Hoxton Gang

Last updated

The Hoxton Gang (or Hoxton Mob) was an independent street gang based in Soho, London, during the interwar years. They were one of several West End gangs which fought against Charles "Darby" Sabini and the "Italian Mob", specifically over control of gambling clubs or "spielers". [1] [2]

Contents

History

During the 1930s, the gang was among many who struggled for control of racetracks and protection rackets and, in June 1936, around 30 gang members attacked a bookmaker and his clerk with hammers and knuckle-dusters at the Lewes racetrack before police arrived, with at least 16 gang members being convicted at Lewes Assizes and sentenced to serve over 43 years. [3] The leader of the Hoxton Mob was called Jimmy Spinks, he was then great uncle of Lenny McLean who was the Guv'nor and known as the hardest man in Britain.

The play West by Steven Berkoff features a character Curly, a leader of the Hoxton Gang. [4]

Related Research Articles

A drug cartel is a criminal organization composed of independent drug lords who collude with each other in order to improve their profits and dominate the illegal drug trade. Drug cartels form with the purpose of controlling the supply of the illegal drug trade and maintaining prices at a high level. The formations of drug cartels are common in Latin American countries. Rivalries between multiple drug cartels cause them to wage turf wars against each other.

A gangster is a criminal who is a member of a gang. Most gangs are considered to be part of organized crime. Gangsters are also called mobsters, a term derived from mob and the suffix -ster. Gangs provide a level of organization and resources that support much larger and more complex criminal transactions than an individual criminal could achieve. Gangsters have been active for many years in countries around the world. Gangsters are the subject of many novels, films, television series, and video games.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steven Berkoff</span> English actor (born 1937)

Steven Berkoff is an English actor, author, playwright, theatre practitioner and theatre director.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Johnny Torrio</span> Italian-American mob boss

John Donato Torrio was an Italian-born American mobster who helped build the Chicago Outfit in the 1920s later inherited by his protégé Al Capone. Torrio proposed a National Crime Syndicate in the 1930s and later became an adviser to Lucky Luciano and his Luciano crime family.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Carl Chinn</span> English historian, writer and broadcaster (1956-)

Carl Steven Alfred Chinn is an English historian, writer and broadcaster whose working life has been devoted to the study and popularisation of the city of Birmingham. He broadcast a programme on the BBC from the mid-1990s focusing on Birmingham's history.

The Irish Mob is a usually crime family-based ethnic collective of organized crime syndicates composed of primarily ethnic Irish members which operate primarily in Ireland, the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia, and have been in existence since the early 19th century. Originating in Irish-American street gangs – famously first depicted in Herbert Asbury's 1927 book, The Gangs of New York – the Irish Mob has appeared in most major U.S. and Canadian cities, especially in the Northeast and the urban industrial, including Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Cleveland, and Chicago.

Organised crime in India refers to organised crime elements originating in India and active in many parts of the world. The purpose of organised crime in India, as elsewhere in the world, is monetary gain. Its virulent form in modern times is due to several socio-economic and political factors and advances in science and technology. There is no firm data to indicate the number of organised criminal gangs operating in the country, their membership, their modus operandi, and the areas of their operations. Their structure and leadership patterns may not strictly fall in line with the classical Italian mafia.

Gang-related organised crime in the United Kingdom is concentrated around the cities of London, Manchester and Liverpool and regionally across the West Midlands region, south coast and northern England, according to the Serious Organised Crime Agency. With regard to street gangs the cities identified as having the most serious gang problems, which also accounted for 65% of firearm homicides in England and Wales, were London, Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool. Glasgow in Scotland also has a historical gang culture with the city having as many teenage gangs as London, which had six times the population, in 2008.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jewish-American organized crime</span> Jewish Mob or the Jewish Mafia

Jewish-American organized crime initially emerged within the American Jewish community during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In media and popular culture, it has variously been referred to as the Jewish Mob, the Jewish Mafia, the Kosher Mob, the Kosher Mafia, the Yiddish Connection, and Kosher Nostra or Undzer Shtik. The last two of these terms are direct references to the Italian cosa nostra; the former is a play on the word for kosher, referring to Jewish dietary laws, while the latter is a calque of the Italian phrase 'cosa nostra' into Yiddish, which was at the time the predominant language of the Jewish diaspora in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles Sabini</span> British-Italian mobster

