The Banished Children of Eve Read online

  ACCLAIM FOR BANISHED CHILDREN OF EVE

  “Historical fiction as well made and whole as this is not common.”

  —The New York Times

  “Peter Quinn’s extraordinarily fine and ingenious novel, Banished Children of Eve, shows how much we are made of history. … Unflinching in its depiction of prejudice and, for that matter, of grace, Quinn deftly weaves the lives of his characters into an intricate web of past and present, of association and moral involvement, until I, at least, had a sense of not only of this terrible time but of history itself at the fundamental level, of the individual actions that make up its fabric.”

  —The Boston Sunday Globe

  “A stunning portrayal of New York in 1863. … Would that all history be told as well.”

  —Chicago Sun-Times

  “Quinn pays long, lusty tribute to his Irish-American heritage and his hometown, New York City. … A spirited tale.”

  —Kirkus

  “This book is a formidable and yet fascinating read. The author sweeps the reader along on an ever-changing tide of people, places, and incidents. … What emerges triumphant is a sense of the vibrant and vital contest between good and evil that made this country what it is. … The writing in this book marks a new voice in the annals of Irish literature. It is dark and brilliant, fateful and forceful, unsparing in its evocations of brutality and tender in bearing witness to the travails of the innocent.”

  —The Irish Literary Supplement

  “Like the best historical novels. … [Banished Children of Eve] is a vividly drawn chronology of New York’s inexorable march into madness, when a protest over conscription into the Union Army degenerated into a frenzy of looting and murder. … A compelling, textured account.”

  —The Boston Globe

  “Vividly imagined, scrupulously researched, and almost disorienting in its authenticity. … A historical classic. … Nothing short of splendid.”

  —The Philadelphia Inquirer

  “Exceptional. … The author’s pungent style, refusal to romanticize, and affinity for historical details all blend to make Banished Children of Eve an achingly vibrant panorama of ethnic feuds and struggles.”

  —Los Angeles Times

  “A terrific novel, an ebullient mingling of fiction and history that recreates America during and after the Civil War. … Quinn breaks the rules for first novels—they are rarely of this scope, rarely this good.”

  —William Kennedy

  “A new and formidable talent. … Flawed and broken though they are, these ‘banished children’ are irresistible. Peter Quinn’s achievement is to have brought them alive in a historic moment and to have given us a historical novel of stature and breadth.”

  —Commonweal

  “It seems to me one of the very, very best of modern historical novels.”

  —Thomas Flanagan

  “A strong, imaginative, and well-researched examination of the life of common people in that time through portraits of hucksters, minstrel actors, speculators, soldiers, and domestic servants whose lives touch. … Thoroughly enjoyable.”

  —Library Journal

  ALSO BY PETER QUINN

  Hour of the Cat

  Looking for Jimmy:

  A Search for Irish America

  Copyright

  This edition first published paperback in the United States in 2008 by

  The Overlook Press, Peter Mayer Publishers, Inc.

  Woodstock & New York

  WOODSTOCK:

  One Overlook Drive

  Woodstock, NY 12498

  www.overlookpress.com

  [for individual orders, bulk and special sales, contact our Woodstock office]

  NEW YORK:

  141 Wooster Street

  New York, NY 10012

  Copyright © 1994 by Peter Quinn

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast.

  ISBN 978-1-46830-511-1

  Contents

  About the Banished Children of Eve

  Also By Peter Quinn

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter I

  Chapter II

  April 13, 1863

  Chapter I

  Chapter II

  Chapter III

  Chapter IV

  April 14, 1863

  Chapter I

  Chapter II

  Chapter III

  Chapter IV

  May 15, 1863

  Chapter I

  Chapter II

  Chapter III

  June 1, 1863

  July 11, 1863

  Chapter I

  Chapter II

  Chapter III

  July 13–15, 1863

  Chapter I

  Chapter II

  Chapter III

  Chapter IV

  Chapter V

  Chapter VI

  Chapter VII

  Chapter VIII

  July 17, 1863

  July 30, 1863

  Chapter I

  Chapter II

  January 16, 1864

  Chapter I

  Epilogue

  For Kathy,

  who taught me

  to love is to persist.

  PROLOGUE

  MUNSEY'S MAGAZINE

  June 1904

  The Mystery of the Bowery Sphinx

  I

  THE MORNING PAPER for February 21st last contained two items that could not help but arouse curiosity. The first, from Cairo, Egypt, recounted how a British archaeological expedition in search of the Lost Tombs of the Pharaohs had unearthed an ancient avenue lined with stone sphinxes. The second was from our hometown of New York. It, too, was concerned with sphinxes, in this case a singular one, the late Mr. James Dunne, a tavern keeper, whose death (from natural causes, we were assured) was reported under the caption “The Passing of the Bowery Sphinx.”

  Given our druthers, we would probably have booked passage on a steamer for the Mediterranean to unearth the full story behind that avenue and its enigmatic monuments. Alas, it was not to be. The directive that arrived on our desk described a quest of far shorter distance. “Who was this ‘Bowery Sphinx’?” it asked. “How had he earned that appellation?”

