Dubious Etymologies: Dead Rabbits, Plug Uglies

[Jonathan Lighter]

Now that you mention it, George, the actual distribution of Plug Uglies is less than transparent.  The gang of that name, allegedly running to "thousands," was certainly prominent in Baltimore the late '50s and later.  Yet Matthew Hale Smith's _Sunshine and Shadow in New York_ (Hartford: J. B. Burr, 1868), p. 669 avers: "The Bowery Boys, Plug Uglies, and low New York patronize this place [the Bowery Theatre], and the plays are of the Dick Turpin and blood-and-thunder scvhool."

  Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace, _Gotham_ (O.U.P., 1999), p. 633, mention tht the "grocery-groggeries in the heart of the Five Points became headquarters for turf-based Irish gangs like the Forty Thieves, Kerryonians, Shirt Tails (from their shirts-out sartorial styl), and Plug Uglies (from their enormous plug hats, which they stuffed with wool and leather and drew down about their ears like helmets when entering battle)."

  Burrows and Wallace go on to say, "The Roach Guards were conspicuous in their blue-striped pantaloons, and the Dead Rabbits, snappy in red stripes, adopted a name that meant 'seriously _bad_ dudes' in Points argot [italics in original - JL]."

  It may be that the Baltimore Plug Uglies could boast epigones in Gotham, or it may be that "plug-ugly" became generic so quickly that the proverbial naive newspaperman thought it designated a particular NYC gang.

  JL

George Thompson <george.thompson at NYU.EDU> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: George Thompson
Subject: Re: Dubious Etymologies: Dead Rabbits, Plug Uglies
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The earliest I have for "Dead Rabbits" in my notes is
Juvenile Rioters. -- Two gangs of juvenile rowdies, varying in ages from 8 to 14 years, one boasting in the title of Dead Rabbits, and the other that of the Bowery Boys. . . .
New-York Daily Tribune, September 14, 1857, p. 7, col. 2

I don't have "Plug Ugly" at all. Herbert Asbury (or someone) says they were a Baltimore gang.

GAT

George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.

----- Original Message -----
From: Jonathan Lighter
Date: Wednesday, June 27, 2007 6:47 pm
Subject: Dubious Etymologies: Dead Rabbits, Plug Uglies
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU


> The History Channel's 2002 show on "Gangs of New York" features author
> Peter Quinn commenting on the naming of NYC's infamous gang, the "Dead
> Rabbits," of ca1860. I paraphrase closely:
>
> "A professor found that the Irish words / dEd r@ 'bid / meant
> "tough guy." One day a newspaperman came down to the Five Points and
> asked, 'Who's that?' And somebody said, 'Oh, he's a / dEd r@ 'bid /.'
> And the gang became the 'Dead Rabbits.'"
>
> Luc Sante told a similar tale, though without the Irish part: "Well,
> 'dead' meant 'real or genuine' and 'rabbit' meant 'tough guy.' A 'Dead
> Rabbit' was a 'real tough guy.'"
>
> And the rival "Plug Uglies"? According to Sante [I think],
> volunteer fire departments used to compete to be the first at a fire.
> The first on the scene would "put a barrel over the fireplug to keep
> their rivals from putting out the fire. One of the biggest, toughest
> gang members would sit on the barrel to keep them from getting at the
> fireplug. And that's where we got 'Plug-Ugly.'"
>
> How anybody put the fire out in those circumstances is one of
> history's mysteries.Maybe they fought each other till one side ran
> away or the house burned down. (Not impossible.)
>
> JL
>
>
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