Charles "Darby" Sabini was a British-Italian mob boss and considered protector of Little Italy during the interwar years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Desmond Noonan</span> English criminal

Desmond Patrick "Dessy" Noonan was an English organised crime figure from Manchester, who acted as a political fixer for the Noonan crime family. He and his younger brother, Dominic Noonan, were suspected by police of being responsible for at least 25 murders during their 20-year reign over Manchester's underworld.

<i>Steal</i> (film) 2002 film by Gérard Pirès

Steal is a 2002 action film directed by Gérard Pirès and starring Stephen Dorff, Natasha Henstridge, Bruce Payne, and Steven Berkoff. It was written by Mark Ezra and Pirès.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Atlantic City Conference</span> 1929 summit of organized crime leaders

The Atlantic City Conference held between 13–16 May 1929 was a historic summit of leaders of organized crime in the United States. It is considered by most crime historians to be the earliest organized crime summit held in the US. The conference had a major impact on the future direction of the criminal underworld and it held more importance and significance than the Havana Conference of 1946 and the Apalachin meeting of 1957. It also represented the first concrete move toward a National Crime Syndicate.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John T. Scalish</span>

John T. Scalish, also known as "John Scalise", was an Ohio mobster who became the boss of the Cleveland crime family. His death resulted in the ascension of James T. Licavoli to the head of the Cleveland Mob and to a bloody gang war that would essentially destroy the once-powerful crime family that Scalish had helped to develop.

The Birmingham Boys were a street gang whose power extended from the North of England to London's underworld, between the 1910s and 1930s. They lost control of the South East racecourses to the Sabini gang. In modern times they gained recognition due to the TV series Peaky Blinders.

The Yiddishers were a London street gang based in Whitechapel and were led by Alfred Solomon. One of their more famous members was future mobster Jack Spot during the inter-war years. During the 1930s, they opposed the growing fascist movement in Great Britain and participated in an attack on members of the British Union of Fascists led by Sir Oswald Mosley, later known as the Battle of Cable Street on 4 October 1936.

The Elephant and Castle Mob were one of the many independent street gangs active in London's underworld during the interwar years. A rival of mobster Charles "Darby" Sabini along with the Birmingham Boys and the Cortesi brothers of Saffron Hill, they were eventually forced out by Sabini with the added manpower of imported Sicilian mafiosi and had disappeared from the city by the end of the Second World War.

The Trafficante crime family, also known as the Tampa Mafia, is an Italian-American Mafia crime family based in Tampa, Florida. The most notable boss was Santo Trafficante, Jr. who ruled Tampa and the crime family with an iron fist. Author Scott Deitche reported that Santo Jr. was involved with the CIA to plot assassination attempts on Fidel Castro. After the death of Santo Jr. in 1987, the Tampa Mafia family has been controlled by Vincent LoScalzo.

The Company, also called the Hawaiian Syndicate, is the name given to an organized crime syndicate based in Hawaii that controlled criminal activities in the state from the late 1960s to the mid-1990s.

Andrew Mark Davies, FRHistS, FRSA is a British historian. A professor at the University of Liverpool, he specialises in the history of crime, policing and violence in modern Britain.

References

  1. Shore, Heather (2001). "Undiscovered Country': Towards A History Of The Criminal 'Underworld'". School of Cultural Studies: Leeds Metropolitan University. Archived from the original (.doc) on 29 September 2007. Retrieved 6 December 2006.
  2. Jones, Thomas L. (2003). "The Kray Twins: Brothers in Arms". Crime Library. Archived from the original on 31 December 2006. Retrieved 31 December 2006.
  3. Underwood, Eric. Brighton. London: B. T. Batsford, 1978. ISBN   0-7134-0895-2
  4. Cross, Robert. Steven Berkoff and the Theatre of Self-Performance. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2004. ISBN   0-7190-6254-3

Further reading