  The “Bowery” part seemed easy to explain. Like “Chelsea Joe,” or “Broadway Mike,” characters of our acquaintance, the mere fact of a long presence in a section of this city is enough to add a geographic qualifier to one’s name. But “Sphinx,” ah, there was the rub. In the loud, unending human chorus of the Bowery, who besides a mute could have gained that title for himself?

  On a bright, frigid morning, with arctic gusts playing about our coat and pulling at our hat, we embark on our expedition. We walk up the great avenue called Broadway. The towering buildings on either side are as solemn and silent as any of those monumental guardians recently uncovered along the Nile. This is Sunday, and the usual rampage of money changers in and out of their temples is suspended for the day. The street is left to an occasional clerk or newsboy, his head bowed into the wind, his jacket and scarf bundled around him as tightly as the wrappings of any mummy.

  We turn off Broadway into the narrow puzzle of streets where the magnificent thrust of the avenue dissolves into a jumble as confused as any found in the qasbahs of North Africa. In front of us pads a Chinaman, his pigtail swaying like a metronome, a distra
ction we welcome since all around us the hour has struck when sagging rows of lodging-houses are disgorging their guests.

  It has been estimated that upwards of ten thousand souls a night seek shelter in these structures, the grandest of them providing a mattress and blanket for twenty-five cents, the lowest offering, for five to seven cents, a roof above and a floor beneath. Herein is an army as numerous as the one Cheops pressed into building his pyramid, but most find little employment beyond the annual ritual of Election Day, when, for a few drinks and some corned beef, the overseers of Tammany press them into the service of The Organization.

  One recent observer counted over 100 churches, chapels, and places of worship of every kind in the lower quarter of this city, and 4,065 saloons, most of the latter clustered along and around the Bowery. This Sabbath morning, it is the saloons rather than the churches that are bringing in the sheep. The closer we come to the Bowery, the more there are.

  Here is a typical specimen: a peeling, faded building that began its life perhaps as some respectable tradesman’s domicile but in its dotage has been divided, subdivided, and redivided into an indeterminate number of “rooms” that are rented for the nocturn. At the street level is a sepulchral hole with a faded sign above that tells us we stand before JOHNNY MCCLUSKEY’S WELCOME INN. Ahead is a dime museum, one of half a hundred to be found in the vicinity. A tattered banner hangs outside and proclaims the marvels of freakdom that are to be found within. The door is open. But we resist the temptation.

  We pass a used-clothing store, whose proprietor is standing out front amid racks of secondhand coats that are swinging wildly in the wind. His face has the unmistakable physiognomy of the Hebrew, the same visage that Ramses and the priests of Osiris looked upon when Moses bargained for his people’s freedom.

  We move on. Our expedition has almost reached its destination. Up to the right, on the far side of the Nile, beneath the elevated railway, on the northeast corner of Bayard Street, is what has been reported to be the former place of business of “the Bowery Sphinx,” Mr. James Dunne. Indeed, as we draw closer, our information is confirmed by the chipped and faded lettering on the front window. DUNNE’S SALOON, it reads. Below, in smaller letterings, is this: PROP. MR. JAMES F. DUNNE.

  As we read, a squat, pug-nosed member of the Celtic race emerges. His bowler hat is pushed way back on his head; his hands are thrust into his jacket. His cheeks and nose are red, a color, we surmise, less inspired by the cold than the warmth he has already managed to imbibe. He regards us warily. We ask, “This is the establishment of the James Dunne?”

  “Yeah,” he answers, “may he rest in peace.”

  We continue: “Mr. James Dunne, ‘the Bowery Sphinx’?”

  “Yeah, that’s the plug he preferred. ‘His Holiness’ was the cap I put on him. You don’t look like no copper. What are ya? A reporter or somethin’ like that?”

  We confess, and our interrogee, having become interrogator, invites us inside to help us solve once and for all the riddle of the Sphinx.

  II

  THE ROOM WE ENTER is long and narrow. Along the length of one wall stretches a bar of dark wood. The walls are stained with tobacco smoke, but are relieved, at intervals, by the framed images of various Tammany pharaohs. Indeed, here are the hieroglyphs of the New Kingdom’s dynastic succession! Without even a word from our would-be guide, we have part of the explanation behind the prominence of Mr. James Dunne, “the Bowery Sphinx.” These wall paintings tell us that, though we may think ourselves in humble surroundings, the Immortals have watered here, supped and imbibed with their supplicants, writing down on a small papyrus the brief messages that when taken to an office of the municipal government may result in a job, a contract, or perhaps even a commissionership.

  The rotund gentleman at our elbow signals to the barman, and in an instant two glasses of whiskey are set before us. We pull out some coins and drop them onto the counter, where they make, no doubt, a familiar ring. Our companion lifts his glass and says, “Here it goes under the nose.” We put our glass to the lip, but take no sip.

