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Police response
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 in front of the store and then two white men and a Black man who picketed in front of the store. Those arrests resulted in calls for 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 struggled 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.
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This page references:
- "1 Dead, 7 shot, 100 Hurt as Harlem Crowds Riot over Boy, 16, and Hearse," New York Herald Tribune, March 20, 1935, 1.
- "5 dying and Scores Wounded as Race Riots in Harlem Subside," Home News, March 20, 1935 [clipping]
- "Mobs Rove Harlem After Riot; 1 Dead, 100 Hurt in Harlem Riot; Snipers Routed, Mobs Rove Area," New York World-Telegram, March 20, 1935 [clipping]
- "1 Slain, 20 Injured in Harlem Rioting," New York American, March 20, 1935, 1.
- Christopher Thale, "Civilizing New York City: Police Patrol, 1880-1935," (Ph.D. thesis, University of Chicago, 1995), 406.
- "Childs's Restaurant First Mark for Harlem Rioters," Afro-American, March 30, 1935, 1.
- "Eyewitness Put NY Mob at 20,000 Plus," Norfolk Journal and Guide, March 30, 1935, 20.
- Public Hearings - Outbreak (March-April 1935), 48, Subject Files, Box 408, Folder 8 (Roll 194), Records of Mayor Fiorello H. La Guardia, 1934-1945 (New York City Municipal Archives).
- Norman Lobsenz, Emergency! The Dramatic Story of the Emergency Service Division of the New York City Police Department (New York: David McKay Co., 1958), 68.
- The Negro in Harlem. A Report on Social and Economic Conditions Responsible for the Outbreak of March 19, 1935 (1935), 12-13, Subject Files, Box 167, Folder 8 (Roll 76), Records of Mayor Fiorello H. La Guardia, 1934-1945 (New York City Municipal Archives)
- Police Department City of New York, Annual Report For The Year 1935 (New York: Police Department, 1936), 33.
- Christopher Thale, "Civilizing New York City: Police Patrol, 1880-1935," (Ph.D. thesis, University of Chicago, 1995), 810.
- Christopher Thale, "Civilizing New York City: Police Patrol, 1880-1935," (Ph.D. thesis, University of Chicago, 1995), 798.