An alternative account in the Daily News presented crowds not as elusive but as "too scattered" to be controlled. As a result, rather than being ineffective, police were absent from the scene of some attacks on businesses. Business-owners who sued the city for damages made that complaint. No police officers came to protect the stores of Harry Piskin, Estelle Cohen, and George Chronis despite Piskin approaching police officers on the street, and them all visiting or calling the local stationhouse.

The absence of police from some parts of Harlem resulted in part from a decision to concentrate them elsewhere. Reported police deployments focused on West 125th Street. Inspector McAuliffe used the reserves sent to Harlem after 9.00 PM to establish a perimeter around the main business blocks of the street, from 8th to Lenox Avenues, from 124th to 126th Streets, according to stories in the New York Times, Daily Mirror and Pittsburgh Courier, the only stories that described police deployments. Beyond West 125th Street, the police relied on radio cars patrolling the avenues and limited numbers of uniformed police and detectives in plainclothes moving through the streets.