  The ritual done, we settle at last into fulfilling the purpose of this expedition. We mention that we saw in the paper several days ago a brief item on the passing of Mr. James Dunne, who was described as a longtime taverner known to customers and acquaintances by a title that had caused us no small wonder. How, we queried, did anyone in this cacophonous, garrulous quarter of the noisiest, most talkative town in the world get a reputation as a sphinx?

  Q. Was he a mute [we continued]?

  A. You mean, could he talk?

  Q. Yes, could he talk?

  A. Sure, he could jaw wid the best of ’em, when he wanted, but it was part of his beard that he handed out words like they was finniffs. It drew the crowds, I guess. Old man Dunne would run his velvet over his tombstones before he leans over and sez something like it’s comin’ from the gob of the Pope hisself.

  At this point, we felt a twinge of sympathy with the first explorers among the antiquities of Egypt, who had been bewildered by the riddle of a language they had no key to understanding. What was a “finniff”? Why would one run velvet over a tombstone? The dilemma of those early adventurers was given a solution, of course, by some soldiers of Napoléon’s who, digging the foundation of a fort near the Rosetta Mouth of the Nile, came across a stone of black basalt that carried on it the Greek equivalents of the Egyptian characters. The mystery solved!

  The aproned figure behind the bar, a small, bald man, proved our Rosetta stone. “Mike,” he said, pointing to our guide, “is a real Bowery mug. He thinks the whole world talks like they does around here.” The gist of the matter was, according to our barman–Rosetta stone, that Mr. Dunne was given to silence, and, as is often the case, whether deserved or not, some saw silence as the same as wisdom, and sought Mr. Dunne out. Mr. Dunne, usually solemn-faced, could always be found in the same chair by the window. When someone would sit next to him and ask for advice, he’d move his tongue across his teeth (“run his velvet over his tombstones”), think for a moment, and give them some small, sage piece of wisdom, or what, on the Bowery, is taken for wisdom.

  Mr. Dunne had been the proprietor here for forty years or so (neither guide nor barman–Rosetta stone could say precisely how long). A remarkable tenure, indeed. But what of his origins? What had he done before running this august watering hole for the tribe of Tammany? What of his family? Barman–Rosetta stone looked at our guide. There was perplexity in both their faces. It seemed we had touched upon a question they had not considered before our arrival.

  Our guide spoke first: “Now listen here, I’m not out to flog old man Dunne’s ground sweat, let him and all the ‘faithfully departed,’ as they sez, rest in peace, but to listen to all the talk you’d think it was some saint that died instead of a kiddie who stuffed the rhino and set hisself up in business before the booly dogs could lay a hand on him.”

  The confusion must have been evident on our face, because our barman–Rosetta stone started interpreting before we even asked. No one really knew about Mr. Dunne’s past. Some said he had set himself up as a taverner with the proceeds of a criminal career (“stuffed the rhino”) that he had landed before the police (“booly dogs”) could apprehend him. But these theorists were merely maligning the dead (“flogging old man Dunne’s ground sweat”). Nobody knew for sure.

  “You could look it up,” our barman–Rosetta stone suggested. “If he ever served time, the police must have a sheet.” We considered it, but as we sat in the very seat where Mr. Dunne had sat for four decades and regarded the dull facades of ancient brick across the Bowery, we sensed that our expedition was coming to an end. The hard labor of that digging was best left to stronger backs than ours.

  “There was a family,” he concluded. “They lived up on the North Side. Dunne would ride the El home every night. When he died, the widow came down here once to sign the papers when the place was sold. I heard she moved. Anyways, that was the only time I ever seen her.”<
br />
  We bought a round of drinks for our hosts. The place was filling up, so we said our good-byes and went out into the cold sunlight that slanted down through the tracks above us. A train roared overhead.

  The Sphinx could keep his secret, we decided. The city that bred him bore as little resemblance to the transriparian metropolis of our day as the mud huts of the primeval inhabitants of Egypt did to imperial Thebes. The sands of time had obliterated the landscape of his birth. And we, standing on the far side of that great desert, are unable to distinguish the truth of what was from the legend. Someday, perhaps, the archaeologists may turn up the bones of a creature with leonine as well as human features, and the Darwinists may draw from that discovery the ability to reach wider conclusions about the Sphinx and the world he inhabited. In this age, all things are possible. But for now, at least, the antiquarians and Egyptologists put aside their spades, and leave the Sphinx to his silence.

  APRIL 13, 1863

  … what is history anyway? Is history simply a matter of events that leave behind those things that can be weighed and measured—new institutions, new maps, new rulers, new winners and losers—or is it also the result of moments that seem to leave nothing behind, nothing but the mystery of spectral connections between people long separated by place and time, but somehow speaking the same language?

  —Greil Marcus, Lipstick Traces:

  A Secret History of the Twentieth Century

  I

  JIMMY DUNNE FINGERED THE GLASS, revolved it slowly in his hand. Whiskey lapped gently against the rim.

  One of Dandy Dan’s rules: Never linger.

  Sorry, Dan. No rule can’t be broken. Said it himself and broke every one. Still, never tired of handing them out.